Thomson Reuters: Now the Answer Company
April 25, 2017
Earlier this year I saw a reference to “the answer company.” I ignored it. Yesterday I saw a link to a podcast with Casey Hall, who is the “head of social media for business communications” at Thomson Reuters. Thomson Reuters is a publicly traded company with revenues in the $14 billion range. Here’s a Google chart showing how the company has performed over the last few years:
To my untrained eye, it looks as if revenues are down and profits are up. Yikes. How were those cost savings achieved? Perhaps the podcast explains how “the answer company” will boost revenues and continue to generate sustainable returns for stakeholders and, of course, senior management.
The podcast addresses a number of Thomson Reuters’ themes. One, for instance, is the fact that the company has 45,000 employees and a “giant footprint.” As the podcast ground forward, I realized that “the answer company” wants its employees to embrace employee advocacy.
It seems that “the answer company” is trying to communicate with its employees. According to the write up “How Thomson Reuters Earned the Brand as The Answer Company” accompanying the podcast told me:
Thomson Reuters encourages their employees to engage with their network of data scientists, finance, and accounting professionals by sharing the brand’s message. Leveraging their employees’ networks allows them to increase their reach and enhance the authenticity of the message since it’s coming from a real person, the employee. The employee advocacy program also helps with internal communications. Employees engage with each other and share what’s going on in their part of the organization.
Yeah, but, what about explaining “how” Thomson Reuters became “the answer company”? As it turns out, the podcast focused exclusively on “on boarding employees,” which I don’t really understand. Another topic was measuring the impact of the employee advocacy program. I think this means closing sales.
I suppose that Thomson Reuters just decided it needed a new tag line even thought its online services usually require a person to run a search, read a results list, and hunt for the needed information. That’s not answers. That’s work.
I believe that Thomson Reuters licensed the Palantir Technologies’ system in order to have tools which make sense of information. But if the podcast is any indication of how Thomson Reuters became “the answer company,” my thought is that the company is trying social media as a sales tool.
As for answers, one still has to hunt to find out what companies Thomson Reuters owns. One has to run queries on its online legal information systems and then hunt for answers.
Ah, PR. Love it. An article title which does not related to the content of the podcast OR the article.
Stephen E Arnold, April 24, 2017
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