Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN), a subsidiary of Sony Corporation which owns and operates the Sony Entertainment network of television channels, is one of India’s leading media companies. SPN’s journey from being a single channel company in the year 1995, to having over 29 channels today across multiple platforms including broadcasting, movie production and a growing digital presence, has been a long and successful one. And the organization attributes this success to its people. Incentivizing innovation, fostering high potential talent through focused development programs & driving a culture of creativity are some noteworthy initiatives that SPN implements to engage, motivate and retain its employees. 

Today, the engagement levels for SPN are at 81 percent, higher than the average levels of the top 25 companies in India. SPN has also been on the top 10 list of best companies in India on health and wellness rankings by SHRM & Chestnut Global Partners for the last three consecutive years. Their progressive work place policies for women which includes reserved parking for expecting mothers and a mother’s room for nursing mothers have led to them being recognized amongst the ‘Best Workplaces for New Mothers’ (2016) - By Baby Chakra “India’s #1 wellness site for new mothers”. SPN’s Management Trainee and Creative Trainee program ( ‘Ingenious Minds’ ) tap into fresh, young talent from across India and put them through an intensive 1-year accelerated development program on live business projects,  to develop future business and creative leaders for the organization. 

SPN’s incentive plan IGNITE [I Gain if the Network, Individual, & Team Excels] builds alignment on organization, business/function and individual performance & incentivizes high performance through a differentiated rewards strategy for top talent. But the core tenet that the organization follows is its commitment towards making employees feel valuable and creating an organizational culture that enables wholesome growth for all its employees through a highly empowered, transparent and high integrity work environment. To define a culture based on values, the organization has made strategic level shifts, one of which has been building a 60:40 performance management system in 2012, in which 40 percent accounted for performance measured in terms of the values. In 2017, the organization has shifted to a 75: 25 split of performance to values, still a significant statement that values are an important measure of success within SPN. 

Incentivizing innovation, fostering high potential talent through focused development programs and driving a culture of creativity are some noteworthy initiatives implemented by Sony Pictures Networks

Apart from this, SPN drives various organization & people capability initiatives via the ‘SPN Academy’ and its robust talent review processes that involve all senior leaders in SPN. SPN has also been creating social impact through meaningful interventions on Environment, Education and Empowerment, the underlying theme being ‘Ek India Happywala’. Amongst its many CSR initiatives, SPN’s support of the 2016 Rio Paralympics, not only contributed to empowering differently-abled sportsmen and women in India through training support, but by showcasing the sport and para-athletes on its channels, SPN also provided significant visibility to parasports – a first for India. Such initiatives have contributed further to pride in the employer brand amongst its employees.