Sonic Team Studio Wins Nikkei 'Best Office' Award

Now SEGA can prove that it is a great place to work - Yuji Naka and the Sonic Team recently won the 16th Nikkei 'New Office Promotion' Prize, an award that "recognizes excellent offices... that are full of originality and ingenuity."

According to a SEGA press release, Sonic Team's concept of "the office is a game! All workers are characters!" was given high praise for providing a fun working environment where employees could feel comfortable and relax.

Some examples of this concept in practice includes "a four-person cell system with an L-shaped desk that takes into account individual environments and just-in-time meetings," a casual 'chat corner' for impromptu one-to-ones, and a conference room with the names of Sonic Team characters and coloured in their respective colours.

There is even a 'Chao Garden' which is described as "an open space where you can not only store materials, but also set up game software and monitors so you can work while playing. The lighting embedded in the storage shelves and the carpet patterns create a 'soft barrier' that is different from the office room."

Yuji Naka is very happy with the award and said that he felt a good office environment stimulates a creative mind. Here is a quote from him about receiving the award (machine translated):

Quote

“I am very happy to hear the news of winning the award. Due to my job, I often visit offices in Europe and America, and I was impressed by the good taste in the office environment. I'm often surprised. As someone who works in a creative profession, I always feel that the work environment stimulates creative minds, and when designing our office, we wanted to make sure it was suitable for creating digital entertainment. In Japan, aspects of the workplace environment are being reconsidered, and I hope that this trend will spread in the future.''

You can see images of the Sonic Team office that helped win the studio the prestigious award by clicking this link to go to the SEGA Press Release.