WorkPlace Now interviews Jun Sochi, Projects Director, Asia for Johnson Controls

What route has your career taken?
I have an architectural and project management background and have been working in this industry for about 25 years. Before joining Johnson Controls, I worked in hospital construction; commuter rail project construction; economic development consulting; and corporate real estate services.
Jun Sochi2
I joined Johnson Controls Global WorkPlace Solutions (GWS) business in 2001 following its acquisition of United Systems Integrators Corp. (USI), and initially worked in the JCI office in New York City managing project management services in the Northeast Region of the USA. I relocated with my family to Asia in 2008, based in the GWS regional headquarters in Singapore, to manage Global WorkPlace Solutions' Project Management services across Asia. Currently, I am also leading the Global WorkPlace Solutions Integrated Facility Management services in Japan and Korea. 

How would your colleagues describe you at work?
They would describe me as hard working and focused on my staff and customers. I may appear serious at times, but I am generally quite easy-going and fun to work with

What do you like about working at Johnson Controls / how would you describe the culture?
I enjoy working for an organization that is dynamic and where the work is challenging. I enjoy being part of team that is working toward common goals while having diverse team members, especially since my move to Asia, with a variety of backgrounds and experiences. Global WorkPlace Solutions’ advantage lies in its talent, knowledge and presence in more than 75 countries.

What services does your team provide in Asia?
We provide project and construction management for Global WorkPlace Solutions' corporate customers in 14 countries in Asia. Our team of about 100 professionals support client requirements from the project planning phase through construction, including space planning, design management, construction management, testing and commissioning, and project closeout. The type of projects we work on include office interior construction; move coordination; building system upgrades; ground-up construction management for corporate office space; data centers; trading operations; retail; and manufacturing plants.

What do you still want to achieve?
At Johnson Controls we believe there’s always more to achieve and accomplish. We constantly raise the bar. We are working hard to expand our business in the region, strengthen our project management capabilities, and be an innovative market leader in Asia.

What are some of your team’s recent achievements?
Over the last eight months the GWS Projects team has successfully completed 49 schedule-sensitive projects across 10 countries for a single global communications customer. These projects included a series of office retrofit projects across Asia that will reduce our client’s overall occupancy cost and office square footage. In addition to reducing cost for our customers, we have implemented projects to upgrade building systems for data centers and test labs to improve efficiency and reduce risk for our customers.

What are the challenges you face as the business leader for the Japan and Korea market?
Japan and Korea are different markets with similar challenges. Both markets are at different stages of growth and scale, however both markets have not traditionally out-tasked or outsourced their internal operations as much as other regions and countries. Japan is a sizable and more mature market. While we continue to focus on supporting multinational customers with facilities and offices in Japan, we must also focus on developing relationships with Japanese global companies that will require our services as they expand their operations locally as well as globally. Korea is a small emerging market where the multinational companies will continue to be the core of our WorkPlace Solutions business. However, we must continue to develop our relationship with large Korean corporations that have aggressive global growth plans.

How is Johnson Controls different to the competition?
It is important for Johnson Controls GWS to differentiate itself from the competition and be an innovative leader in the market. Building Efficiency provides us a platform to accomplish this by leveraging the strengths of Systems, Service, Energy Solutions, as well as Global WorkPlace Solutions, giving us the competitive advantage of offering a truly integrated building solutions package to our clients.

What are your key goals for the next fiscal year?
Our key goals include sustainable and profitable growth; strengthening engagement with employees; developing customer loyalty; and operational excellence. We will also focus on alignment with Global WorkPlace Solutions strategic growth plans and seek to connect our in-country teams across accounts and across the region to share practices, challenges, and solutions for our cutsomers.

What one thing could you not live without?
At work, there are two things that I could not function without - my technology tools (laptop, cell phone, etc) and the GWS teams across the Asia Pacific Region.

What would people be surprised to know about you?
I competitively race sailboats and enjoy volunteering as a sailing coach at a local sailing center.

If you had to choose a completely different career – what would it be?
If I wasn't in my current career, I would be a naval architect. I enjoyed studying ocean engineering in college and I continue to be interested in boat construction and sail design.

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