How Panasonic Turned Car Commuters Into Transit Riders

Ken Jeanos has been working at Panasonic’s North American headquarters in New Jersey for about 25 years, and up until two years ago he drove into work almost every day. The car commuting habit followed him to several different homes across the state. Now and then he’d take the train to work, but the shuttle taking employees from Secaucus Junction to the office ran infrequently; if he missed the only one that got him in by 9 a.m., he had to call a coworker to pick him up at the station.

That all changed when the company moved to downtown Newark in mid-2013. Now Jeanos takes New Jersey Transit into Newark Penn Station. He bought an iPad for the trip and reads the Wall Street Journal or catches up on emails. “It really sets up a much easier transition into the work day,” says Jeanos, who’s now CIO of the North America hub. “Personally, I really didn’t think I would be a huge fan of it, because of the independence of having the car. And it’s really been wonderful.”