Leaders: Staying Close to The Frontline

How did you, personally, look to stay close to the front line, as the CEO?

I travelled a lot. I visited every factory; I visited a lot of factories, once, twice a year. I travelled a lot in Asia. When I was back in Hamburg, I travelled a lot. It was like 180, 190, 200 days a year, I was on the road, talking to everyone. At the end, I also, of course, used video conferences. One tool that we developed was that I would come out once a month, or at least every two months, with a video statement to all employees and all factories, in English, telling them about how we were doing, what the challenges were, how the numbers developed, what I liked, what I didn’t like. At least every two months, they had a video message where they could see what I wanted them to do. They would probably bitch about certain things, once in a while, but it was a good tool to get across what you were after. Really everyone could at least say, I know what they want.

Sometimes there were people not agreeing to what we decided was what we wanted. You have to sit down and talk to them. Or if you couldn’t convince them to be on board, then you have to separate. It was a very good tool, for everyone in the company to understand what we were after.