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Expertise and cases of InterExcellent

Read examples of the interim management cases executed by InterExcellent:

HR takes decisive action at Mead Johnson Nutrition

After assisting in implementation of the stock exchange listing of Mead Johnson, reorganisation in Europe and the new HR strategy in the Netherlands, Anna van Dongen, the interim HR Manager, reflects on her dynamic assignment. "We've achieved a lot," she says. "The key to success is being active, setting an example and learning through experience.”

Roughly speaking, the assignment of Anna consisted of a number of phases. In the beginning, she was closely involved in preparations for the stock exchange listing at the Dutch branch of Mead Johnson. She assisted the CEO of the company in his interaction with the Works Council of Mead Johnson Netherlands. "It was a very interesting process," says Anna. "The CEO was used to the American way of getting things done. He was new to the Dutch phenomenon of the Works Council and how employee participation is organised here. He learned that to reach an agreement with the Work Council, one has to communicate a lot in order to create mutual understanding between the management and employees."

Building the European organisation
Once this phase had been completed, Anna was involved in building the HR organisation in the Netherlands and Europe. Under the motto ‘From fire brigade operations to becoming a business partner’, Anna assisted the management in making an implementation plan for reorganisation at Mead Johnson Nutrition. "Our Health Check of the organisation showed that there was a maintenance backlog in some organisational issues. The main problem was that improvements in the working situation in a factory or office cost money, while the benefits it brings are not immediately visible. This is a thorny problem, particularly in an American organisation, where you have to show results. That's why it was important that the management took responsibility and ownership of the organisational problems. I had to push this process and ensure that managers set the right priorities and claimed the ownership. In order to reach that, I had to show that we could achieve more, and initiated many activities myself."

The Leadership Day
Communication was extremely important in the process of reorganisation. Together with the management, Anna developed an internal campaign called 'Super John'. "The starting point was a Town Hall meeting, where Super John was chosen as the symbol for changing the organisational culture. This new culture and requirements for new leadership were developed during the Leadership Day. Results of the Day were communicated to the employees in departmental meetings, training courses, workshops and departmental development plans. The objective was to get people moving."

Creativity
Anna firmly believes that the creativity boost at Mead Johnson Netherlands is one of her main achievements. "Here in Nijmegen, in what we refer to as the 'supply chain operation', we have well defined processes. That's quite logical when you manufacture critical products such as baby food. The feedback that I've received here is that I've been able to make a major contribution to getting people moving and taking a fresh look at work and processes. We've achieved a lot and what remains to be done is clear. So my successor has a great job to do!"

Change management and efficiency improvement for Damen Shipyards in China

AFAI Southern Shipyard Ltd in Guangzhou, China, builds high-speed passenger catamarans for Damen Shipyards. AFAI is a Chinese state-owned company and works exclusively for Damen, while design, engineering and project management are coordinated from the head office of Damen in Gorinchem, Holland. Frans Potters, Executive Interim Manager of InterExcellent, was hired by Damen to improve quality and efficiency in China. “It takes a lot of patience, a lot of communication and a lot of knowledge transfer,” says Frans Potters. “The people in China are ambitious and eager to learn”.

Learning curve
The management of AFAI and Damen Shipyards was concerned with mediocre quality at various departments, bad planning and low efficiency. Many problems were caused by inability of managers to handle multiple projects simultaneously. The situation looked quite worrying because the order portfolio was full and several high-speed ships were about to be put into production. “People did not understand each other,” says Frans Potters. “They were not getting on well. That was a risk for Damen because there was a danger of losing a shipyard that was theoretically good. Working in China is very different from working in Holland. There are a lot of positive sides: people are opportunistic, eager to learn and they work hard – six and sometimes even seven days a week. They work long hours but not always very efficiently. You could say that the organisation looks good but it doesn’t work the way we are used to. Relationships are different. For instance, there is hardly any communication between employees and management, so consequently there is hardly any learning curve.”

15 improvements
So how does an outsider manage to achieve the required improvements? “That depends very much on your personality,” says Frans Potters. “It’s about a mix of setting clear objectives and patiently communicating them. You need to be prepared to explain the same things many times. And you have to be constantly on the shop floor. You have to realise that people are not unwilling to change, they just used to different things, and certain things are simply rooted in their culture. But when they see that the change works, they adopt it because, like I said, they want to learn and progress.” After the first weeks, Frans made a list of 15 actions, subdivided into priority areas such as Communication, Supply Chain, HR, Production and Quality Control. “Quality in particular deserved a lot of attention,” says Frans. “AFAI has various local subcontractors supplying and fitting specific parts of the ships.”

Knowledge transfer
According to Frans, working on improvements is a question of continuous communication between people. And not just with management and employees of the shipyard, but also with subcontractors. “It’s a question of first establishing a relationship,” says Frans. “You can see that after that people start appreciating your contribution. They understand that you’re here to help. Transferring knowledge was part of my job. For example, I spent my last weekend in China before departing home, on teaching a group of managers about project management techniques - explaining them what was going well at AFAI, what could be done better and how they could make progress by adopting a much more structured way of working. This assignment was a very special experience for me because I could contribute to people’s development.”

Uretek Germany: the problem often lies deeper

Uretek is a rapidly growing company. However, one of the owners left and he was responsible for the operations management. What was needed was an experienced interim manager to manage the company, strengthen the organisation and improve the profit margin. Executive Interim Manager Roland Wester was the right man for this job. “I always make a sketch of the situation first,” he says. “And then I talk to everyone, because the problem often lies deeper and has a different angle to the one perceived by the management.”

Removing uncertainty
Uretek has a unique product - resins that are injected under floors and foundations in order to ‘lift’ and level them. This is a very effective way of restoring floors. Uretek has grown rapidly and has three branches in Germany, in addition to its branch in the Netherlands. Roland Wester’s first priority was to restore confidence and stability within the company. “The people were used to my predecessor. His departure caused a lot of uncertainty. What was going to happen? What was the new man going to do? People were very concerned about keeping their jobs. So I was introduced as a project manager. The term ‘interim manager’ would make people even more uncertain, as it evokes an image of restructuring. That could be useful, but not in this situation.”

Increased profitability
His first analyses showed that the organisation was reasonably in order. “The major business processes were well structured. My main concern was to get all the branches working more efficiently and use the same systems. I also devoted a lot of attention to developing the organisation and improving all sorts of sub-areas, including marketing and sales. Following a bad year, the Dutch branch has returned to profitability and profit margins have also risen in Germany.” Roland regards this is as a typical ‘in-between’ situation: a company has grown rapidly and has to scale up operations. This means integration, working with the same systems and overcoming internal barriers. “This is a familiar territory,” says Roland. “People complain that everything used to be better before. So you have to come up with a clear plan and show them that it’s useful to approach things differently.”

Focus on what you can do
Consequently, this is about focus. “We stopped with a number of side issues - products for new markets and specific segments. You should focus on the things that you’re good at; people can only spend their time once. Moreover, we’re far from finished with our current market. So it’s better to focus on that. Especially now, when a number of important new products are in the pipeline.”

From interim to permanent
The Roland’s story makes it clear that Uretek is a company with great potential. What is surprising is that once his assignment was complete, Roland decided to stay at Uretek. “You don’t hear that often, indeed. I completed my first interim assignment fourteen years ago and I liked it very much, so I didn’t expect to leave the interim management field. I’ve found the ideal situation at Uretek. It’s a company with new product lines, enormous possibilities for growth and improving profitability. There’s so much to do that an interim period is too short to develop the strengths of this company. I would like to go further and this is a conscious choice. In fact, I suspect that almost every Executive Interim Manager has to make a choice like this at some point in their career.”

Modernisation of Damen Shipyards in Romania

After working for 3 ½ years as manager of an aircraft components factory in Thailand, Kees de Ruiter returned to the Netherlands. Shortly after, he started a new assignment on behalf of InterExcellent Interim Management. He became Managing Director of a shipyard in Romania that belongs to the Dutch company Damen Shipyards. The assignment was reorganise the shipyard in order to be able to build advanced ships there.

More advanced ships
The shipyard in Romania manufactures 20 to 25 ships a year, and is an important part of Damen. Since Romania joined the EU in 2006, a lot of skilled employees have left the country in search of a better future and a higher salary in other countries. “In the past, hundreds of people were waiting at the gate every day to get a job at the shipyard,” says Kees de Ruiter. “Now you could say that we have to lock the gate to keep our workers here. This change means that we have to work with limited resources, plan more precisely and pay our people better. At the same time, Damen wants to build more advanced ships here. This sounds paradoxal: many experienced people have left the shipyard, while we have to build more sophisticated ships,” says Kees.

Structure and priorities
Kees de Ruiter has been working all over the world for more than 33 years and have used his broad international experience in Romania. “To me, the starting point is always the organisational structure. I always check if tasks are assigned to the right people, if they are carried out at the right place in the organisation, and if the priorities are well set. There was no HRM department as known in the West. The only task HRM performed here was registration of the personnel. Moreover, HR Managers were in short supply in Romania, because of the communist past. Furthermore, some basic functions like planning, work preparation and engineering were all mixed together. Quality control was unsatisfactory. A shipyard is very labour intensive, so clear working procedures and structure are very important. You’re talking about people with welding equipment and screwdrivers and they need clear objectives and good management. And in general, the shipyard in Romania had to catch up with Western industrial standards and best practices.”

Culture and speed
Was there any difference with an interim assignment in the Netherlands? “Generally speaking, you use the same mix of management principles and techniques everywhere. But the culture and the speed of change are different. For example, Romanians were not expected to show initiative at work during the communist past. The work of planners, engineers and purchasers was valued less than that of production workers. Many people still think and act the old way. Being critical is still seen as risky. Any change in culture requires a lot of patience, empathy, continuously drawing attention to the need for personal reflection, and being critical in order to carry out tasks more efficiently and more effectively. One of the habits here is to start a new job when the last job is 80% complete, because asking for missing materials or drawings sounds like criticism. So it’s always wise to explain that it’s better to complete a job first, and then to discuss mistakes without frustration or anger, so that mistakes can be avoided in the future. If you want personal reflection and more efficient way of working, it’s a long road. And of course we want it to go much faster. We are working hard on it but you have to be patient with changes in culture. It always goes slower than you would like it to.”

People management
The present status is that there is now a good organisational structure with the required internal procedures. This new organisation is the basis for working efficiently. “In the future, the organisation will continue to develop,” says Kees de Ruiter. “The structure is in order and that’s important but we'll have to pay more attention to people management. That will put us on the right track. Attention to the organisational culture, HR management and improving management tools such as planning, work preparation, logistics and costs reporting.”

Growth market
For Kees de Ruiter the assignment is also a first introduction to InterExcellent Executive Interim Management and to working with an agency. “I’m not so used to that, but it works well,” concludes Kees. “There’s an intensive contact between the agency and me. I’ve noticed their enthusiasm and it’s clear to me that the people at InterExcellent consider foreign assignments as a growth market. And rightly so because there’s still a lot to be done in the world!”