Coffee with Laura Brandes, GM Europe, Victorinox ☕
What does it mean to be “future ready”? How might leaders be pushing weak performance without realising it? Is it time for businesses to start considering a head of AI role? I take a deep dive into these and other topics with Laura Brandes.
I recently enjoyed a virtual coffee with Laura Brandes, GM Europe at Victorinox, after coming across a quote of hers on the IMD Business School website. She touched on the critical themes of being "future ready" and the subtle ways leaders might unknowingly be pushing weak performance. Intrigued by these concepts, I wanted to dive deeper into what they mean in a practical sense. We explored these and other topics, drawing from Laura's rich experience and insights gained from an impressive career with Nike, Speedo, adidas and Victorinox, to uncover practical lessons in personal and professional growth, and some of the real word challenges and opportunities facing businesses today.
GRISHMA: Can you share what being “future ready” means? I'm particularly interested in how this concept plays out at Victorinox under your leadership. What specific strategies or frameworks have you put in place to make sure that the company is moving towards being future ready?
LAURA: Let me give you some context first. I asked Victorinox to sponsor me on the Breakthrough Program for Senior Executives at IMD Business School. After four years, I felt I was too much in the Victorinox bubble, especially considering that two of those were pandemic years. I was craving for more interaction with other senior executives and understand the way they think, and if there could be different ways for me of approaching problems and finding solutions.
I found this program at IMD Lausanne. It's a very intensive program. It's only 10 days, but you are fully immersed in it. You’re told beforehand, you will not have time to do anything else. You still think you will be able to check some emails. You can’t.
For those 10 days, I was with another 30 people from different nationalities. They come from all over the globe and different industries. We were working together on business cases and it was a wonderful, deeply enriching experience.
One of the topics we looked at was about being future ready. This subject was led by Professor Howard Yu who is the LEGO® Professor of Management and Innovation at IMD and well known for his expertise in this area.
What was interesting in this class was learning that it's not really about the organisation, it’s about the individual, meaning us.
I’m at Victorinox now, but in the future I can be with another company. So how can I ensure that I am future ready? Not just with me helping my organisation, but as an asset that other companies can hire, I need to be future ready.
I thought that was very interesting because usually we talk a lot about organisations and not so much about the people. I found it refreshing to have the professor saying, “Hey, this is also about you. Maybe the organisation is not future ready, but you can be, and you have to be.”
As an example, companies like BMW, Toyota and GM developed electric cars almost 20 years before Tesla. But they were not thinking about how they could bring that into the future. They were so stuck by all the challenges in that moment, that at some point, they just let go of this idea and said okay, this is not going to work, we’ll just keep doing what we know how to do.
So they closed those departments. The people who were there developing those cars, they found that they didn't have a job anymore. But they were future ready. Many of them had already been developing the ideas of what else needs to happen so in the future, electric cars are a reality. These people went on to work for Apple and other big technology brands.
That made me reflect on Victorinox. What should I be thinking about? Where are we today? Where is there an opportunity for the future? Do we have something that is potentially at risk and that we should be talking about now so that in the future we are ready when that happens?
One example is what's going on in legislation. The laws are changing in many countries in Europe and Asia when it comes to the classification and sale of weapons. We might think, “Okay, but Victorinox is a company selling kitchen knives or the very iconic red Swiss army knife. It’s not the same, because those products are not actually weapons.” However, they fall under the category of weapons in many countries and could be classified as such.
We already see in the UK, strict regulations coming into place on how knives are packaged, displayed, and distributed. If you want to display a knife, the packaging must be tamper-proof and so secure that no-one can open it inside the store and use the knife. If you buy a knife online, you need to be present when they deliver, and you need to show your identity because you must be over 18 years old.
This seems like a simple thing, but it involves a lot of complexity. Now imagine that's happening suddenly everywhere in Europe. It’s still in early stages but there is a trend towards these tighter regulations. What happens to Victorinox? Our sales might decrease dramatically overnight.
This is one of the topics that I brought to the company and said, we need to talk about this. It will be more and more difficult to sell knives. That's our main product, what do we do?
Should we have a Swiss Army Knife without the blade? The first - and understandable - reaction you get is “impossible. That's our iconic product.” But if you remove the blade you still have another several other tools and you don't fall under these weapons regulations. We have scissors, screwdriver, nail file, we have a lot of other things. If you remove the blade, you're not killing the product.
And this is not about accepting or not the idea. It is important having the conversation, explore possibilities, then decide one way or the other.
This is one example of being future ready - thinking on things that are not necessarily fully happening at the moment. You cannot just dismiss them and pretend they will take many years to happen. Because suddenly, your business could crash because you didn't pay attention.
GRISHMA: Can you give me another example, where you feel that you need to be future ready and what steps you're taking towards it. Is technology something that is an area of concern?
LAURA: Very much so. In my previous role with Victorinox, I was responsible for global sales, strategy and operations. I was involved in a project with the team in China to develop their digital commerce business.
Digital for commerce, the marketplaces in China and how they operate is very particular to that market.
As we know, in China, they have their own platforms for everything. They have another version of Facebook, another version of WhatsApp, and so on. They always have their local version. And they have their local marketplaces that are huge. So here we have Amazon, there they have Tmall and other options, and they are all locally developed.
These companies have been developing a lot of technology to drive consumers onto their platforms, interact with them and create community. The way they announce the products on the mobiles and how people can quickly shop online is much more developed than what we have in the rest of the world. It's a different way also of marketing the product.
The full consumer journey, from awareness to buying, is supported by one data system that tracks and analyses consumer behaviour. And consumers go beyond shopping your products, they become advocates, influencing additional sales – all connected in the same system, with very close integration of Product, Marketing and Sales areas. This fast-evolving technology will eventually be available in Europe and other regions, so I keep thinking about how to lay the groundwork, prepare the systems, bring in the skills and talents who will be able to successfully manage that.
GRISHMA: Speaking of being future ready. What is your take on AI? Do you feel that at some point in the near future, it will be important to consider a head of AI role in businesses. Someone who would be responsible for identifying opportunities for AI application across the business, ensuring the ethical use of AI, managing those AI projects and leading teams of professionals whether internal or external to achieve company objectives. In the US more and more, a head of AI position is really becoming something that companies are looking at now. I haven't seen so much of it in Europe, but I was wondering if it’s come on to your radar as something that needs to be looked at.
LAURA: That's a very good question. I also don't see that much of people talking about specific positions on AI, it's much more about how you can use AI in positions that are already existing in the company.
But I could see that role becoming necessary. There are so many things that are connected to AI for which we need to be aware of, the legal aspects, the risks, the ethics. At Victorinox we've been talking about this, and I think it's super interesting.
I even asked the legal department together with the transformation and technology teams to come to one of my quarterly team meetings and talk about AI and ethics, and what is available in the company, what they can use and what they need to be mindful of.
I could definitely see a position head of AI being required now or in the very near future in many companies, because eventually all the different areas in the organisation will somehow use AI. There are so many different applications for the technology. Who can oversee that and who can be aware of what is available in the market, how to choose the best option, and then the legal aspects and ethics. I could see that need for a head of AI.
GRISHMA: Finding a head of AI at this point in time is deeply challenging as you can imagine. The role requires a rare combination of deep technical expertise in AI and machine learning, as well as practical business application knowledge. Not only is there scarcity of talent but also increasing competition for these skill combinations.
LAURA: I'm thinking people with the profile for this position will also need to be very good at navigating within an organisation. There will be resistance. People will not understand what you're doing 100%.
GRISHMA: Yes, it will be crucial to clearly communicate the shift towards AI and its benefits to all employees. Many employees will feel apprehensive about AI taking over their job. So, when these organisations start leaning into AI in a broader sense than the current fragmented or siloed application of it, they've got to be crystal clear about what that's going to mean for everyone's roles, not just now but a couple of years down the line. It needs to be presented in a really simple way that people can understand and can see, “Okay, you know what, this is actually going to make my life better. It’s going to automate all the boring stuff I hate doing anyway, and I can focus and even expand on more interesting tasks.”
GRISHMA: Moving on to something else you mentioned from the IMD program, about pushing weak performance without realising it. That caught my attention. Can you explain a bit more about what you mean? I'm interested in how this happens and what effect it might have on teams.
LAURA: This was an interesting realisation for me. Usually we talk about high performers in the organisation. We put a lot of attention to all the extremes, the high performers, or the people who are not performing well at all and you need to do something about it.
Then you have all the rest of the team that are not necessarily at one of those extremes. If you don't pay attention to them, you might potentially be losing the opportunity of developing good people, or make them feel that they are not valued enough. And that can create weak performance because it's resulting in a feeling of “I'm not seen that much in this organisation”. Not because anyone was doing anything specific, it was instead the lack of attention.
We also looked at the topic of miscommunication. When as a leader, you don't take the time or bring the effort to ensure you are communicating with clarity, especially if you have a huge organisation, you might trigger actions in the wrong direction with the team. They may end up using their resources in the wrong direction and causing a lot of frustration because you as the leader are not able to communicate properly.
I thought I was doing fine, but after this session I had to ask myself the question - am I really paying attention the way I should to my team? Or am I putting so much focus on the high performers or weak performers on the extreme, that I’m forgetting or not putting the needed attention in the rest of the organisation. Something which, with time, can create frustration within the team.
It made me more conscious with my actions today, the way I give attention to the team, the way I communicate to the team. Am I being really clear and a good leader or am I sending half a message and thinking I’m being clear but in reality, I’m not? Or are there some employees that are just invisible to me because I don't make the effort to check?
GRISHMA: What does it mean to give more attention to these “invisible” middle of the performance spectrum team members? Does that mean having one to ones with them? Does it mean coordinating with the leadership team on greater efforts with development plans? What corrective action did you take to make sure these team members feel seen?
LAURA: One action is when I have my meetings with my direct reports and some heads in their departments, I always include the question on how the team is going and ask about the people. I don't need myself to be in contact with everyone. That would be impossible, I have 230 people. But I need to be able to enable and support the other leaders and people managers in the organisation to pay attention to the people.
The fact that you ask about them, triggers already a response for people managing others, that they need to really think about it. They need to think about if individual team members are having challenges and how they could support them better.
Succession plan, for example, is something that some organisations have very well structured. I’ve had experience of both, very well structured succession planning and other companies that don't have that at all. The fact that you talk about preparing people to take more responsibility, you will go through the discussion of what kind of talent do we have available? How can we develop people? Are they in the right position? Sometimes you see that happen at Victorinox. When I came into the role that I have today, when I was talking to the team, I started to see a lot of talent in the organisation, but they didn't have the proper attention to help them to develop. If you don't put the attention toward that, eventually they can feel frustrated.
GRISHMA: You've had quite the international career, working in Brazil, Germany, Switzerland, and even Panama. Each place has its own unique culture and approach to business. Could you share some of the biggest differences you've noticed in how people work and communicate in these different environments? I'm really interested in hearing about how you've adapted your own style to fit in with each new setting. What's that been like for you?
LAURA: When I was working for Nike, I was in Brazil, and that's an American company. People were very much direct in the way they were communicating. And I see that not just because of the company culture at Nike, but overall, every time that I have business conversations with companies in US or colleagues working in companies from US. People are just much more direct and they don't take criticism personally. If you are in a meeting, you can clearly say what's going right, what's going wrong, and that’s it, no hard feelings. You can have a very direct conversation.
I feel in other cultures that really doesn't work. People can even feel offended. And so you need to be mindful on how you share information or criticism.
I realised in Switzerland for example, culturally it's very, very democratic. And this is how it works in politics, the way that people vote. They vote for absolutely everything. The government wants to buy new fighter jets for the Swiss Air Force. Do we agree to that or not? Then people vote. There will be a change on this tax related to something specific. Do we agree or not, then everyone votes. It’s incredibly democratic.
And you'll see that when you are working in a Swiss company, how sometimes things move very slow because it's natural for them to act for everyone. It's just part of the culture. I needed to be able to adapt to that. I was used to a different pace in conversations and decisions, and it's not the same in Switzerland. I had to learn and have that in mind, and even anticipate, that when I need to act for something that will require an important decision, am I involving everyone from the beginning that I know will be expected to be part of this conversation?
GRISHMA: Laura, I have loved this conversation, thank you so much for sharing so openly and honestly these great insights, it’s been truly fascinating.
LAURA: Thank you for this conversation, Grishma. It was really very interesting. It's the first time that I had to try to explain what I learned and how I have applied it. I realised it was not that easy for me. But I appreciate it very much.
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