KMU Swiss Forum 2016: When values get you ahead
What is a successful entrepreneur? The KMU SWISS FORUM in Baden dealt with the values of an entrepreneur, his dealings with customers as well as the culture of innovation.
Caroline Magerl-Studer, Bianca Braun, Carl Elsener, Plenum (Pictures: Fabrice Müller)
How can customers help a company to succeed? In his presentation, Steffen Müller, head of the "Customer Relationship" course at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW), showed the mechanisms, stumbling blocks and opportunities of customer feedback systems. These basically serve to record and understand the needs of customers. Instead of surveying customers once a year, Steffen Müller recommended collecting customer opinions promptly after the purchase of a product or service. Ideally, the surveys should be conducted by neutral persons in order to obtain opinions that are as objective as possible. "Only a small proportion of customers complain if they are not satisfied. 20 to 60 percent remain inactive. It is important to pick up this group of customers and turn them into fans of the company," said Steffen Müller. The collected values form the basis for internal training and improvement measures. But that's not all: "Companies do well to let their customers know what improvement measures have been taken," emphasized the ZHAW lecturer. Customer feedback is also a matter for the boss, which is why Steffen Müller recommended that managing directors also conduct regular complaint discussions with customers. "This has a strong impact on customers and employees."
Never leave the planet without ...
Time and again, the company Victorinox, based in Ibach SZ, receives letters from customers who report on their experiences with the famous Swiss Army Knives. This includes, for example, the episode of Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who described in his book how he had to use a "Swiss Army Knife" to open the door to the Russian Mir space station and then wrote: "Never leave the planet without a Swiss Army Knife." According to CEO Carl Elsener, the knife is the linchpin for all Victorinox innovations.
Success goes to the corporate foundation
The developments of the company from a small family business to a globally active company with 2,000 employees and a turnover of 500 million Swiss francs in 2015 are impressive. 60,000 pocket knives leave the factory in Ibach every day, and 13 million pieces are produced annually. 90 percent of these are exported all over the world. The central pillars of the company are employees, customers, production and brand, as Carl Elsener informed. At the same time, the company lives values such as credibility, openness, trust, respect, gratitude, modesty, courage and responsibility. The patron described the establishment of the company foundation in 2000 as an important milestone for the company. Business success is invested in the foundation for the benefit of sustainable and independent company development. 90 percent of Victorinox's share capital belongs to the corporate foundation.
Plea for family businesses
Are family businesses less successful than listed public companies? No, thinks Bianca Braun, member of the board of maxon motor ag in Sachseln OW, a leading global supplier of high-precision drives and systems. Her book "Erfolgreich jeitseits der Börse - Was führende Familienunternehmen auszeichnen" (Successful beyond the stock market - what distinguishes leading family companies) deals with the family business and its success factors. According to two recent studies, the performance of family businesses is better than that of publicly traded companies, Bianca Braun said in her presentation. "Customer value" instead of "shareholder value" is the motto. Financial independence, but also the strong identification of management and employees with the company are important factors that speak for family businesses. maxon motor sells four million motors and drives in 15,000 different variants per year. 2,200 employees work for the company, around 1,000 of them in the canton of Obwalden. An important milestone was maxon motor's participation in the first Mars mission in 1997. maxon motor has been involved in all Mars missions since then with its drives. According to Bianca Braun, the latest innovation is the "smallest, lightest and most powerful e-bike motor." "We develop new products from our gut feeling and fight for their success."
Tradition and high-tech
High-tech and top products are also the focus of M. Opitz & Co. AG in St. Gallen also relies on high-tech and top products. The company, which is present in 40 countries and on five continents, employs 60 people and manufactures high-quality cosmetic and pharmaceutical products. Despite all the modernity, the values of the company's founder Emilia Altherr, such as gratitude, honesty or politeness, are still upheld, as her present granddaughter and company owner Caroline Magerl-Studer reported. The success story of this SME business began in 1938 with a hormone hand cream that was sold door to door. Today, the Mila d'Opiz brand is number 1 in Iran, for example, and many global brands are developed and produced in St. Gallen. Ten percent of sales is invested in the company's own research department. Mila d'Opiz's latest products include "Skin Whisperer" - a cream with five stem cells and what Caroline Magerl-Studer calls a "revolutionary" raw material, for which the company won the award for best innovative cosmetic product in 2015. "We believe in our employees and innovations. And we live our values," the speaker emphasized.
Text and images: Fabrice Müller, journalistenbuero.ch
