Platform for success
THE COMPANY AS A SOCIAL NETWORK
TODAY, AGILITY IS ALSO ESSENTIAL FOR ANY ENTERPRISE, NO MATTER ITS SIZE. CREATIVITY AND FLEXIBILITY DETERMINE WHETHER COMPANIES PUSH THE PACE OF INNOVATION, MANAGE TO KEEP UP, OR END UP FALLING BEHIND. AGILITY ALSO CALLS FOR NEW STRUCTURES AND LEADERSHIP METHODS – BPW DEMONSTRATES HOW CHANGE CAN SUCCEED.
of electric drive solutions exhibit plenty of team spirit, and their straightforward and honest approach to working together helps them take even the greatest challenges in their stride.
HIERARCHICAL, PATRIARCHAL, AUTHORITARIAN? OUTDATED!
The traditional management model has had its day, even at family-owned companies with over 120 years of history. A focus on values, on the other hand, is just as relevant as ever. In fact, common, reliable values create a stable framework in which change can actually take place, explains Head of Development Dr Markus Kliffken: “The business world is increasingly characterised by VUCA – volatility, unpredictability, complexity and ambiguity. At BPW, however, the workplace atmosphere is characterised by a sense of community and trust. The employees identify with their company to an extraordinarily high degree. If you view your employees as an intelligent network, value them highly and delegate responsibility to them accordingly, you turn them into a driving force for innovation. Then VUCA takes on a positive meaning, namely vision, understanding, clarity and agility. A clear, long-term vision is important, because today technologies, but even goals and strategies, can change abruptly.”
A few years ago, BPW formulated its mission statement for the first time: to develop from an axle manufacturer to the preferred system partner of vehicle manufacturers and mobility partner of vehicle operators. In the meantime, this has manifested itself in numerous innovations, from Industry 4.0 running gear production running gear production and telematics to a digitised spare parts business. Dr Kliffken is proud to have not only increased the pace of innovation through agile leadership and development methods, but also accuracy and cost efficiency:
“We develop new ideas faster to a high degree of maturity, because we closely involve our customers in our development work.”
Dr. Markus Kliffken
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Over 50 locations Around 120 vocational trainees in Wiehl 7,362 employees
Anything that enhances BPW’s innovative capacity ought to take hold throughout the entire company. To ensure this is the case, BPW is also creating the necessary structural conditions, such as organising divisions that used to be managed centrally into “business units’ that will enjoy a high degree of autonomy in the future. When implementing changes at such a rapid pace, how to ensure employees are keeping up?
“Transparency and openness are tremendously important in change processes – after all, we are essentially in a state of permanent change,”
explains Barbara Höfel. “That’s why we don’t just communicate via traditional information cascades from management down – every employee can sign up and participate in the monthly project meetings, regardless of department or team function, for example. The discussions during these meetings can get quite heated, and this openness is a sign that employees identify with and trust our company.”
These personal interactions are complemented by digital means of communication, such as the intranet and collaboration platforms that allow BPW employees around the world to connect with one another. The fact that BPW is refining its image through targeted brand communication and public relations activities and is also pulling out all the stops on social media in this regard is additionally
having a positive effect on the company’s HR strategy – it is increasingly succeeding in raising its public profile as a hidden champion and thus getting its message heard by potential new employees and trainees. BPW is arming itself for the now global battle for the best minds – including at its own vocational training centre in Wiehl, where trainees can now learn how to work with production robots. The new training centre for robotics is quite special, even for the German state of North Rhine–Westphalia, which is known for being a major industrial region.
Learning at BPW does not end upon completing a vocational training programme. The company keeps its employees’ knowledge up to date through seminars and systematic advanced training – which increasingly includes digital learning opportunities such as educational videos, webinars and e-books. This ensure that employees have access to the latest information at all times, even from their mobile devices.
