The MVV Energie Group aims to maintain its profitable growth. However, sustainable, healthy company growth is based not only on the "hard facts" involved in profit-driven strategic and operative corporate management. A corporate strategy aiming to ensure sustainable growth and future viability also has to account for "soft factors", such as values, guiding principles and corporate culture, all of which also contribute to the company's success.
Since the IPO in 1999, the MVV Energie AG workforce has witnessed rapid and momentous change in their company. Its development from a municipal utility company into a successful energy supply group with nationwide and international activities has led not only to significant changes in employees' tasks and working environment – it has inevitably also left its mark on the corporate culture. The stock of common values and assumptions built up over time has altered, thus also leading to changes in the behaviour and expectations shown by the workforce.
Unlike corporate development, changes in corporate culture often take place more slowly and over a longer period. We aim to proactively shape this transformation in our corporate culture and to initiate processes guiding this change in a mutually desirable direction. By maintaining a balance between our values and value-driven company management, we aim to make a positive contribution towards securing our company's earnings power in the long term.
Our programme to shape our corporate culture
In summer 2006, we launched the move programme, which is intended to subject our shared view of ourselves to a critical review.
move is an acronym which stands for Courage (Mut), Openness (Offenheit), Change (Veränderung), Success (Erfolg):
- We demonstrate courage with this programme by subjecting our shared values to critical re-examination. And we enhance our courage by promoting constructive criticism within our company, thus freeing up resources for our change process.
- We show openness by welcoming new ideas and changes. In our dealings with each other, we aim to be honest and respectful.
- We are prepared to press ahead with change, because we are not just satisfied with what we have already achieved. Innovation is the key to improvement. We promote constructive change in order to be open to future opportunities, to analyze past errors and to avoid these in future.
- Our company is successful when we all work together on a basis of trust. By implementing move together, we will make a joint contribution towards turning MVV Energie AG into an even more effective company and employer.
Timeframe
We began the first phase of move by identifying what we would like to change and what we believe is worth retaining across all levels of the hierarchy. With this aim in mind, a total of 31 move workshops were held in autumn and winter 2006/07, at which our employees discussed all facets of our corporate culture.
Together, we compiled proposals for a desirable corporate culture for the future. On four weekends in April and May 2007, the Executive Board and managers analysed the results of the workshop in detail and formulated their change, avoidance and retention targets.
Process encounters resistance
We have naturally also encountered some resistance along the way. Questions were raised, especially at the beginning of the process, as to the programme's meaningfulness and chances of success. Would the action just fizzle out? Would members of the Executive Board and managers also be able to accept criticism and demonstrate their willingness to change? How would the workforce react? These and similar questions concerned our employees. But that is precisely the point – change and willingness to change arise on the basis of discussions and new perspectives. This automatically generates some headwind, as well as motivating us to put our stamina and the seriousness of our efforts to the test. We have also learned that it is difficult to reach all employees in equal measure across all of the company divisions. We will continue to make targeted efforts to do just this.
Initial measures being implemented
What insights have we gained? Our employees placed the topic “Appreciation, Respect, Recognition” at the top of their list of change targets. Our Executive Board, managers and Works Council are therefore addressing this issue with special priority. We have initiated four measures to achieve this change target
- Regular meetings of management and employees
- In a series of eight “ move Dialogue” podium discussions, six to eight employees, including specialist and management staff from our shareholdings, hold discussions with one of the members of our Executive Board. A group of 50 employees in the audience has the opportunity of joining in the discussion
- By the end of 2007 each member of the Executive Board will on at least one occasion invite ten employees to gain insights into his activities at our “Management Café
- All management staff will introduce a fixed regular time for meetings and hold meetings for employees at least once a month.
The topic of “Management Courage and Social Competence” was accorded high priority by employees and management alike. We will be implementing the following measures in this area in the near future:
- In future, employees will also appraise their superiors. By December 2007, we had compiled a concept for this form of “upward appraisal”.
- We are currently compiling joint proposals for a systematic basis for selecting management personnel.
The third priority topic we identified was “Customer Orientation”. We intend to introduce suitable measures in this area, such as making specialist departments more accessible by telephone.
We will review the efficacy of the measures taken by holding employee surveys at regular intervals of around six months. In this way, we intend to find out in a targeted manner whether we have already met our initial targets and what still has to be improved. We will discuss the results of these employee surveys at the move steering committee and factor the insights gained along the way into subsequent measures.
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