Self-organized work is becoming increasingly important in everyday working life. Companies are increasingly moving away from hierarchical structures and relying more and more on self-organization and agile forms of working. In the process, employees and teams are challenged to lead themselves. The fact that many people are currently working in home offices due to the Corona pandemic reinforces this trend. How do people experience themselves in self-organized work contexts? How do they lead themselves? What opportunities do they recognize and take advantage of? What challenges do they face? What competencies are helpful in leading themselves well?

Self-leadership is demanding

At the individual level, it is evident that employees appreciate the extended scope for creativity and the increased influence they can exert through their own decisions. This strengthens their self-efficacy and increases their sense of purpose. This is reflected in the increase in motivation and commitment. However, self-leadership requires a continuous willingness to develop and change, the ability to reflect, self-initiative and a high sense of responsibility.

Openness and willingness to change are required

In general, high intrapersonal and interpersonal skills as well as professional skills are rated as important. Professionally, employees should be able to structure and process complex content. Openness to new things and a high, continuous willingness to learn are required. Self-leadership requires stamina, discipline, self-confidence and mental strength in dealing with pressure situations. Since many agreements are necessary to organize together and yet independently, a high level of social competence as well as a distinct ability to deal with conflict is central.

Cooperation at eye level

At the team level, the self-organized colleagues notice an increased exchange among each other and a high level of motivation. The general readiness for self-responsibility and the definition of clear goals and responsibilities promote successful cooperation within the team. A pronounced appreciation was also noted due to working at eye level. Trust and psychological security in the team are of high importance. On the other hand, a lack of communication and prioritization or a lack of transparency in the distribution of tasks hinder cooperation. Conflicts in self-organized teams are often negotiated dialogically and independently, with specific roles for conflict management.

More freedom versus excessive demands

At the organizational level, transparency, clear definitions of roles and goals, and a working climate conducive to learning are perceived as supportive framework conditions. Overly sanctioning corporate cultures and micromanagement make self-leadership more difficult. Self-leadership requires more communication. Furthermore, the organization must be aware that increased self-leadership also poses the risk of overstraining and overtaxing employees. Appropriate framework conditions and the existence of a good error culture and psychological security can counteract this. Companies can thus actively promote a self-leading way of working.

Source and further information: www.zhaw.ch/psychologie

Every year, the auditing and consulting firm EY presents the "Entrepreneur Of The Year" award in five categories to entrepreneurs who have rendered outstanding services. Traditionally, the award ceremony takes place at a festive gala. Due to the current situation, EY decided at an early stage to hold this year's award ceremony in the form of a hybrid gala. Thus, this year's award show - in compliance with a strict protection concept - was streamed live from the studio of Swiss Television in Zurich on October 30, 2020. The jury, finalists and the organizers were present on site. The invited guests, including the families and friends of the award winners, were able to virtually participate in the ceremony and interact with each other thanks to the live stream. In total, over 1,000 viewers from 20 countries took part in this digital premiere.

Entrepreneur of the Year 2020: The Winners

In 2020, an eleven-member jury was responsible for evaluating the candidates and awarding the EY Entrepreneur Of The Year Awards. It examined the candidates independently of EY. The following entrepreneurs have now been chosen from the finalists:

• Patrick Firmenich, Chairman of the Board of Directors Firmenich, Geneva
  The winner in the "Family Business" category is Patrick Firmenich, because he has held the tradition of the family-owned company together so successfully for many years that it is one of the top companies in the world. Patrick Firmenich is the family delegate and chairman of a traditional family business that was founded back in 1895. Today, the largest privately owned fragrance and aroma company is present in over 100 markets. More than 10,000 people work for the Swiss company worldwide.
• Marek Dutkiewicz, Founder and CEO HR Campus, Dübendorf (ZH)
  The resume of the winner in the "Services/Trade" category shows that true entrepreneurship is borderless. Marek Dutkiewicz came to Switzerland as a Polish refugee and started his company HR Campus in 1998 as a technology provider for HR departments. Today, with more than 160 employees, the company is the leading service and IT provider dedicated to HR excellence. Its tools, solutions and platforms cover the entire employee lifecycle for HR professionals.
• Avni Orllati, Founder and Board Delegate Groupe Orllati, Bioley-Orjulaz (VD)
  The winner in the "Industry/High-Tech/Life Sciences" category receives recognition for his hard work that led to an inspiring start-up story. In 1997, at the age of 21, Avni and his twin brother started their own business by renting a machine that breaks up concrete. Today, Orllati is a leader in the field of "green building" and employs over 850 people in western Switzerland. The company specializes in all areas of preparatory construction work, such as demolition, earthworks, wastewater disposal, and drilling.
• Michael Born and Karim Nemr, Co-Founder and CEO respectively Chief Business Officer PXL Vision AG, Zurich
  The winners in the "Emerging Entrepreneurs" category are honored for having developed an absolutely convincing future technology. Michael Born and Karim Nemr met at 3D scanning specialist Dacuda (2012 EOY winner) and decided to develop this technology further. Today, PXL Vision provides a technology platform for secure identity verification and trusted digital identities. The platform is a scalable business model that is only at the beginning of a large and global application area.

Stefan Rösch-Rütsche, Country Managing Partner of EY Switzerland, comments: "This year's implementation of our "EY Entrepreneur Of The Year" election has once again shown that Switzerland has a very large potential of innovative entrepreneurial personalities. I am also pleased to see that a wide variety of professional and private paths can lead to successful entrepreneurship in Switzerland."

Logitech founder honored for lifetime professional achievement

At the same time today with Daniel Borel a long-standing, successful and deserving Swiss entrepreneurial personality was also honored. He received this year's "Master Entrepreneur" award from the jury for his professional life's work. Daniel Borel co-founded Logitech in 1981 and led the computer mouse manufacturer as CEO from 1992 to 1998. He served as Chairman of the Board of Directors from 1988 to 2007 and subsequently as a member of the Board of Directors until 2015. In 1988, Daniel Borel led Logitech to the Swiss stock exchange SIX and in 1997 also to the US technology exchange Nasdaq. Jury member Prof. Dr. Thomas Zellweger says: "With Logitech, Daniel Borel and his comrades-in-arms have written a Swiss success story that has attracted international attention. Today, Logitech is headquartered in Switzerland, engineers and researchers work in America, and products are manufactured in Asia. There are few companies from Switzerland that have achieved a listing on Nasdaq. At the same time, Borel also mastered entrepreneurial crises, such as when the company had to lay off half of its workforce in 1994."

Source and further information: EY

A representative study has examined the state of mobile, flexible working. For this purpose, 2000 people in German- and French-speaking Switzerland were surveyed in mid-August. At a time, therefore, when the daily infection figures were low and there was no longer any advice against returning to the office. "The survey was therefore conducted under the impression of the pandemic, and yet the timing allows certain conclusions to be drawn about how the situation might develop after this situation," explains study leader Dr. Johann Weichbrodt, a research associate at the School of Applied Psychology at the University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland.

A small proportion of companies refuse to accept home office & co.

As recently as 2016, 38 percent said they used mobile-flexible working at least occasionally. In February 2020, 41 percent of the study participants said they had regularly used mobile-flexible working - i.e., they had worked part of the time in their home office or at another location outside the company premises. During the lockdown from the end of March, this proportion rose to 58 percent and then fell again - but only to 48 percent. Johann Weichbrodt considers these to be high figures, which can be explained to a large extent by greater potential. For example, the proportion of employed persons who state that they cannot work in a mobile-flexible manner due to their job has dropped significantly: from 45 to 37 percent. "On the one hand, this has to do with economic structural change, but it probably also reflects a change in perception."

What has not changed, however, is the value of those who could use it because of their job description - but are not allowed to: As before, 7 percent of employees are denied mobile-flexible working. Surprisingly, this figure did not fall below 3 percent even during the lockdown in March/April.

SMEs catching up with flexible forms of work

The study also sheds light on the differences between employer structures. The study looked at those that could enable flexible working on the basis of job descriptions. And here, striking differences emerge, especially between employers from the public and private sectors, respectively depending on the size of the organization. To illustrate this, the study works with a phase model that shows the development from completely location-bound working (phase 1) to completely flexible working in terms of time and location (phase 5). In phase 2, for example, flexible working is only the exception, but in phase 4 it is almost the rule.

In 2020, the 100 largest companies are on average consistently in phase 3 in many areas - work model, office architecture, organizational structure - and even in phase 4 for technology. Significant changes are visible in all areas compared with 2016. The difference between larger companies and SMEs has also narrowed: The latter have caught up considerably and have significantly reduced their gap to the large companies compared to 2016.

Public administration is struggling

Public administration, on the other hand, is consistently in phase 2 on average, which also represents a significant development compared with 2016. However, the differences between the individual administrations are still large: A certain proportion of administrations are still in phase 1 - i.e. working completely from a fixed location without exception. "This is where the pandemic is likely to trigger discussions," explains Johann Weichbrodt. "During the spring lockdown, these administrative units also had to comply and often had positive experiences. Overnight, the proof of the pudding was that it just does work - especially technologically."

Home office monitoring: no systematic approach

For the first time, the study also looked at the question of monitoring in the home office. Here, 13 percent said they were monitored. In terms of the type of monitoring, 9 percent of those in gainful employment said they felt monitored via the status display in programs such as "Skype" or "Teams. "That's fewer than the public discussions would suggest," Weichbrodt said in assessing the numbers. "Surveillance of work in the home office does not seem to be the problem. The vast majority of employees can do their own work from home." Only 4 percent said that their employer uses special software for monitoring.

Massively more women work mobile-flexible

One of the most significant increases across the study is in gender differences: significantly more men (2014: 40 %, 2016: 47 %) than women (2014: 27 %, 2016: 28 %) worked mobile-flexibly in 2014 and 2016. In 2020, women caught up massively: The proportion rose to 43 percent for them and 52 percent for men.

The biggest obstacles and problems

Those who frequently work mobile-flexibly perceive a lack of identification with the team (60 %) and emotional isolation (53 %) as the biggest problem, followed by the feeling of working all the time (41 %) and work-life balance (36 %). Rather less problematic are rated health aspects or the potential for abusive use of the fewer opportunities for control by superiors. Among the obstacles, the argument that the job requires proximity to the team (44 %) is put forward by a wide margin, followed by the lack of support from the corporate culture (29 %) and the lack of opportunities to process sensitive data on the road or in the home office. The lack of technology was rated as the smallest obstacle (15 %).

Home office & Co. becomes the norm - pure presence the exception

The Work Smart Initiative has been monitoring the acceptance, introduction and establishment of mobile-flexible working for five years. This year's evaluation marks a turning point, as for the first time a large majority of those for whom the job description allows home office & co. can also use this. Nevertheless, Johann Weichbrodt still sees a lot of potential for development: "In the beginning, there was the commitment, sometimes also the symbolism, but now mobile-flexible working is becoming part of everyday life, the norm. This not only has consequences for those who continue to refuse it - it also challenges those who already apply it. That's because structures and management models need to be adapted to it, and aspects perceived as negative by users need to be addressed." The pandemic will accelerate both, it's clear: 49 percent of respondents said Corona has led to culture change at their employer. But 39 percent, on the other hand, said that skeptical attitudes remain in their company and that they want to go back to the old if possible. Johann Weichbrodt: "In the summer, it became apparent that a flattening of the infection figures already leads to an increased return to the office. But it will hardly be possible to turn back the clock to the level of February."

Source: work-smart-initiative.ch

SMEs that have successfully ensured their succession and thus their preservation over such a long period of time have already had to overcome several crises such as world wars and economic crises and rise anew like the "Phoenix from the ashes". The focus as potential award winners is therefore on Swiss SMEs that have been entered in the commercial register for 100 years this year. From these companies, an expert jury and a jury advisory board with representatives from science, entrepreneurship and the media selected the Phoenix Award winners in the categories "Innovation/Disruption/Renewal Capability" and "Impact and Performance as a Team". The award was launched in 2018 by the initiative Successor bus.chan information campaign for SME entrepreneurs on the topic of business succession that is unique in this form. ORGANISATOR accompanies this initiative as a media partner.

Distillerie Morand: Honored for team performance and social responsibility

In the category "Impact and Performance as a Team," the jury and jury advisory board voted for the family-owned company founded in 1889 by Louis Morand in the Lower Valais, among other things because of its social responsibility, with which it was ahead of the times for a long time and continues to fulfill this comprehensively today. This includes the pension fund set up by André Morand for his employees in the first decades of the 20th century. Since 2015, the company has employed people with intellectual disabilities. In collaboration with FOVAHM (Fondation valaisanne en faveur des personnes handicapées mentales), 16 jobs were created in an integrated workshop in the areas of labeling and packaging.

Further essential for the approval of the award by the jury and the jury advisory board were the more than 100 years of consistency in the product portfolio with parallel constant development of convincing product innovations. "We are proud of this unexpected award, which honors our entire team. A really nice recognition and confirmation for our work, the family business and our strategy - and an inspiring motivation to keep at it," said a delighted Fabrice Haenni at the award ceremony on October 20, 2020.

Convincing in "Innovation, Disruption and Renewability": H. Rüetschi AG

H. Rüetschi AG in Aarau also received a Phoenix Award. This company has been in existence since 1367, i.e. for more than 650 years, making it one of the five oldest companies still in existence in Switzerland. The jury therefore considers H. Rüetschi AG to be a special example of sustainable entrepreneurship, as the focus here is not primarily on growth. Rather, thanks to successful diversification, innovation and market development, the niche player has managed to preserve an old craft over more than six centuries and to transform it into a modern SME. The willingness to disrupt and innovate has been ingrained in the company's DNA for more than six centuries. What began as a bell foundry in 1367 is now a company diversified into art and industrial casting, church tower and bell ringing technology, church and building automation, and research and development, with 45 employees from 14 different professional groups.

René Spielmann, owner and managing director of H. Rüetschi AG: "We are proud of this unexpected award, which honors our entire team. The award is an extraordinary recognition of our consistently future-oriented approach, our spirit of research and the close cooperation between different generations and professions. Personally, I am very pleased that the Phoenix Award is dedicated to successful company succession, as this is a particular concern of mine."

Phoenix Award as another highlight of a necessary initiative

The award, which is being presented for the first time this year, is seen as a further component of a necessary initiative on the subject of succession planning. Every day, 14 SMEs close in Switzerland due to a lack of a succession solution. Carla Kaufmann, an experienced expert in the field of business succession, has observed this negative development over the past eight years. Since it is well known that watching does not change anything, she initiated the succession bus. Together with 15 experienced experts, the owner of the Companymarket AG in 2018 for the first time across German-speaking Switzerland and offered SME entrepreneurs free qualified talks on all aspects of the entire succession process. In total, the Nachfolgebus made stops in 14 cities in German-speaking Switzerland in 2018 and 2019, and 300 hours of personal discussions were held by the Nachfolgebus "experts" with SME entrepreneurs. After two years "on tour", the initiative Nachfolgebus has reached a first milestone: the urgently needed awareness for business succession is growing. Now it is time to keep at it in order to achieve the appropriate social, economic and political relevance for succession. That's why the Succession Bus Tour 2020 has various innovations on board: digital expert talks, the succession magazine produced together with ORGANISATOR, the Succession Day, and the Phoenix Award.

More information: www.nachfolgebus.ch

This idea - born in the Corona emergency - turned out to be a stroke of luck: More than 400 participants at dozens of customers of the software manufacturer from central Switzerland had the innovations of OpaccConnect2020 presented live in their own offices. What in other years was done with a large customer event with a marquee or other function rooms, was now staged with decentralized events. More than 25 MyConnect arrangements were booked, where at least five customer representatives followed the live stream in their own offices and were personally accompanied by a project manager. Daniel Preisig, IT manager at Möbel Pfister, was enthusiastic on behalf of many other Opacc customers: "A really great live session, very professional and competent, that makes you want more!

OpaccConnect2020: Live with Sascha Ruefer

The four-hour live session was moderated by TV man Sascha Ruefer in an entertaining and humorous way. Prof. Ralf Wölfle presented the latest Commerce Report and explained trends in digital commerce. CEO Beat Bussmann and the responsible project managers were in constant action to bring as many of the numerous highlights as possible closer to the customers via the live session.

SmartCloud makes OpaccOXAS even more flexible for third-party applications

Opacc refers to the increasing merging of internal and external resources into a homogeneous whole as SmartCloud. These cloud integration services are available to Opacc customers at the push of a button without any initialization effort. For example, Opacc customers can immediately use third-party providers or external services, such as Moneyhouse (HR data on companies and individuals), deepl (translations), SMS messaging and much more.

In the latest version, OpaccOXAS remains the backend of Opacc applications, but at the same time is expanded to become the actual platform. Beat Bussmann, CEO Opacc Software AG: "As the backbone of digital marketing, the upcoming version also supports the seamless recording of all contacts with prospects and business partners. For this purpose, OpaccOXAS provides a powerful data container for recording these contacts, so-called touchpoints."

EnterpriseShop benefits from platform architecture

Opacc assumes that the next generation of WebShops will offer more customer group and customer-specific services and data. All sales and interaction channels must be represented. The latest EnterpriseShop version already masters the handling of this paradigm shift. At Connect - as an example - a simple application for the recognition and processing of address duplicates, which can arise in the context of self-registration processes, was presented.

Noticeable corona effect

According to Beat Bussmann, the effects of the Corona pandemic are also being felt at Opacc. For example, the digitalization push has triggered more e-business projects. "Things are going better than ever in this respect," he stated. The company is happy to take the associated growth as a "reward," because it does not have an actual growth strategy, but rather primarily pursues qualitative goals - which in turn lead to Opacc continuing to grow.

Opacc is also known for its outstanding working conditions as an employer. The company recently received the Best Workplace Award in the SME category. Among the privileges that Opacc employees enjoy is the use of mobile devices, which make it easy to work from home - of crucial importance in Corona times, of course. Nevertheless, Beat Bussmann relies on the high level of personal responsibility of the employees. And despite everything, personal exchange remains important.

Source and further information: Opacc

Although the Swiss SME Day 2020 was moved, but the annual KMU-Tag study by the Swiss Institute for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (KMU-HSG) was nevertheless conducted and has now been published. Over 200 managers took part in the survey.

Need for action in the Swiss SME landscape

According to the survey, 52% of the respondents see a high need for action to align their company in an agile(er) way. The number of reports of economic instability has increased in recent years. Political surprises have occurred at ever shorter intervals, causing uncertainty. The most recent three major events alone pose existential challenges for many SMEs: The lifting of the exchange rate floor by the Swiss National Bank, the Brexit decision in the UK and, above all, the Corona pandemic. Thus, 54% of the respondents state that uncertainty is higher or significantly higher today than it was five years ago. SMEs were also naturally surprised by the impact of the Corona pandemic. Over 60% of respondents rate the impact of Covid-19 as negative or even very negative for their business. In addition, just under 10% of respondents consider the likelihood that they will experience financial difficulties in the next twelve months to be great or very great.

High resilience and confidence

However, the results also show that SMEs have a high level of resilience and also prove themselves in times of crisis. Compared with large companies in Switzerland, SMEs have significantly higher scores for flexibility, agility and willingness to adapt and change. Despite all the uncertainty and surprises, 87% of SMEs rate their competitive position as good to very good. 44% of the companies continue to focus on growth and want to further expand their market shares. 30% of the respondents even want to penetrate new markets and business areas.

Pandemic drives digitization

Even the current pandemic is not leaving only negative traces in the Swiss SME landscape. Many SME managers praise the motivation and solidarity of their employees. For many SMEs, the pandemic seems to have triggered a new sense of unity. In addition, many respondents see a positive influence on digitization in their company. It is also frequently mentioned that the crisis has helped to question processes and structures and to align them consistently (more) with the needs of customers.

Source: SME-HSG

Every year, the Switzerland Global Enterprise Export Award recognizes a company that has successfully established a foothold abroad. A total of three finalists were nominated for the Export Award 2020: Berlinger & Co. AG from Ganterschwil, Sensirion AG from Stäfa and Storz Medical AG from Tägerwilen.

Berlinger & Co. AG chosen as winner

The winner was chosen by the independent Jury of business, science and media representatives, finally Berlinger & Co. AG from Toggenburg. The jury was impressed by the company's internationalization strategy, which is based on careful market analyses, the cultivation of global partnerships and a clever growth strategy.

Award ceremony by Ruth Metzler-Arnold

The Export Award 2020 trophy has been presented by Ruth Metzler-Arnold, Chairman of the Board of Directors of S-GE. "International business has been becoming more uncertain and volatile for years," said Ruth Metzler-Arnold. "Berlinger & Co. AG has managed to prove itself in this difficult environment and become a world market leader with a remarkable internationalization strategy and excellent risk management."

Innovation meets tradition

The high-tech products of Berlinger & Co. AG are used for the temperature monitoring of pharmaceutical and medical products as well as for the safe transport and storage of doping samples in elite sports. Thanks to personal contacts with international pharmaceutical companies and humanitarian organizations as well as sports federations and organizers of major sporting events, the hardware and software solutions from Toggenburg are in demand in over 180 countries. "Feel safe" is the slogan of the 155-year-old family-owned company, which trumps with continuity and innovation and plays an important role worldwide in terms of patient safety and in its commitment to clean sports.

Source: Switzerland Global Enterprise

The SSIS is the largest study of the Swiss software industry and provides forward-looking statements on revenue and employee growth. This year's study focused on the impact of COVID-19 and the importance of software reuse for Swiss software companies. The results were presented on the occasion of the CNO panels published in Bern on October 26, 2020.

The main results of the SSIS 2020

The SSIS 2020 states moderate growth overall with prospects for improvement: Profitability (EBIT margin) fell by 2.2 percentage points year-on-year to 6% in 2019. At the same time, Swiss software companies were able to increase revenue per employee to around CHF 245,000. Looking ahead to 2020, the software industry expects low revenue growth of 2.7% (2019: 9.5%) and employee growth of just 6% (2019: 11.9%). For 2021, a recovery is in sight with a forecast revenue growth of 10.2% and employee growth of 11.6%.

Swiss software industry successful abroad

2020 formed a successful year for foreign business: In 2020, the Swiss software industry generated around 21% of its sales abroad. After an interim decline in 2018 to around 14%, this represents a return to the export ratio of 2017. Germany remains by far the most important export market with a share of total sales abroad of around 55%, followed by the other European countries. The export share to non-European countries remains relatively low at 14.6%.

Investing in home office infrastructure in the wake of the COVID 19 pandemic.

Swiss software companies have not been spared from COVID-19 and the associated restrictions. Overall, however, the Swiss software industry was well prepared for the lockdown. Only 10.2% of the companies surveyed had to make major investments in the company-wide basic infrastructure for home office work (e.g. communication and collaboration software or VPN). However, 86.7% of the companies surveyed had to make larger investments to equip employees' home offices (e.g. in notebooks, monitors or headphones).

More flexible working models as a result of the COVID 19 pandemic

A majority of the Swiss software companies surveyed expect that the experience with COVID-19 and the associated restrictions will lead to the introduction of more flexible working models. In addition, a third of the companies surveyed want to empower their employees even more. Only 4% of the companies want to reduce their dependence on freelancers and sourcing service providers.

Revenue sources during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Providers and resellers of standard and cloud solutions as well as providers of customization services for third-party solutions experienced a slight upswing thanks to the pandemic. However, the majority of the industry suffered from the postponement of existing orders and the difficulty in acquiring new customers and new orders.

Swiss software industry wants to reuse more software

Increasing productivity through software reuse is of strategic importance: Reusing software and software knowledge to create new software is of great importance to Swiss software companies: 73.2% of the companies surveyed systematically store knowledge from past projects for reuse, 67.6% consider reuse to be critical to success, and for 50.3% it is even among their declared strategic goals.

Source and further information: ICT Switzerland

Founded in 1962, the family-owned company WESCO specializes in the development, manufacture and distribution of fume hoods and ventilation systems for kitchens, homes, offices and schools. The company employs a total of 300 people at its headquarters in Wettingen and at its subsidiaries in Germany and Italy, generating annual sales of over CHF 90 million. There is now a change at the top of the company: Irina A. Leutwyler succeeds Beat Ernst as the new CEO, who has been in charge of operations since the departure of Dr. Adrian Beer and will now concentrate on his strategic task as Chairman of the Board of Directors of the WESCO Group, which operates throughout Europe. In parallel, he will continue to accompany selected innovation projects.

Experienced manager 

"With Irina Leutwyler, we have appointed an experienced managing director at the helm of our dynamic family-owned company, who brings comprehensive know-how in the development of international sales channels as well as in the opening up of new markets and business areas. I am convinced that Irina Leutwyler, with her drive and passion, will steer WESCO AG into a modern and successful future," Beat Ernst elaborates. "The mission Better Air and WESCO's commitment to the health and well-being of its customers will be our guiding principles."

Irina A. Leutwyler: "Courage to break new ground".

"WESCO is a well-established Swiss brand. I'm looking forward to continuing the success story together with the employees," says Irina Leutwyler and adds: "With a pioneering spirit and the courage to break new ground to develop forward-looking solutions, we create added value for our customers."

Before joining WESCO, Irina A. Leutwyler (46) held demanding management positions in renowned Swiss SMEs and an international industrial group. The electrical engineer trained as an industrial engineer and also holds an Executive Master of Business Administration (EMBA) in Business Planning.

More information: WESCO

Fall is the budget season for businesses. Upcoming project costs, sales and fixed costs must be defined or forecast. Budgeting should be as realistic as possible right from the start so that there are no nasty surprises at the end of the year and company goals always remain in sight. Traditionally, young companies in particular find it difficult to estimate future costs and revenues. But the impact of the COVID pandemic makes it difficult for even long-time entrepreneurs to forecast their revenues. But especially for companies that work with foreign currencies and have to convert their sales in each case, early planning and hedging is urgently needed - also because the coronavirus will keep international trade in its grip for some time to come.

Autumn: It's time for budgeting

Zurich-based fintech company Ebury offers flexible financial services in the areas of financing, currency and payment services to SMEs operating internationally. In doing so, the company makes use of state-of-the-art technology. In addition, Ebury specializes in protecting companies from currency fluctuations and provides the following tips to help internationally active SMEs take the right measures for the coming financial year. Foreign currencies play a special role here.

Step 1: Estimate your costs or sales in foreign currencies

As difficult as it may seem, every company needs to estimate its expected fixed costs as well as variable costs for the coming year. Existing companies can forecast their revenues based on experience or existing orders. But even start-ups or younger companies should at least estimate their cost side with some degree of reliability: These include rents, insurance, wages and production costs. Here, special attention should be paid to costs or revenues that are spent or received in a foreign currency.

Step 2: Profit or cost protection - define the strategy

Once a rough idea of the coming year exists, the business should consider what is most important to it in terms of foreign currency management. Regular revenues or expenses in foreign currencies are naturally exposed to exchange rate risks. Now, if costs in a foreign currency are to be forecast through the end of the year, the operation should choose to minimize fluctuation: That is, the exchange rate should be fixed so that no unpleasant surprises await at the end of the year. Another option would be to protect operating profit: fluctuating exchange rates can eat up defined profit margins very quickly - in this case, the company could aim to define forecast sales in the foreign currency and fix the margin level based on this.

Step 3: Fix your budget rates

The budgeting is in place, and the currency management targets have been defined: The major part is done! Now it's time to define the budget rates for the various currencies based on the current rate. When defining, a buffer of about 5% can be quite useful, i.e.: Instead of fixing the exchange rate of US dollars to Swiss francs at the current 91 centimes, an exchange rate of 95 centimes can be budgeted. In this way, a pain threshold is set for the conversion and a negative exchange rate movement can be partially absorbed.

Step 4: Set the hedging strategy

With the targets set and the budget course, the next questions arise: What currency development can be expected? What is the industry outlook? Is the order situation relatively secure? Or are there practically no empirical values? All these questions are answered in the fourth step together with a professional. Ebury then defines an individual hedging strategy in close consultation with the company.

Step 5: Ensure flexible fitting

It's done: The measures have been defined, now it's time to implement them. While Ebury implements and continuously reviews the steps discussed, the company is well equipped to concentrate on its core business. Unlike traditional financial services providers such as banks, Ebury constantly monitors international trade and political events to advise clients on adjustments to their strategy. The team in Zurich is supported by state-of-the-art technology and international currency analysts. It does not matter whether the changes are driven by the currency market or whether the order situation of the company itself changes. This allows the SME to focus on the operational business, which can be worth its weight in gold in uncertain times like these.

Source and further information: Ebury

Maybe you know when parents encourage their children to go outside and play instead of always sitting in the living room. Why do they do that? Because they want their offspring to gain experience outside and experience something. Because we know that life experience never comes from studying in a room, but from getting your hands dirty.

Get out the door

I also sometimes feel like dad when I'm strategizing with my clients, saying, "You need to get out and experience and test your ideas!"

What do I mean by that? For most leadership teams, there is a big dip in the strategy process when it comes to transitioning from strategy to execution. Often, they have developed great new value propositions and new business models, or have come up with new structures and requirements for the team, or other innovations.

Turned in the wrong direction

And what happens next? Many are now trying to perfect these results with additional people. More stakeholders are involved in the discussion of business models, or HR managers in considerations of cultural change. The discussions are becoming more difficult because more and more details are being added.

It drags on and often comes to a complete standstill at some point. That is a pity! Because the results were excellent in the first step. Then you just took a turn in the wrong direction: Because instead of finally "going out to play", one has continued to occupy oneself "in the room".

Testing ideas in real life

But as I said at the beginning: You can only gain experience outside. That's why you need to get your new strategy hypothesis out into the market and into the reality of your culture as quickly as possible. This is the only way to avoid getting lost in the madness of discussion.

Here are three ideas on how to do that concretely:

1. Once you've decided on new value propositions and associated offerings (almost always an important part of the strategy), try to sell them to existing trusted customers - doing the following before you develop them or even produce them! You can offer favorable entry conditions for this or whatever else fits your market. Only when the first customers express serious interest, you know that you are on the right track.
2. For culture change issues, start the changes with a few teams or areas. See how it goes. You almost always need to make adjustments to communication and the exact design. But you won't know until you test your ideas in real life.
3. Shrink the time for everything, that is, give challenging timelines. For example, you might expect your people to have tested a new value proposition on 10-20 customers within 2-4 weeks and come back with suggestions for adjustments. Many people wait far too long and then wonder why nothing is progressing.

With these ideas, I hope to be able to encourage one or the other to bravely try them out. So then: What are you waiting for?

To the author:
Volkmar Völzke is a success maximizer. Book author. Consultant. Coach. Speaker. www.volkmarvoelzke.ch

The pandemic continues to set the pace. Whether in terms of the economic outlook or corporate risks, Swiss CFOs still seem to see the short- and longer-term development of the pandemic as the main factor in their planning. In terms of the economy, they do expect a rapid recovery compared with the spring. Nevertheless, a relative majority of 42% assess the economic outlook for Switzerland over the next twelve months negatively. Only 28% have positive expectations and 30% are neutral. The survey was conducted in September, i.e. before the current case numbers had shot up again.

Payment and credit defaults as a risk

However, economic expectations have clearly improved. In the spring, a full 96% of the CFOs surveyed after the introduction of the Corona measures still expected a negative development of the economy for the coming twelve months. "Our survey shows that the precarious situation of spring has eased for many companies," explains Michael Grampp, Chief Economist at Deloitte Switzerland. "However, the situation remains unstable, as can be seen in the latest pandemic developments. The steeply rising infection figures in Europe are unsettling many people. Much now depends on further political reactions - this applies to Switzerland as well as to our major sales markets."

The federal government's aid measures were able to stabilize the economic situation in Switzerland. In particular, short-time work and the rapidly disbursed Corona loans enabled companies to navigate through the crisis to some extent. "It is clear: The government aid measures were absolutely necessary at the beginning of the crisis," says Michael Grampp. "However, the longer such measures remain in place, the greater the risk of negative side effects. Companies that do not generate profit or create value should not be kept alive artificially on a permanent basis, otherwise there is a risk of zombification of the economy," Michael Grampp continues.

Return to pre-crisis levels still a long way off

More than half (54%) of the CFOs surveyed say that the financial situation of their companies has clearly improved compared to three months ago. In June of this year, just over two-thirds (67%) believed the outlook was poor and only 9% believed their situation would improve. "This significant turnaround is very encouraging," explains Alessandro Miolo, Managing Partner for Audit & Assurance at Deloitte Switzerland. "The Swiss economy seems to be stabilizing a lot faster than after the euro crisis or the franc shock."

As far as the growth outlook for the next twelve months is concerned, the CFOs surveyed are more cautious: only 36% are planning for growth and 29% are expecting a decline. Major differences can be seen in the details. While sales recover the most with an increase of 51%, there is only a slight increase in margins (increase of 21%) and employee numbers (increase of 1%) and the figures remain clearly in negative territory.

CFOs are less optimistic than they were three months ago about their revenues: "In the summer, CFOs were even more optimistic and assumed that the majority of their companies would already be generating revenues at pre-crisis levels again in the first quarter of 2021," says Alessandro Miolo. "Now, most CFOs don't expect revenues to fully recover until the third quarter of 2021, a full six months later."

Digitalization push catapults cyber security to the top

For the first time since the CFO survey began over ten years ago, Swiss CFOs cite payment and credit defaults as a significant risk for their companies and rank it as one of the top three risks. "The fact that payment and credit defaults are seen as one of the biggest risks clearly shows: CFOs take this risk very seriously. There is a risk that credit defaults could also affect banks," says Alessandro Miolo. "For the moment, payment difficulties can still go unnoticed, as government aid measures help bridge the gap," Miolo continues.

The pandemic is still the number one risk, followed by weak demand, which is also related to the pandemic. The biggest jump on the list is visible in the topic of cyber security. The risk identified in the Spring CFO survey predicted Digitization push during the pandemic has led to more people working from home, but this is increased the risk of cyberattacks. "CFOs have recognized that the flow of data into the home office needs to be better secured," explains Alessandro Miolo. "Companies are now required to take targeted measures to ensure that the home office does not become a gateway for cybercriminals. This includes, among other things, better training of employees and targeted investments in more secure IT solutions," says Miolo.

Reduction of employees and office space

As expected, many companies have imposed new cost-cutting measures on themselves. These are already very advanced at most companies. Most of the companies (85%) have mainly reduced spending on business travel or marketing, followed by a reduction in overtime and vacation balances (70%). As is very often the case during a crisis, many of the companies surveyed are planning to reduce headcount - 33% of respondents have already implemented this.

The situation with office space was also evaluated. 31% of the respondents are looking into what office space they will need in the future and 17% have already made changes. "More employees are working in home offices and this will continue in the future," says Alessandro Miolo. "On the one hand, companies can realize savings on office space as a result. On the other hand, more space will be needed to ensure spacing and to use the existing space differently. For example, there will be more space for sharing and meeting and less space for classic desks."

Source: Deloitte