staufen magazine 2019 | No.2

Science
Dr. Weyrauch, the topic of sustainability is at the top of Dürr‘s
agenda, not only in terms of its products and production methods,
but also explicitly in terms of its employees and leadership.
What does sustainable management look like at Dürr?
At Dürr, we like to use the image of an “entrepreneur at the company”
to illustrate this. As a global plant and mechanical engineering
company with individual projects worth over 100 million euros,
we need employees with a high level of customer orientation,
flexibility and personal responsibility. Here, it is essential to give
employees a sufficient degree of freedom, for example, through
flat hierarchies and short decision paths. In addition, we train our
employees to identify problems early on, independently develop
solutions, and make decisions. The basis for this is the trust and
orientation of their own leadership skills. In addition, we practice
a culture where mistakes are allowed, addressed and corrected,
rather than staying silent. It is important for our motto to be: A
mistake is the start of a sustainable improvement process – and
we want to anchor this understanding even more in our company,
also by introducing Shop Floor boards.
In the media and at conferences, sustainability has not been
discussed much; the focus has been on agility. Does the “agility
hype” with project work, freelancers and greater individual
responsibility overshadow sustainability?
The word “agility” is also on everyone‘s lips at Dürr. Particularly in
the digitization of our products and services, the high dynamics of
the market cause established methods to reach their limits. But
the concept of “agility” is not fundamentally new: Short planning
cycles, flat hierarchies, working in teams with changing composition
and a strong customer focus all existed in the past.
employees and executives when introducing and developing
working methods.
In addition to agility in the operative business, the general
adaptability of a company plays a decisive role in the medium
to long term. How do you manage to not only do everything
right at Dürr, but also always the right thing?
Management must clearly communicate and put change into
practice. This is vital for its success or failure. Change can only
work if a company‘s own employees are actively involved in the
process. A good example of agile change at Dürr is the development
conference for establishing the IIoT platform ADAMOS
during the summer of 2017. At that time, around 70 employees
from 3 companies across all hierarchical levels sat at one table or
in changing groups, and developed a common vision and shared
tasks in a very short time.
And how are sustainability and agility reflected in your
day-to-day – as a Dürr board member and in your private life?
Personally, the exchange with and feedback from employees are
very important to me. For this reason, I, for example, regularly
invite a small group of people to breakfast meetings in a relaxed
atmosphere. In my opinion, sustainable business management
can only succeed if you know where the real problems lie. Agility
and sustainability in my private life has helped me with my now
grown-up twins, my long-lived passion for automobiles and my
love for aviation that has lasted for 25 years. ■
So sustainability and agility do not contradict each other?
Exactly, we want to achieve sustainable goals through agile
processes. Here, agile methods are a useful addition to existing
tools. The requirement for this, however, is to involve your own
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