Denmark vs. the world
I was at a meeting the other day – a Danish-born multinational company – when there was an awkward moment of silence. It happened because the English and German country managers had asked that the brand of their company should be “less Danish”.
The Danish managers then asked what exactly that meant. The halting reply came that subsidiaries outside Denmark experienced the management style as “dusty”, “slow” and “bureaucratic”.
Interesting really, when you think about the tremendous speed of fast-developing economies such as that of China. Makes me wonder how competitive Denmark might be in the future – particularly when I also hear a comment from Grundfos’s large Chinese subsidiary say (quoted in Børsen) that, in their opinion, Chinese engineers are better than Danish engineers!
June 20th, 2007 at 11:25 am
Denmark vs. The World,
As a Danish national, I have to admit that the Danish management style seems to be viewed as both ”dusty” and ”antiquated” and ”slow”.
I shocked a Harvard and London Business School professor yesterday when I told him that in the top 200 companies in Denmark only 1% of managers are not Danish nationals. He was appalled when I added that the board of the Confederation of Danish Industries [DI] is made up of 78 white male managers over the age of 50 and 3 women. ”These are Italian standards”, the Greek professor in out-sourcing spitted out.
MIGRATERS scouts for managers in Asia Pacific and has a vast pool of
partners in the BRIC countries. Chinese managers and graduates have an impressive level of proficiency and efficiency, and often surpass the best Western managers.
Then again, why the fuss? The population in Asia alone is approx. 3 times as large as the US and Europe added together, and some Asian management schools are simply excellent.
Charlotte/
MIGRATERS
June 21st, 2007 at 10:33 am
I was struck by a photo in Børsen (Danish national business daily) today of Danisco’s managing director, Tom Knutzen. It epitomized the dusty, traditional, out-of-date profile - he was depicted in semi-darkness, at his desk, flanked by two old Danish-design lamps, etc. I was amazed that a company that wants to be seen as innovative actually puts such photos out in the press!
In New Zealand, by the way, I remember that the top 5 positions in the country were held by women: Chief Justice, Governor General, Prime Minister, largest company’s CEO, and damn it, I’ve forgotten what the fifth position was. Come on Denmark!
June 21st, 2007 at 2:22 pm
Denmark vs the World
There is a structural reason for the maleness in Danish businesses. Danisco is one of a vast number of companies founded by one man in the 18th century, Carl Frederik Tietgen. The same man founded the largest Danish financial institution, the Børsen (the stock exchange), and several more. He also founded the city of Esbjerg and the first telegraph. In fact, you name it, C.F.Tietgen founded it. His companies changed business life in Denmark. The management guru, Michael E. Porter of Harvard, says he has never seen a business community such as the Danish.
MAERSK on the other hand is not a Tietgen founded company and MAERSK conducts its business by its own standards. Funnily enough MAERSK is the star in Denmark in terms of turnover and revenue. Yet, we see no copycats. MAERSK may not have an impressive track record on hiring female managers, but MAERSK has a level of diversity seen in very few Danish companies. In fact, I find MAERSK excellent in hiring local managers on sites in China, etc.
”Danish design is an old chair”, foreign designers say when looking at Danish design from abroad. The old chair – The Chair – is known as Ægget and was designed almost 50 years ago. But we still praise ourselves for our innovative design.
Come on Denmark!
July 13th, 2007 at 6:20 pm
Although there is a lot of noise in Denmark about globalization and looking to the rest of the world for opportunities, inspiration and human resources, I am disappointed at the lack of non-Danes being invited to contribute to this discussion.
At Dansk Erhverv’s 2007 annual conference (Årsdag), there was one foreign guest speaker - Simon Anholt - who was excellent. Bravo for getting him involved. However, he didn’t really have an intimate knowledge of Denmark. And what does he really care? There are plenty of well-qualified, able foreigners here who have a great deal of knowledge about and commitment to Denmark, yet you very rarely see them (us) contribute.
I’m sure that these ‘local-foreign’ opinions would offer a lot of great ideas, and an independent perspective, that would benefit Denmark’s place in the international business market. Just give them a chance!