Name: Mondelez CEO Dirk Van de Put Promotes a 'Culture of Questioning'
Uploaded: 2019-02-07
Duration: 4 min 56 s
Description: Van de Put says he wants to remove the fear of failure for his employees.

[ MUSIC ] Derrick, when you were recruited to be CEO of Montalees you were brought in to really change things up. And there's always that debate about is an outsider who brings a fresh look gonna be better than an insider who already knows the lay of the land? So now that you are the company's new Outside or boss. What would you say is the most special thing that you bring to your leadership? I think the style that I bring in a company like Mondelez is very different. My style I believe is very authentic, down- to- earth, casual Say it like is, be real, as they say. And I find in corporate America, that's different, and I would say refreshing. I hope that will inspire people to feel like I'm working for a company that is trying to do the best it can. And I want to be part of that. You worked at many companies before you came to Mondaleez, you were CEO for many years of a private Canadian company Mckain Foods, you also worked at Novartis, Dannon, Coca- cola, many others. When it comes to reinventing a company and leading change, what have you leanred from all those experiences that tells you Who are the winners and who are the losers? The winners are the ones that have the best vision of the future and where the leader, the CEO, is osught of the ambassador of the future. In his mind and with his team, they have already decided what will be true five years, 10 years down the road for the company. And on a day to day basis, they tyr to get the whole organization. Along to make that huge hit a reality. I think that separates the real winners from companies that are really just living from year to year trying to deliver financial results. Well, a lot of business leaders say that you really have to have this culture of innovation to do what you're Talking about, what's your thought on that. It's not necessarily a culture f innovation, certainly that's part of it. But it's a culture of constantly questioning, constantly trying to improve, never be happy with what's going on and giving people the opportunity to constantly evolve and do new things. Many companies don't like that, they like a certain way of working and they wanna repeat the same, I think the winners are the ones that can question that. And then constantly wanna change that. So, what are you doing? What's the key thing that you are doing at Mon Delice to create that culture of questioning? I don't have the answers. I need everybody in the company to find the answers. What I can do is enable you, is empower you, is giving you the possibility as somebody who works in the company to help us to fulfill our purpose as a company. And so we're trying to make sure that people feel that they are empowered, they have autonomy, and they can go and do things and make it interesting for themselves. You've also talked a lot about the importance of speed of innovation Of being agile and nimble. And we hear this actually from a lot of companies these days. You've gotta move more quickly. So what are you saying to Mondelez's 100, 000 employees all around the world? To get them to move more quickly, I mean it's not like you have an on and off switch here. I need to take away any barriers that exist for them to move fast. I need to take away blaming, or feel of failure, or not accepting being different. But then it's up to the people to, when they have that freedom to really go and do something with it. And so I need to create the framework, the space. They need to have the mindset and the willingness and the courage to go and do that. How's it going so far? So far so good, I see a lot more enthusiasm about what we can do as a company. There's a lot more initiatives going out. We don't feel that we have this pressure of constantly watching where we're gonna make extra margin. But that we really are shifting towards focusing on the consumer. So Dirk, was there a person in your personal or professional life who gave you some really meaningful leadership advice that resonates with you today and really shaped your leadership style? In beginning of my career I worked for Marsh and there was somebody who really Was my mentor and promoted me and gave me a lot of leadership opportunities. And as I grew up through out the organization he kept on telling me, he said if you want to lead the [ UNKNOWN ] you have to turn your back to the audience and he meant that you are not playing for your boss, you not praying for if you are in a public company fo the outside world You're here with your team. Make sure that's the core of what you do and make it successful.

Mondelez CEO Dirk Van de Put Promotes a "Culture of Questioning"

Van de Put says he wants to remove the fear of failure for his employees.