 Thank you very much for having me. I'm very happy to be here today I'm also very happy to be moderating this debate since it's it's an odd mixture Actually, I think when you're talking about strategy because we have three entrepreneurs Young startup companies and then we have one old timer Yeah, I can call him that and I am I'm going to going to introduce them one by one and calling them up here I think we're gonna start with ladies first. So Joining me on stage, please. Karina is the founder and CEO of winter spring I went to her LinkedIn profile the other day and her skills were all about financial stuff It's it says you're good at fixed income capital markets and credit sales And you've also had an impressive career in Bank of America Merrill Lynch and you've been in Morgan Stanley But suddenly she decided to try something new. So she started a company that makes ice Desserts, it's very different from investment banking And we'll hear a lot more about that. So thank you, Karina Also joining us is a middle degree. Come on up here media here Metta is the CEO and co-founder of and Armando. She actually graduated from Aarhus University in political science, I believe and She worked for McKinsey and company, but then suddenly she Decided to get off the beaten track. She quit her day job and she co-founded and Armando in 2007 They had a rough start because no one would give them capital, but they succeeded and today and Armando has 26 million users worldwide. You just told me I bet some of you use it when you're running and Bicycling and yeah, we all pretty much know it. Thank you, Mitty And The gentleman today, let's take the old-timer Peter to ball come closer Peter is the CEO of of Arla and he he's been there since 2005 in this position he steered the company through a lot of rough times most famously the the crisis in The aftermath of the satirical Muhammad drawings and since then he's Had a very ambitious growth strategy And he actually he excelled in it because the target was a revenue of 75 billion Before 2015, but he already reached that last year. So a very cool gentleman joining us today. Thank you And last but not least more than stronger More than modern founded Unfoned which you probably know the the mobile company it served as a game changer. I just when I was reading about you modern I read that Unitiated a price wall that actually cost the industry Roughly two and a half billion Danish Krona So I guess there's a lot of angry mobile phone CEOs out there when they think about you But he sold on phones to TTC in 2011 Which made him a millionaire, but he didn't Kick back and rest and said he he went on and in 2013. He founded Moffibo an e-book company so this is our panel for today and Will be doing all of your questions in just a while To start up. I have one question. I should have two questions for all of you The first question is how do you define strategy? What is strategy to you and how does it play a role in your Company and I think we should start with you Karina. Sure So, how do I define strategy to me I started up very basic I had a vision and That was a point somewhere out there and my strategy was how to get there and Starting up a business like mine doing well to do the same quality. I Sussex that you get at the best best restaurants. I had loads of setbacks I mean every day there was a setback But as long as we kept going it took two years to develop my route was my strategy and My strategy was the route to my vision But did you sit down in the beginning and write down a strategy and decided this this is how I'm going to do it And did you do it in a lot of steps or how do you how do you do that? So I worked very much According to whatever came against me on a daily weekly monthly basis So I adjusted my strategy to whatever obstacle I had in front of me My vision stayed the same. I wanted to bring this product to the market I started with the Danish market and that was my vision and my strategy then changed According to obstacles one example could be that the production site couldn't deliver the quality I wanted or I couldn't get the ingredients. I wanted I was in constant competition with the best restaurants for where I bought my quality my my ingredients And that's just a sort of a practical example of what I would face of both obstacles and I think As an entrepreneur Your flexibility is to go against whatever up to obstacles and keep going on your strategy on your route to your vision What about you Peter you were you come from a pretty different starting point And you've been through a couple of strategies actually already in Anna. What does it mean to you? Actually, you know, I get I sense that it's the same thing But I would then express it maybe in a different way because I have to speak to so many markets and and people So so it becomes in that sense, maybe a more boring kind of way of talking about it But it basically is the same it it it must start with as I showed this Afternoon also with a mission and vision the reason for being something that you dream about and even a big corporate Out of who's can dream about something at least I can And it had and that dream must be somehow ambitious You know you want to raise yourself that could be size-wise as we have done But it could also be into an area that you know you dream of or an ambition or a set of competencies that you want to acquire But I think also it has to be demand driven. Otherwise, you know, it goes nowhere You won't be able to make money out of it So so there must be a demand out there you have to understand it And then I believe that strategy basically and that's maybe the corporate side must be kind of a framework of tasks That you can actually from the top drill down into more and more specific Actions and things that happen and projects and what do I know? That's what I need So so it starts there and then it has to be Interpretated and I have to have a certain set of KPIs that follow up whether we are actually You know doing something that reaches the vision and the ambitions or are we just you know Working and going and going nowhere. So it has to be measurable But then it also and that's maybe the Something which could be surprising it has to be agile. I mean planning everything in detail It's just impossible you hardly can't do that a year ahead But you can have an idea where you're going and that idea should drive you and then you have to have be agile and Have the courage to change your mind on the way not on the big way the only way you want to be but how you do it Close down projects and open up new projects and and have the courage That's what I call it. There must be some agility in the in the strategy. You're working with and that's why I'm very Fund of a framework of a strategy, which is a framework that releases some energy in the company and and and that's and where I can get Surprised of solutions to a strategic issue. Do you confess to any I mean specific the strategic Designs or theories when you sit down and make your new strategy for the next three four five years. I For many years worked with something called loads LOTS, which is an idea of how you work process wise with your strategy It has no fancy models, but it's just you have to go through a certain set of frequencies You know your vision you have to describe that know where you are one of it want to be You have to be able to describe and analyze where am I then today before you start setting specific targets and think about your organization So it's it's more of a process tool that so it clicks in my head as oh, we are here now So let's discuss this and then people are jumping ahead of me and I said listen We're not finished with this. We need to understand where we are and not where we're going We can talk about that later. So it's a process tool, but it's not a you know What you learn? It still sounds it still sounds very organized Because it's not valuable. It's just because I'm a simple guy. I just need to Govern that process and then we have people who are just as bright as you are and they work with all the tools Middle what about you and when you started in the Mundo, what did you do strategically? Did you sit down and like arena make a blueprint or what did you do? Yeah, we did so we didn't have any money at all to put into this when we first started out So we had to find investors. So we had a very nice business plan Coming from Mackenzie. We had an easy time making very beautiful slides And we got all the meetings with the VCs, but it was like no money followed those meetings so we just had to keep on working on our own strategy and there were a lot of things to consider because We started a market that didn't really exist and there were Naysayers all over the place people would sell us almost on a daily basis that it was way too soon GPS technology wasn't advanced enough yet Maybe if we came back in three years, they would consider it Or they said who in their right mind would bring a phone when they go for a run That was another thing we kept hearing so We really had to think strategically about it But then at the end we just followed our passion and we just believed that so you stuck to your initial Strategy. Yeah, so I mean one thing is vision and mission and those things are kind of easy and they never change at least For us. It's been seven years now, but the strategy changes every year a year and a half for us So modern stronger the the investment banker the CEO and the McKinsey Corporate representative they all have a different take on charity. You graduated from high school That's it education wise for you. What did you do when you had to sit down and then and make a strategy? I think that now we we have a framework as well. We understand which drivers should be in our strategy We spend a lot of time about talking about our vision and defining our vision. I think for me it's It's I haven't read any books about strategy at all Though I have a book business. I've only read like 10 books in my life But I've been at TDC for two and a half years where I learned a lot about corporate and how they work with strategy within corporate Which is actually really I've learned a lot from that in which we use the movie was well for me strategy It's extremely important that you remember the customers. It's extremely important that you that you that your employees understand With in which direction you're going. I see a lot of companies focusing more about having the right story towards their shareholders Then making a strategy and creating a strategy which their employers actually understand and that should be prior to one two and three because you get a much more effective Organization if they actually understand How they should act in the day and which direction they which what creates value for the company Can you give any examples? I mean what what differs the two strategies the one for the for the stakeholders and the one for the employees I Think we do have a very clear strategy towards the stakeholders because we are a company We are spending shitloads of money and are going to invest a lot of money and going into new markets So we have to raise money at all times. We're actually raising money at the moment So we have to be very clear in terms of what creates value for the for the shareholders and and integrate that into our plans as well if we we might have some brilliant idea of where we want to go but if if there are if The shareholders they don't agree and in terms of what creates value, then we won't get the money and the book closed down the project So we do believe a lot. We work a lot with with the shareholders, but I believe even more in It's much more important that the employees actually understand especially when you're small company They need to know which direction you're going and why they actually work for you Then they sit and work all weekend. They sit and work till late at night and so on and then they work on the right things And not the wrong things I want to ask you one more question before we turn to the questions from the audience because you're all here because you have You've had success with what you're doing and your success stories But I want to know if you've ever had a failure with your strategy, and I know a middle degree We talked about this just before we came down here. You said, oh, yeah, there's been plenty So so what has that meant for you that that you've had some some failures? well the main I think the biggest strategic mistake we made was some years ago we Of course, you know being a tech startup. We had no clue how to make money We just wanted a lot of users and then we thought, you know, we'll figure it out as we go along but then when we When we then started thinking about what should the business model be At some point we went into hardware Which was really not a clever move at all We're good at software. I think we figured out how to do that. Okay But but going into hardware for us meant starting an apparel collection We even started producing hard-rate money with money source and it's just a completely different ballgame And it's super competitive. So it cost a lot of money To to go down that path and it's really for me it's been I think the money has been well spent in the sense that I learned a lot and We are not ever gonna get the focus like that again Is it my microphone being weird or Maybe it is. Maybe this will get someone to look at it. Meanwhile, I'll ask you Peter to walk you You've been the strategic game a bit longer. Are there any pitfalls regarding strategies? I mean anything that you can say don't do that No, no, no, no, but I have had my chance or my part of Failures not something that I normally advertise. So it's a bit surprising to be here But but let me tell you one story of one of the things that I had on my list the last In the last in that strategy we had for five years since 2008 was to create a big other foods in Poland It was very important to us to get farmers to get, you know, it's very close to us and Could be dangerous because you know They can produce cheap so we wanted to be part of that and I never forget then I think it was in 2009 That we sat together on the 22nd of December and I had prepared everything and and the papers were there And we had had tons of meetings And then I got my farmer board together with the farmer board of the opponent You can say it turned out to be an opponent and and we had Christmas Christmas gifts It was in Copenhagen. It was at Rødhåsplassen. It was wonderful And and halfway through the dinner ready to sign the chairman stood up and said we are not ready yet And then it all turned very sour and one of the reasons that I really I Had forgotten that that the owners really were in Poland There were farmers. They were not ready actually to be part of something that was not Polish So that was a cultural thing actually all the business people all the business was right We were we were in fully agreement with each other. It was a I mean it was fantastic for them actually But culturally I'd forgotten to understand them. That's the ones in a lifetime. I'll never do that again So we packed together. We didn't have the reason among we went home Damn actually What about you Karina any any epic fails in winter Springs beginning Well, my my company still very young But I thought I shared with you today this absolutely humiliating Situation I had six months ago, which was we are very close to the end of our product development In fact, you can I could bring samples to this presentation Which was with a very large capital fund an equity fund and I was looking for an investor and I came in I made the call They took me in all the senior partners there were was present and as you know now my background is banking so I'm used to these sort of meetings and I had a great presentation with me including ice desserts of a certain standard and I did the presentation at the end the guy who was the most senior he put down his pen and he said Karina It's not going to work. Why don't you come and work for us and give that up? And I I was speechless because I thought I did brilliant and I thought my vision was very clear And I thought I could take this company anywhere in the world And the guys just totally closed down my idea and my strategy of getting an investor on board now And I went home I by then I financed everything up to that point and I said to my husband That's it. I'm going to be stupid now, but I'm going to be ruthless. I'm going to invest I'm going to go all in this is my company and I believe in it and that changed everything But it was different because I didn't think that was my strategy and I had to change strategy And now I don't need an investor and that's why I could bring this product to the market Which was in my way the best way, but of course it was a huge setback I mean, I'm standing here laughing, but it was humiliating and Also, I realized I wasn't easy. It wasn't easy for me to explain to people where I wanted to take it and Yeah, and and in two weeks I'm going to New York and I'm meeting a strategic partner and not a money partner as such and I know it's going to be different It's sort of a classic tale actually, isn't it? You have to go into some very strong headwind before you can actually say this is what I want to do You get your your target straight. What about you modern stronger? Does it apply to you, too? Or is it in somewhat cliche Yeah, I think I had my share of failures. I I think one of them is Agnes the cupcake company, which I don't now don't know why I bought But I did and I didn't Big mistake. I didn't use enough time on analyzing the case before it was a company going bankrupt So I had to move fast But I didn't I didn't dive into the figures as much that I should have And I actually didn't close down the company After buying the company I should have looked into the I did look into the company I got quite surprised of what actually was going on in the company, but then I decided okay I have to try to turn turn it around where I should have actually said, okay This won't work. I should close it down straight away And I get the company going for for a year so and lost Quite a lot of money on that. So I think that's it You have to admit your mistakes straight away I think that's what actually big companies are very good at they're very good at laying down a strategy and then sticking to it No matter what and not Sacrificing projects a fast enough, which doesn't work and so on So so I think it's very common both for small companies, but also for the big ones. They're very good at not revising the strategy often and not enough and Not admitting that they actually chosen the wrong path or the wrong project or whatever So but has it scared you off from investing in in in branches or categories that you don't necessarily know anything about I Think I shouldn't go into Physical stores and into beverages and so on I've had a Cupcake company which went bankrupt and I had a beer company So I think I'll stick to something with subscriptions or an online based but apart from that I'm still very happy to invest and to go out into new ventures Okay, I think we should turn now to some of the questions that the audience has Has delivered. I think actually we're gonna start with the one With the most votes so Peter you were talking about that you that you didn't embrace the culture enough when you had your new new strategy and This question is actually about that Culture eats strategy for breakfast true or false. So Peter Natural to start with you. It's true. What do you do about it? But you can't separate the two and that's what's wrong with the question If you did want to choose one or the other then the question is of course, yes, because there's much more sustainability in culture But but the two belong together a good strategy Also understands the values and the cultural elements of what you're doing and the markets you're approaching So they go hand-in-hand and don't eat each other That's what I forgot by the way in Poland, but so many other things went well Made a look you're still you're still a small company. You do have a couple of employees. I think it's around 30 40 40, sorry Okay, how do you I mean? How do you ensure that your strategy goes hand-in-hand with with the culture that that you are growing? I think it's a lot easier when you have a small company and It's easier when you are a startup because the people you bring in They only join because they believe what you believe most of the time They're gonna take a salary cut if they came from another job, so they do this because they're very passionate about it So in that sense, I think it's it's a lot easier in a startup because we're really living the vision all day long Working at McKinsey. I worked with strategy and very different type of corporations You know the size of a penis and there it really is It can be quite tricky because you have so many layers and you really need it to be bottom-up and not just top-down More than how do you define culture and when you're starting a company? Do you do you define it or does it create itself? I Think it creates a self for me. I'm very I put a lot of effort into to creating the right culture as Metta said we would be paying a lot more In salary if we didn't have the culture we had We would be seeing people coming at 9 o'clock and leaving at 4 o'clock and not leaving at at 8 o'clock in the evening so I think it's For us as a small company culture is extremely important because you have to push your employees to a great degree because you Just want to move forward and you want to accelerate as fast as possible So it's extremely important that that the employees are there for another reason than money They have to be there because they love the vision to love the idea to love the team to love all that but yeah Cleaner what's your take on it culture versus or is it implies to be honest when I read the question? I didn't get it because I don't separate the two And I think the culture of the company particularly when you're young when the company's young and you're very small Small being less than 50 people It's so important that you embrace a culture where everyone gets what you're doing and of course they do because you're full of passion And you're the owner of the business Morton I coming up here today We talked about him hiring a senior person and taking someone from another company and put them into your company and make them believe And trust everything you do for a lot of people. That's a huge sacrifice That's outside their comfort zone and we as entrepreneurs and we kind of embracing that we want them because we need their knowledge But we also well aware that we have to create a culture that makes them feel safe and of course need it because we need them The other thing about culture is say no one loves your company more than you and you have to step back and and understand that So whoever you hire is never going to be you but someone who could almost do your job But with less passion and in the beginning I found that really hard I couldn't understand why someone wasn't reading emails at 2 a.m Because I was and why was why were they not researching the same ingredients or something else or techniques Because I was but of course, how could they how could I put that on put that on them when it wasn't their company? It wasn't their vision Having said that though I think we all hire people that look a lot like ourselves and the culture we create is a reflection of us Peter you wanted to get back on that Yeah, I think that and there's absolutely no difference between being a corporate big creature like us and a smaller company like like what you're representing No strategy works if the culture doesn't work and if the culture is not clear And you won't be able to attract the right people either and there will be people who enjoy working with other foods And you know they will give anything to work with us and those who say no That's not a place for me and that's actually very fine because that tells me that then we stand for something at least also as a big company And that's very important. That's what I spoke about this morning because what is culture? Culture is also what your brand represents. It's your branding value. It's your leadership style It's it's the whole HR community. Of course It's the identity of the company as well also the outside identity all not only what goes inside And the beauty is big or small company is if you can get your identity You're in a DNA call that culture or whatever. I call it the DNA if you can get that Into helping you make business outside. That's when the agents really starts to sing And that is right that is difficult in a big company But nevertheless, it's needed and big surprise I spent minimum 50% of my time on HR issues or my on on value issues And the rest is strategy and occasionally visiting customers Okay, I think we have a question from the audience In line with this We all agree or I think most would agree that many changes or many strategies that fails comes from within the culture when people have Disabilities or unwillingness to change Do you have any examples from your strategy? Implementations where they failed in this regard good question. I think we should start with you middle of it I don't I don't think we've had any examples of the strategy failing because of the culture We've had examples of the strategy failing because of leadership and bad strategy So I don't I don't think we have in terms of the culture But we we have been through a couple of years ago Two and a half years ago. We we went in position where we were running out of cash A little bit too quickly for my taste and we had to To cut a quite a bit of cost so we had to let go of a third of our team Basically at that time and that was really tough Of course, it's tough to let people go, but it was especially tough to build up the team spirit afterwards With two-thirds left and a lot more people left voluntarily And because there's nothing easier Then then for an engineer to get a new job. I mean they can always start on Monday somewhere else So that was really tough But it took eight nine ten months and now I think we have a culture That's we have a much bigger team now But we also have a much stronger culture because we've been through that exercise You say that your your work is easier because your startup company which means the culture is is stronger What do you do to ensure that the culture remains strong? I mean in the future so you don't have failures because you don't have an alignment between the two I think one important thing that I learned from banking was that you share the ins and outs of what's going on and You sit down and you spend the time and you make the effort of explaining what's going on what what's happening And with that you just show passion because it is your business and You share the idea of where you want to take it next what markets you're looking at you also Plan seeds for your employees to grow with you take responsibility Find you Products that wherever they exist. I have an employee who came to me not reached a lot long ago and said look This is happening in Norway. We've got a look at this It's not far from where we are doing and so on and I didn't ask him to do that But I could tell he's just out of passion. He investigated it himself He found it somewhere and it made sense to him that we had a chat about it And I think by being honest and showing who you are and where you're coming from in good and bad ways You are kind of feeding into that culture. You're trying to build The other thing I say is that no matter what level and no matter what you do you have to share that It doesn't matter if someone is senior or junior you share and the culture is Important as much for the senior person as the junior person Peter you have thousands of employees I guess you can't sit down and be sure they all share the same culture No, and I'm actually coming back to the question down there because I think that I have I have something that that inspired me from from the World I come from From alafous alafous the the foundation of the alafous that you know today was created in the year 2000 after through the 90s mergers and mergers in Denmark that was when we were known probably still are but but in an unnice way as the giant And and and then there was a merger between the big Danish company and an almost as big company in Sweden That's the foundation of alafous that we know today and and at that time management and I was actually part of it Not the CEO, but I was part of the management at a slightly lower level We were very occupied on you know heart synergies There was a ton of sorry don't say to anybody But there was a ton of money to be made in heart synergies really getting efficiency out of the company You know all that thing which is as far as way from culture as you can get or branding But really getting you know the inner synergy is right and a lot of money and we should work on that but we actually for a period Forgot two three years or didn't have time to you can say to actually get together and say this company Which has been built very rapidly of different cultures What is actually the inner DNA of it? And I remember there was a saying in alafous that we are we are a group of merger of among equals That that's that's rubbish There is no because that's you know saying that the cultures that we there's so many cultures and they're different They're all equal and it went haywire Actually, no branding strategies. Nobody sat together thinking about all the smart things we should do But we made a lot of money said it was okay then in Denmark in 2004 We ran into this big crisis that we had we had it was really horrible and our image dropped like hell And it's coming back now again, but but it's we really had some years of toughness Because we had and I think it was because we haven't thought about our inner DNA Which made so we could we haven't earned the right actually to be So big in the consumer in the fridge back home with the consumers as we are And this is why I actually when I took over in 2005 it could have been anybody else But a CEO at that time in his right mind would say stop now We need to get back and find out what is the DNA amount of woods and then get rid of all the other stuff and Defined the culture and I spent two years on that some of our the employee said what are you mad? You're spending so much time on this together with your HR director. I have the best HR director. Don't tell anybody in The world and we traveled the world and we still do Visiting places Talking about all of this because it's never ending One strong I also want to hear you about this question. Have you had any incidents where you're where a strategy failed because of the culture? I think that Merging on phone into the TTC corporation. I wouldn't say it failed because we did leave all that the hard stuff in terms of Merging a company and made a lot of money out of that But the cultural difference between the on-phone company with with something like 200 employees and a company like TTC Didn't go well at all. We really tried to to to to prepare ourselves and to to explain the vision and merge the visions and so on But but in the first two months and everybody was very eager and very happy about it to start off with But after three months or something like that, it became the TTC way of the highway and and that actually a lot of the employees They ended up leaving the company But isn't that sort of natural? I mean when you when you urge into a big company I can't I wouldn't say that it's it's a failure because it's we expected something like that to happen because it's two different Totally different companies. It was it was a small company built in extreme values and very driven by me as a person and Coming into a big company with eight thousand employees Where where you run the company in another way? It's has to have some consequences and those people and those profiles of employees They don't see themselves in a in a role like that and won't ever see them. So it's it's a natural thing, but I Think we could have been a little better a lot. I Think we should take another question from from the audience It's a lot about ducks and horses. I don't know if my management lingo is is getting a bit tired I'm not sure if it's actually a saying Strategy wise would you rather fight one whole sized duck or 100 duck sized horses and how would you do it? I'm going to translate this into would you rather meet one very big challenge or a lot of small ones in your strategic work So Karina, what do you say? Oh, I don't know. I guess you get hit by both Truth is you get hit by both particularly if you're ambitious and we all are that's why we're here, right? I think if you do a globalization if you take your company global you will face this and Would I rather be hit by it? I don't know. I think you have to keep your company on its feet You have to be really ready to maneuver in whatever realities throws at you whatever market you're going to entrance I Don't know what else to say really. I mean The truth is when you're small you can really adopt very quickly as much as you can with the cash you have and As much as you like to be a sort of a flexible you there is also some some things that are just not possible For example, I'm thinking of taking my company I already have a deal with by Norway and I'm thinking of doing Sweden That should be a no-brainer But in fact it showed me that it's not and I'm taking a step back from that and maybe let that happen Next year or a year after and there's loads of reasons for that But I think I'm going to be hit by one horse and a lot of ducks Neither sounds very nice. Peter. I'm gonna ask you the the crisis Related to the circle Mohammed drawings. I mean I would call that one huge horse-sized duck What what was worse getting hit by that or or every day smaller problems? definitely the big elephant-sized duck I don't understand the question actually But but I think I understand it but but but yeah, it's it's a That was horrible actually kept me quite awake for for some nights over half a year period But but in terms of competition if that's what's meant I think you know the tough competition that we have and I think that's very important that you as a company Define your competition who's actually my competitor what market am I in so that's something that you've read in the book I'm sure but and and I know that the toughest of our peers That's the Nestle the Unilever some of the really big elephants that we are they can hurt us and damage us and some of the dreams That we have they can block that But to be honest, I enjoy every day when some of our employees for example in Denmark say we have a tough Composition with teaser they just made this and that and I said excellent. Let them bite you again so that you to keep your life So that's the small dog and I love those because that they keep us alive and then in spite they actually inspire us The big other elephants. That's a nasty game on the savannah If we look at it as a as a competition View more than you've been the smaller smaller challenger to a big business. What did you take from that that you can use? I just want one comment to that didn't I'll also built More liking they didn't they get more sympathy within the markets You're in the home markets the McSween and so on do the Mohammed crisis So they actually increased your brand like in in those markets in some yes And and in others not actually we had some problems in Denmark because Denmark was divided in two So it was like, you know having two hearing program three and program one in At the same time and and we couldn't separate it So we were loved by some and hated by others and and outside of Denmark. They just didn't understand anything But but the brand then became Quite famous in these markets and that by that we grew But we lost in Middle East for some years. I have to admit Yeah, I wanted to know about being the being the small challenger. What did that teach you? And coming into a big corporation or just I mean challenging the market I mean you were Yeah, the Trojan horse of the mobile market, I guess. I think what I've learned is that a lot of the big Corporations they they say that they are Customer centric and focused on the customer But for real they're not they don't know much about their customers And they don't really care about their customers So I think a big Being a small player, of course, you're you're faster. You move faster. You don't have anything to cannibalize and so on All all you create is new revenue and so on But I think You know, there's always an opening in a lot of the big markets in terms of taking the customer side and creating and really thinking of the Customers and prioritizing him number one two and three So that's what I've learned also from being within a big company It's very seldom. It's actually customer first But is it possible to keep that strict view on on your customers when you grow and you get larger and You end up being the size of Alan. I Think it's hard. I think what I've learned. I was actually I was it with TTC a year longer than I had to So it was free will is because I actually learned a lot from being within TTC I love the job. I have a really good network there and I talk with them like every month or so And it's a really good company. I hope the company and so on But but I think what I learned is is that Oh Question again. What did you is can you keep the view on on strictly on your customers as you grew grow and get bigger? I mean, it's pretty easy for you to say when you're a small company Yeah, the problem is but when you get bigger for example when you by being in a company, which is on the stock They focused or tend to focus on the next quarter And that means you make just decisions you take are quite short-minded Where if you have a startup, of course, you have to focus on your shareholders But you tend to have a you take the right decisions on the longer run as well That's a bit a huge difference But at some points when you become big enough and your shareholders have a big enough vote Then you will take decisions where you where it hits your customers in on phone We're in a lot of money by putting small fees on top though We were like the cut the company with a promise that we would have fixed bills and so on We did put in small fees, but we had to 250,000 customers So a small fee could give us something like 25 million in EBDA a year just by adding a small fee and On things like that. So we did Yeah, you do if you're pressured hard enough by stockholders and so on you do Unfortunately, you are pushed in that direction Do you have any any take on the on the ducks and the horses? Yeah, I'll keep away from the analogy But I think it's true that that you always have both small medium and big challenges and And when you're CEO, it's your job But I think of my job now as only working with the big challenges So the big dogs and then I try to delegate the rest and to be frank a lot of it Nobody really addresses because when you have a team of Less than 50 people you can't do it all So I I'm aware of at least 20 things we ought to do but it's just not top of the list at this point And so I tend to just focus on the two or three most important things. Yes, Peter That could also be me. I have to say but actually if I look at that And that's coming back to the question about competition and different approaches to the market and where you actually Some places we are very big like in Denmark. We have a huge market share 80% Sweden 60 UK 45 Middle East again. Yes 30 to 35% market share Etc that requires a special set of skills and and and and some people are attracted to that You know really be working refined with all of the the processes and taking care of that and and and we measure them with a certain Set of KPIs you have to be very close on that and big businesses But then we have those more entrepreneur type of businesses where you know Though the people who are setting up our Nigerian thing that we talked about this morning or Argentina or here six months from now or traveling to Kormulombo or getting new people starting from scratch You know just finding an address out there and Different type of people they would be probably a disaster in our Danish organization and and and would feel Strangled like you probably some of you would and others and but also some of our day Those who are working one in the more mature markets would be you know scared of that You know fantastic opportunity to set up something new it could also be on on the go Categories which is something that we have really never cracked the knot on and then that requires a different Type of people and a different approach and I think that the three of you Represent that different approach. We actually have that inside honorfuls as well and I just have to make sure that I don't Don't write the horse in the same way actually Okay, let's let's move on. I think we should stay on what's inside of you. Can we're gonna go to this question You need to have psychopathic characteristics in order to be a CEO. You need true or false I'm very anxious to hear you answer this one. Karina. Let's start with you. Oh No No, definitely not. I mean today when I did my talk I Emphasize on why it is so important to be an inspirational leader and inspire others and why you should choose and a leader who inspire you and No, I don't believe that at all. I don't know why anyone would write that because that kind of is goes against all Normal thinking I guess well, I guess in some ways you have to to be closer to yourself If you're a CEO you have to take tough decisions. Sometimes you have to fire a lot of it's not about being close to yourself It's about being realistic and assess and not being afraid of You're not making friends by the decisions. You're going to make but that's okay That's not why you're there and I think that's really what it is I also think that as a CEO you take huge responsibility And you have to be someone who likes that and you have to be someone who leaves the door at night And you go home and you don't leave the office mentally and that's a huge part of being a CEO as well It was when I was an MD at Bank of America. I Often check the markets even I was closed down out of my office. And of course I did that in fact all the time But but I guess made a look at for example I mean not everyone goes and starts their own company like like you did for example You must have some different traits than than the rest of us so to speak I mean, what is it that differ you from the rest? Well, I probably do to some extent, but I think when we talk about being a leader It doesn't really matter if it's in your own startup or if it's at Arla somewhere else people need to respect you on two different levels So professionally they need to think you know that you you know what you're doing So you make the right decisions and and you're good at what you do But then I think just as important is the personal level if people think you're dick, you know They're not gonna work for you They're not gonna want to and and if you want real good talent they can choose so they can go somewhere else If you really are a psychopath, I don't think you'll you'll get very far with talented people Peter so what do you say? I actually think that it's I understand where it comes from and and there's no such thing in my in my book as Psychopathical psychopath characteristics. You're either bloody psychopath or not. That's it. It's it's one or zero Not the question is are you all are you not Peter? No, no, no because then I wouldn't be standing here I can tell you that But I think where it comes from is some studies some of you might have known this better than me But I'll read that many years ago that that amongst leaders not only CEOs, but also what managers There's a larger proportion of psychopaths. That's how it is. I think it's was it 10% or something like that So what does that tell me we have 1,500 leaders in other foods if that's a normal population hundred and fifty of those would probably be Small or big hopefully the bigs are gone, but but have some of that And we have to spy spot them and kick them out immediately because there's no room for them, but and probably Our proportion is not that big, but don't don't don't mix it up with being at times Need to impose some raw will in your decision that we need to do this Because I say so it happens very rarely in my time, but but I it throughout the year I have to make these decisions And and and to be tough in some traditions We need to let go of this project and fire the people who belong to that project Although we know that it's tough on them and they gave us you know their mind and their heart But it's how you then do it that you do it in a proper way and that you don't enjoy doing it And that's where you spot the psychopath That's if there's some enjoyment in imposing that role and then it gets then it gets dangerous Luckily, I don't see them so often But I see them and I can spot them and It's bloody difficult and never get a boss with those characteristics He or she will eat your life, and you don't even know you don't even know what you'll probably enjoy it while it happens Karina jumping I am I don't know how many of you knows dick fall I heard of the name He was the guy who took down Lehman Single-handedly he was the guy who was responsible for Lehman's failure On the 14th of September 2008. There was a huge announcement in the financial market and probably the biggest Breakdown ever I think actually even the biggest collapse in US history and he had those characteristics And it's been known for ages for years. He had run a culture of fear In fact, he had his own elevator so he didn't have to mingle with people like us He ran that company like that and he had to pay people quite a lot more than the standard average market rate to get to go to Lehman But what he also did was he attracted people who had a mindset similar to himself now? I'm not saying everyone at Lehman was psychopaths definitely not But there's certain some types there that was not far away from what he gave to them as a leader And I think it does exist. I mean, I'm sorry if I said before the question is not relevant because he certainly is It's just rare. It's rare that someone becomes a CEO now. Let's not forget. He did build that company from scratch It was a standard broker before Being Lehman being one of the big ones at Wall Street I do think that kind of stands out because we all heard of the Lehman Failure and what that meant to everyone else Motorstronger, I think this one you should have to answer this question as well Not if you're a psychopath or not, but has it I'm wondering has it changed you? Do you feel it changes your your characteristics being a leader? I mean, do you have to to rough it up and somehow? Yeah, you do it sometimes sometimes you need to take the awkward decisions and Yeah fire people or closed-down projects or whatever and I think that It's very true. If you if you like that and sitting in and taking an employer side if you like to do that Then then you have a problem but also think that that companies today are it's very much about people management and leadership and And new startups and so on so I don't think we'll just I don't think we'll see many psychopaths as the lack of empathy and so on won't work as a Modern leader, I believe at least one shouldn't be able to climb that high up the stairs at least if you don't have those Yeah well, let's leave the extreme characteristics behind us for a while and and skip to the next question I Think we have we've already talked about strategic decisions. You would do in a different way. So actually I Think we'll go to this question. How do you incorporate uncertainty in your strategy We don't know anything for sure Peter to ball. So How do you foresee? satirical drawing and you lunch person Or what do you do with your strategy? I? Think that different ways that one could could answer that question There's a whole risk management part of running which is actually not a direct part of the strategy But is you know an analysis and assessment of the risk that surrounds you and I think that you can't specifically Pinpoint that we need to close down all our Russian business because Because of what happened in Ukraine? So don't try to predict exact have things that happens But that's sort of you know, what if we have a food crisis? what if Whole market breaks down in certain ways that we can't predict what will we then do? How will we work with it? And and we actually take that very serious and and and have what we call Seven black swans that that that we work with that that would really damage the company Like what we have seen there and where it can go all haywire and really be a big strategic problem That that's the kind of thing that interests me quite a quite a bit, but you can't predict exactly what happens But the kind of thing You know a food scandal that that somebody dies from our products because somewhere we didn't get it What will then happen? How do we handle it? Who handles it? And and is it escalated to me or not? That's very precisely described in other foods And we took a lot of learnings from the Middle East crisis from that where we did it more by intuition Suddenly I was there on the same day. So that was fantastic. So let's take it from there But we have actually written it down these procedures afterwards Because we know of all everybody actually we know that every year has its crisis One strong you've made a startup business. You sold it now. You've made a new one How do you calculate uncertainty when you when you're working strategically with Moffibo? I think there's a lot of uncertainty in our strategy We're building a new market when we entered the market in Denmark 3% of the Danes were reading ebooks Luckily today is something like 20% so I think that's I Think what you have to is to make a clear plan of where you want to go But but be very agile on the way and I think you can de-risk uncertainty by revising Your strategy doing this process frequently So it doesn't strike you I think a lot of it of course Sometimes it can strike you straight away and you couldn't calculate with it But I think you can you can de-risk the case a lot by revising your strategy more often and and and Yeah, do you do it systematically? Do you have a meeting every half year where you say now? Let's let's review our strategy and look at how the market is evolving. How do you do it? I think we have We have the vision of the company and then we have very much the strategy but also and then we've drilled it down as as well in terms of Allah into specific initiatives and Mushroom battles actually we learned that from CDC So in every business line saying what is it exactly the next three months six months and 12th month You need to reach of targets and then of course we have KB eyes Which we have received daily where we very measure these targets and where we're going and and so on and then every Three months we follow up on our mushroom battles to make sure that then the ones With which we lay down for next 12 months that they should still be the same And doing that process which we do every three months then we've we find a lot of New ways and then certain Jesus will and uncover them So we do have a process process for it. I think that's very healthy That's what I learned from CDC is to be very structured in terms of Of with mushroom battles and then revising your strategy often and so on What about you middle? I mean people are there? Exercising more the running more the biking more mean your future must look clear and bright So I guess you don't need any uncertainties in your strategic work Well, I think we have we have several different like major trends that we are tapping into and one of them is certainly health And that's in pretty good shape because we you know We want to be healthy to a larger lot or larger extent so that's that's fine But then when it comes to technology, which is the other main one That is where I see the main the main potential risks because we don't know what's going to be the next defining Product in connected fitness So I always have a list in my head of Top three main trends or you know what could what could turn into a thing and how we address that so we We try to address that Quite fast or even in advance There's one trend for example where we've now build a product just in case that trend becomes a big hit Then we are ready with a product. We don't have to start from scratch. We are year ahead if that happens So we try to do that, but we can't do it with everything So we need to pick our battles on that as well And what if you miss what if you're sitting there with the project and product and no one will ask for ever? Well, I kind of hope so I think of it as a life insurance. You kind of hope it doesn't really get Get relevant, but and we can also turn it into a business at some point if we if we had more resources and Karina you're you're from the investment banking world. You're a hardcore investment lady I guess you don't operate with uncertainties No, I did it a pretty pretty extreme way. I hired a risk manager And I did that because I'm doing food And I got someone who's an as expertise within foods And this person only deals with risk management in a risk versus an action point kind of way So as a function of we assess the risk we understand the risk We're facing if anything goes wrong and we have an action plan according to that That makes me sleep better at night. It's a little bit overdoing from where we are as a as a company now But we are we're very ambitious and with our goal of establishing ourselves in us in 2015 We're not early with this. We should be in place with this. How that's how I see it I made a few points in terms of Incorporating uncertainty. I think it could also be a positive now We heard meta saying that they have created a product in case this trend comes up I've also created things in case this is actually if I see the world the way I see the world happening in my market if that happens the way I look at it I'm ready to expand into a certain area and I think that's a positive So it's not just the uncertainty in the negative way It could also be the possibility that something comes to play and being ready for that Well, I think that concludes what we can we have time for from questions from the audience, but before we go You've all been asked to to think about one short advice for the leaders of tomorrow What would it be? I think we should do a ladies first middle. Look at what's your advice? I Have to I'm sorry. I'll make them sure the first one is just follow your passion wherever it takes you Just do that and the second one is make sure to sleep Every night with your sleep when you don't get sleep you make crappy decisions People will stop respect you professionally and you become a bitch or take on whatever and nobody wants to wait for those So get your sleep and you'll be all set Karina I say one thing if you're not prepared to be wrong and if you're not prepared to make mistakes you'll never be original and Coming from that take the risk take the risk all the way and a little bit more Because chances are you convince someone on the way to go with you and that's where big things happen But I guess you get all your sleep every night, but what's your advice? I have a one-year-old daughter Find your inner drive your passion the same thing stay focused On what you do. I've seen so many Dreaming about the future and a better career than what they have today Then you'll never get anything Deliver results. It sounds boring, but sometimes I see people forgetting that belongs to the stay focused part Choose your boss will care not because he necessarily can be a psychopath There are not so many of those luckily enough, but some bosses can actually help you Through your career. They'll make sure to spot you before you know that you're a talent yourself and bring you along and give you other Opportunities and some you are very protective and keep you you know in that bottle so nobody Discovers that you are good and then as I said this morning Really make sure that you one way or the other get some international experience and don't be afraid to go out there and travel out there and see the world and It's not it's not Grand Canary. I'm talking about modern Yeah, from my point of view, I think it's It's important to be extremely ambitious I see a lot of people who talk about the ideas and plan and so on but don't execute and don't just go do it So a little less talk and a little more walk. I think it's extremely important And I think it's it's healthy to be ambitious and I think it's important that you set your targets But at the same time Be very honest and humble I think you get a lot further by I have remembering that as well. So, yeah Thank you. I think that's excellent advice