Christoph Schmid’s Post

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Chief R&D Officer @GN

Is it possible to combine a medical, consumer, and enterprise R&D organization?   That was the question last year when we announced GN Group moving closer as one company, also establishing one combined R&D organization of 1200 employees across 9 major sites.   Today, we can say: 𝗼𝗳 𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘀𝗲, 𝘄𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝗻!   The last 9 months have been a high-speed and intense journey. I am amazed at how much I have learned from our teams globally operating in different industries.   This is my four must-wins in any successful R&D integration: 1️⃣ 𝗕𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗳𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀: We continuously align with each of our three divisions to ensure a sharp customer focus. 2️⃣ 𝗣𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲: We stay close to our people and listen to their needs. In these kinds of changes, it is vital to understand your teams and their motivations. 3️⃣ 𝗢𝗿𝗴𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: In January, we established an R&D organization leveraging knowledge across, ensuring a strong customer focus in each of our product segments. 4️⃣ 𝗣𝗿𝗶𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗲𝘀: We harmonize our ways of working, processes, and systems. Enabling us to prioritize our portfolio investments and deploy our knowledge across the company.   Recently, I witnessed another important milestone on this journey. It was rewarding to see our first-ever common PI planning sessions, bringing all of R&D together physically and virtually. Sessions, determining priorities, and aligning plans for the next three months.   It has been amazing to observe how much closer our organization has come together as a team in such a short time and how much they can already now benefit from each other. It makes me excited for how much more we can achieve together.    Thank you to everyone for your commitment to this journey so far. I am looking forward to continuing this journey with you all.   #PIplanning #innovation #R&D #BringingPeopleCloser

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Commercial focus is key in the Commercial point one. This is not the same as, Consumer focus. This differentiator, which I have executed and experienced, needs to be adopted as key strategic element in order to drive value in development and innovation pipeline within R&D. so I would argue, that you left out a 5. point. Consumer centricity.

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Kamila Ishbulatova

Head of Sales Enablement & Marketing - Sustainable Energy Systems @ Siemens Energy | eMBA

3w

Congratulations! Thank you for sharing. I would add another must-win to your list, continuous communication is crucial for maintaining alignment between divisions and ensuring all employees are involved.

I am sure it has been a journey with many challenges. Congratulations and thanks for sharing these important lessons.

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Joel Beilin

Advisor and Board member

3w

Well done, Christoph and team(s)

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Ronald Gleitman

President, Great Hearing Benefits

3w

Thanks for your leadership!

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