BUILD, BOOST AND TRANSFORM

Europe's heart on the way to a sustainable economy
By Marcia de Troyer, Vice President and Co-Taskforce leader of Sustainability

Between the English Channel in the west and Germany in the east, the Benelux countries Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg are home to Europe's most important hubs for world trade. All three nations have in common that they are small in size but extraordinarily strong economically. Belgium, for example, is not only one of the world's largest exporters, but as a European trade center it also has one of the densest infrastructure networks on the planet – with about 200 ports and an xceptionally high percentage of inhabitants (98%) that belongs to the urban population. With Brussels, the capital of Europe, the country is also a hotspot for dynamic, internationally active companies and groups.

The dynamic and broad industry portfolio of these players is reflected in the orientation of the local consulting market. Certain consultants tend to combine generalist and specialist know-how. That means they can be deployed in a wide variety of projects – whether it be chemicals, discrete manufacturing, food and beverage or infrastructure companies like Infrabel or the Port of Antwerp-Bruges – and they can also go in depth or work with experts. Accordingly, the majority of our Belgian consulting projects has a strong international reference and address a wide range of topics, on operational excellence as well as extensive transformation projects, M&A, or major change programs. Analytical projects are also carried out, e.g. data analysis to improve supply chains. In this respect, our local office has a rather generalist profile with very different types of projects. Nevertheless, we are currently observing two exciting aspects that our customers are facing: the potential of digitalization in terms of sustainability and how to boost organizational transformation.

Combining sustainability and digitalization

For our economy, the European Green Deal is one of the key drivers for sustainability. This concept, presented by the European Commission in 2019, sets the goal of reducing net greenhouse gas emissions in the European Union to zero by 2050, making it the first continent to become climate neutral. Of course, there are big differences in the way companies deal with this and with other sustainability topics as well. Many of them are currently reinventing the way they do business and are taking accelerating measures to reduce their greenhouse gases. Here, in particular, connection with automation, digitalization and sourcing the right data, as well as the close networking of partners in the value chain prove to be as important measures.

On top of the ongoing, more traditional continuous improvement programs, we’re noticing a drastic increase in transformation and change programs lead by and in in the R&D/corporate development departments of our clients. So, there’s a clear change to a new course to become climate neutral by 2050, which wouldn’t be possible by only sticking with the traditional improvement programs and measures.

At the same time, we observe a surge in very focused energy improvement programs with specialist partners who work in an EPC or ESCO model. A strong driver here is of course the drastic increase in energy cost all over Europe, that requires new, short term energy efficiency gain.

Another challenge in this context is how to link the long-term sustainability strategy targets and the more short-term operational results, that operations departments need to achieve yearly, monthly, weekly and daily. Setting up the right cascaded dashboard and performance management supported by an adapted data capturing and management approach is crucial here.

Also, the human dynamics part can improve a lot to meet these challenges. For example, enhancing cross-company and cross-department collaboration or ensuring openness to digital solutions. To unify these perspectives, many companies could already achieve more with digitalization. For example, some logistic providers could manage the transport flux in a more automated way, but solutions are delayed due to job protection or political reasons. In plants, automation solutions are sometimes turned off as workers find it hard to accept that a machine is doing something they have done themselves for years or don’t trust the solution and fear for their safety. This clearly confirms our position, that digitalization / Industry 4.0 are not just about attaching sensors and collecting data, it's also about getting people to embrace the new digital processes. At interfaces, where human dynamics and digitalization meet, we do a lot of change projects to get people to accept the change.

In sustainability, there’s a shift towards change
and transformation programs.

Exploiting new transformation paths

These issues are, of course, closely linked to the second major topic: changing organizations in such a way that they can master new challenges as well as mobilize economic resources quickly. In the past, ROI-EFESO was known for so called “build programs”, e.g. building traditional lean programs or analyzing, planning, implementing large improvement programs, including employee’s skill trainings. But today, companies need a faster return on investment. So, we defined “boost programs” which can pursue different objectives. For example, achieving first results in manufacturing lines within 8-12 weeks, which brings in money for further investments. Or, with a more disruptive transformation approach, automation programs for factories.

Regardless of project goals, ROI-EFESO consultants are seen as transformation partners who support the CEO, COO or line managers to make things work. There is a relationship of trust, which is expressed through many long-standing client relationships. In cultural terms, we're all quite pragmatic: “just making things work” is an attitude that is often encountered in our region. In Belgium, clients and consultants are motivated as well by the results that they get as by the process of getting there. And of course, we are a global company ourselves – our country teams often work closely together to find the best solution for the client, and they complement each other very well.