Let’s talk about commercial talent and what it actually means and go deeper behind the meaning of it.
So here we are, focusing on B2B talents. Hosts Svitlana and Hanne ask Mladen Mitic, Head of B2B Europe Growth@Core, and Dr. Rolf Nafziger, SVP Global Business and Global Carrier at Deutsche Telekom everything you need to know in order to train commercial success in the 2020s.
What did they discuss about commercial success?
Svitlana Bielushkina
Human beings, talent is at the heart of strategy because people make it happen. People make strategy happen. Welcome to human centric Podcast. Today we will talk about commercial talent and what it actually means and go deeper behind the meaning of it. What skills do we need to have? What competencies do we need to have and how to really get there? If you have this small project of going deeper behind corporate lingo and how just to pause for a moment and have a human conversation? What are we really trying to solve? What are we really talking about? We are doing it as a partnership. So I have my partner in crime from Oslo; Hanne, welcome.
Hanne Lindbæk
Hi. Yes, thank you. Svitlana. Yeah. So if you’re looking from the inside perspective, I am definitely looking from the outside perspective. For the last 20 years, I have been training and connecting with a multitude of organizations and NGOs, and politicians all about the theme, how to communicate well, when you need to communicate well. And it’s led me to this curiosity quest of investigating how organizations actually work to implement strategies. And how the human beings at any given time is that the core of course they are of implementing strategies, and how can you actually go beneath the surface and have the necessary conversations to make it understandable and for people to know how to show up what to do? So that’s why we’re here, isn’t it?
Svitlana Bielushkina
Yes. So, let’s welcome our guests, Mladen Mitic, Head of B2B Europe Growth@Core, and Dr. Rolf Nafziger, SVP Global Business and Global Carrier at Deutsche Telekom. I live in the mind zone was there over there; I remember when I joined Deutsche Telekom. It was like I was calling myself a newcomer for two years in the role, because you really have to take time to absorb what’s inside
Mladen Mitic
I consider myself still as a new guy in the in the company, even if it is a lot of months.
Svitlana Bielushkina
And Rolf Nafziger is really happy to have you in. I know, you’ve worked together in the European segments. And we’ve worked a lot about getting you back to growth and working growth mindset. You’re coming from the commercial side of organization. And I think I have to say, really happy to have you because you associate in my mind with talent development, because you really stood behind those words, and you walk the talk. So I’m quite excited to see how the conversation will fall.
Rolf Nafziger
Thank you. I’m also very excited.
Hanne Lindbæk
Thank you. Now then, if I can take us back to you and your background for a second because you actually traveled across borders. You’ve been to quite a multitude of countries. Am I right?
Mladen Mitic
Yeah, you’re right. Just a few words about myself. I’m an engineer who wanted to be an architect and ended up as a marketeer. So it was a it was quite some journey. And then also a couple of geographies. Yeah, I started actually developing in telco born and raised in consumer a long time ago, 17 years ago. And then after seven, eight years, I just thought like, okay, let’s explore something else. And then I moved to Norway, back in 2011, in your beautiful Oslo, where you’re currently logging, and then after, it was supposed to be two years, but then after five years, I moved a little bit more south to the home, which was in Denmark, in Copenhagen. And then after a couple of years, I’m now involved. So I’m getting closer and closer to home. So let’s see, what will be the next destination?
Hanne Lindbæk
Well, and thank you as a guest for actually mentioning what I’ve forgotten to mention that, of course, the reason why I’m on the screen today is because I’m actually in lockdown because of the virus rural getting to know rather well, isn’t it? So here we are. And what you’re saying London is that you’ve traveled across borders, both from a geographical point of view, but not in the least also from like a field of expertise. perspective to that is interesting to me. If you look at that kind of multi hottie approach, or multi skilled approach, and you link that to the idea of talent, which is, of course, what we’re discussing here. How does that show up for you? Do you have any reflections on that?
Mladen Mitic
Well, yeah, you know, the thing that I could speak about my experience, I was always coming somewhere to bring my own expertise to the local teams, and also to try to learn and to get from all those teams and those cultures, something for myself. And then that was like some kind of constant process of let’s say, self inventing myself, or reinventing myself and also trying to develop myself into different skills. And then I was trying to do a different many different things, starting with the customer facing roles and end up with the marketing and product. It actually that was more or less developing myself as a person as a leader. And also, you know, that was giving me some kind of learning that Actually, the constant learning is the thing that is common in all those things. Because you know, that is something that is developing myself as a person and also as a leader. So that is some kind of reflection on that.
Hanne Lindbæk
Excellent point, which we’re also discussing in another episode on this season of the podcast, the idea of eternal learning, being the only possible perspective really now in order to remain being lucrative with a talent for the organization you’re working for. That’s great. Thank you very much. And Roth, are you if we look at the idea of talent, I mean, look at your background. Tell us a little bit about how you got to where you are today.
Rolf Nafziger
Oh, that’s a good starting point. Because I’ve never been on a talent program, I must say.
For me being, its starting a talent program. It’s also been part of that a bit. Talk about this later on. Well, how did I get where I am today? I think it started a long time ago, before I was at Deutsche Telekom. I was always eager to become a photographer. And so when I was 15, I wanted to be a press photographer in my local city. And with 17, I was a press photographer in my local city. And I thought it’s boring. And I want to become a press photographer, in the capital bond. And two years later, I was impressed with a verb capital bomb. And I thought, ha, I was working for one of the biggest news agencies worldwide for Associated Press. And I thought maybe this is after a while. This is boring. So I have to proceed. And this took me to study business administration. This took me to be a media consultant. This took me to enter during the hype around telecommunications into Deutsche Telekom. And this was so far my final destination. I’m now with Dr. Tilikum since 20 years and years, 20 years, and I’ve never had a boring day. Yeah. Because in this industry, everything is always changing. You have new regulation policies, you have new technologies, you have new competition. And in my career here, it took me from being entering the fixed network side. So I was T comm 20 years ago on the b2b side, domestic business. Then I changed over to T-Mobile, Germany, also domestic mobile business. And from there, I went international, yeah, to the headquarters running the commercial management there. I just talked about and maybe your pre predecessor or something like that. Yeah. So this was 10 years ago. From there, I entered the international wholesale market and international wholesale department. Honestly, seeing at that point in time, I did not have any clue about international wholesale. But this is exactly what I’m expecting from people who want to grow, to enter into new fields, to bring over what they have collected, as experienced before, and then try to change what they find, but also being inspired what they get there.
Svitlana Bielushkina
And I was mentioned wholesaler wanted to go there. Because for many people, it will be really understandable. So I wanted to double-click on that to explain a bit more, because you’re working with wholesale now.
Rolf Nafziger
Yeah, of course, the US domestic wholesale. I’ve never been to domestic wholesale, the International Wholesale is all the interfaces we have to other international carriers. And this is very important because a carrier as Deutsche Telekom, we are not really international. So we need networks. Wherever you are in the world, in Norway, yeah, we need to be connected to terminate voice. We need roaming agreements there. We require IP peering. This means, although the internet is not really international, it’s not one big network. So we need to connect. Also, the OTT is to our network. And this is what we are dealing with.
Hanne Lindbæk
If I speak as a tourist listening in, what you’re saying is when I traveled to another country, it doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s an agreement between my telecom company and the country I’m traveling to
Rolf Nafziger
definitely agreement between the country you’re traveling to and my department. Otherwise.
Hanne Lindbæk
We meet you. Yeah. Check mark, I want to bring us back to the idea. I think what you’re stating beautifully is that boredom in itself can be a driver for personal development.
Rolf Nafziger
Absolutely. I think whenever you are bought on your position, you need to move on. Yeah, this is my feeling that I always had. So for me, it was always that I was very excited. The first year, the second year, it was okayish. And the third year, I thought everything is organized and then you have to move on. Yeah, yeah. My current position I’m on since seven years, can read from that. Never been bought.
Hanne Lindbæk
It’s a compliment wherever you go, you will never be bored for sure. So the idea of being bored too much leading to actually creating some change for yourself. And then on the other hand of that scale, there will be never ever being bored, but maybe being like too stressed or frightened or change happening too much. Did you ever experience that in your life?
Rolf Nafziger
Yes. And this is a must as if you change, and you enter a new position, I would really wonder if you are not stressed. Yeah, there are new people. There are new tasks. There are many things you don’t know, there’s a new culture. So if you’re not stressed, I will say something is wrong. Yeah, I was always stressed the first year. Yeah, hopefully receive it. But of course, you have to get into that. But I would not say stress. It’s a challenge in the end. Yeah. And I personally, I love challenges. So whatever I do, I love it. I mentioned my challenge as a photographer in the past. So it was really the challenge to get there to do it to prove I can do it. And then after a while, finding there is a certain routine and everything you could cover, you’re covered. Yeah. And this is, of course, also the same for life.
Hanne Lindbæk
And love, am I right? It sounds like it’s a bit of the same with you. And the way you’ve been shifting?
Mladen Mitic
Exactly, I was just listening to them, I now see that they have more common things with Rav. So actually, yeah, exactly the same feeling when I felt it is like a little bit boring, or I would not say even boring, but that you know, the things are going very easy, smooth time not needed anymore, to you know, sparkle something in the organization, then it’s a good time for change and to go somewhere else where actually I will feel some kind of internal drive to actually be able to understand that there is something I don’t know. And then to try to develop myself to actually fulfill that role. So that is some kind of coastal feeling that I’m looking for. And this is actually why I came to Deutsche Telekom also 11 months ago. And I still feel that kind of feeling inside that there is still something I don’t know here. And I’m still learning a lot here.
Hanne Lindbæk
So, of course, we call ourselves the human centric podcast. And the conversation that we need to have with you two gentlemen, today, certainly needs to be about customer-centric behavior, and phenomenons and relationships and whatever, right? So if we’re looking to develop talent, that will be good at the customer-centric perspective. Can I take us there? How can we define what skill set is needed? In order to be good for to be made good use of for you guys, today?
Rolf Nafziger
Well, if I pick this question, of course, customer centricity can be a buzzword. Yeah. But it’s very much about do you really understand the market environment? Do you have the analytical skills to understand it, but you’re also close enough to those people who are using your product. And from there you need to come you need to develop those propositions that your customers don’t need today, but those propositions they need tomorrow. And normally, this is really a 36 degree approach between market research between talking to customers, I very often talk to the front end people you have because they have a very, very mature feeling about what is going on.
And of course, you need to talk to the customers themselves. And from that you need to develop the next stage of propositions.
Hanne Lindbæk
It’s such an interesting point, isn’t it to understand that it’s not about the thing you’re selling. It’s about how the customer is going to feel when they have it. Exactly, exactly. Yeah. Right. And that shift is so and I love you for saying the word buzzword, because that’s exactly what we’re trying to shoot down here is like go beneath and explore what is actually at the core of all this lingo in the corporate world. And yes, customer centricity is one of them. And you’re definitely saying then that it’s got to do with understanding and analyzing the target group, understanding what’s out there in the market, and what lies ahead of us rather than behind us for sure.
Rolf Nafziger
Here’s this one. It’s about the needs the customers have in the future. And they have them Yeah, Steve has often said, I don’t need market research, because our customers don’t know today what they need tomorrow. So I think we still require market research. But it’s this little on top, that you know more about the needs of the future than the customers no to love it.
Mladen Mitic
Love your perspective. demystify a little bit, because now we are speaking a little bit about the models on high level terms just to make it a little bit more practical. You know, the way how you can develop people and talents to think in that direction or, or to always keep the customer in mind, besides the different tricks that you know, you can put the customer in the room or some kind of mutual customer or whatever. But actually, in your work when you’re developing propositions or doing something for the customer or journey or whatever, you can ask two simple questions. One is, why would someone buy this? Another one is why would someone buy these from you? And then those are super good, at least in my personal experience. Those are two super powerful questions that are always actually ending up with the customer because then you need to develop something that someone needs and also you need to do have something that is better than someone else is able to develop it and then you know you need to put the customer in the center otherwise, you will not be able to answer all those questions.
Hanne Lindbæk
So here we are learning how to survive in the marketplace with the two gentleman’s with Lana, the idea of that kind of person Listen, does it then take who gets to be good at what you’re just describing? What is the profile we’re looking at?
Svitlana Bielushkina
And if I can build on that, hon, I’m just thinking that now the customer is what the wolf was mentioning the needs of tomorrow. Yeah. Technology is developing rapidly, how customers engaging with the ones also developing rapidly. So to really be able to engage with customers, to engage where they are, and they have less than less time for us. Yeah. So what do we need them sizes, see in terms of talents, what roles profiles skill sets, because how to demystify this commercial talent for tomorrow, what is it?
Mladen Mitic
So, it goes a little with the various work because the way how you’re working the way how you’re developing your propositions, and where do you put the customer in that process, because as telecom sector, we’re usually going inside out. So we believe that customer something requires, we believe that customer will want this, we believe that this will be good for the customer. And then we face the market, we face the customer me and says oops, we sold only 100 of some pieces or something is wrong, then we go back and all those proceeds are quite long. So actually, instead of doing it, that way, we can change. And that’s where the agility is, is coming into the play, and the whole new way of work that we are now experimenting with a couple of our Narcos actually putting the customer in the beginning of the process. So you actually prototype or your prototype, you pretend that you have the product, you go to the customer, and then you check, and then you go back, and then you check again. And then you go back. And then actually that is the way how you can actually involve the customer in the beginning. And then speaking about the skills and people that are actually and profiles that are good. And that you feel that because you feel the passion, because some people are just having the passion to understand the customer create something for them and go there. And some other people are, you know, just different. So you can teach them to some extent. But also, you know, maybe they are not for that kind of role. So they can do some other things.
Hanne Lindbæk
So here we are, again, at this very well-used word in the season of discussing talent, you are saying that passion is a core ingredient. And that if you don’t have the passion for it, whatever that it may be, then you need to find some other place where you have passion.
Mladen Mitic
I completely agree. At least that’s my view. Yeah, that’s why we’re here. Especially, three is difficult. And then speaking about, you know, what, what Rob mentioned being bought somewhere, you know, when you lose the patient, and you’re getting bored. So you need to have passion, otherwise, you know, there is no point,
Hanne Lindbæk
In a way I would argue, if you are on a payroll, you have to make sure you keep being passionate. And if not, you have to be aware of it yourself.
Mladen Mitic
True. But also that is changing a bit from, at least from what we can see. Now, it’s not only about the payroll and the salary anymore.
Svitlana Bielushkina
Reading between the lines and knowing your margin, it is also about the impact and purpose creates. Yeah, so that’s kind of your key driver gives you passion, because the outcomes that you’re after,
Mladen Mitic
it’s about purpose, you know, we need to find our purpose, and then you know, you’re starting somewhere you need to earn for, you know, for your living, and then your motives and your, your actually motivation is changing in time, and then insert the moment you reach some kind of failover, you need to understand the purpose. And then you know, that’s what you go for. So you know, that needs to be something that is bigger than you maybe something that will be you know, that will stay there after you.
Svitlana Bielushkina
So commercial talents in a way what I heard is the way of work. So engaging customer more, and his passion, and its purpose behind what you do. So that would be the key ingredients.
Mladen Mitic
Now for some skills, of course, we cannot ignore the skills because in certain areas, you know, people need to have some skills in order to be able to fulfill their tasks, what they need to learn those skills critical for commercial, well, if you are speaking about, you know what is coming and the whole the whole digital trends that are that are, you know, taking over everything so and you know, the full digitalization, then we are speaking about, let’s say, two or three areas that are now super critical. And those are the resources that we are all fighting for not only this industry, but also other industries. So we are speaking about, let’s say double the value management, people that are able to create some kind of value, understand the pricing, understand the data, understand the numbers. The second group, at least in my categorization, is the let’s say customer facing roles we just described a little bit about that. And then the third one is, of course, typical digital channels, digital marketing, and all those new roles that are becoming necessary in our industry, but also in some other industries.
Hanne Lindbæk
So to sum up our conversation so far, because I’m thinking, if there’s a young talent out there in the organization somewhere, looking at one of you to gentleman, and kind of going, oh, I want to be in his position in some years time. Right? I’m not talking about unnecessarily climbing the hierarchical ladder just for the sake of it. But because you want to make good use of yourself. And as we’ve established, we don’t want to get bored. What would be your advice to someone young today, in terms of being of good use to the organization you’re in and climbing the ladder?
Rolf Nafziger
Well, first of all, I think it’s this impatience you need to have Yeah, that you’re never really satisfied that it’s good enough that you always see the extra mile to go. I think it’s very much also around creativity that You’re have the ability to think a little bit different, like the other people do to change the current system you’re in. I’m a strong believer of the growth mindset theory, yeah, that you have this strong belief that you can grow with going the extra mile with doing an extra effort with learning on your job. Yeah, with connecting to other people. And that it’s not so much even though we talked about talents here that it’s not so much about the talent you have, but the ambition you have. And definitely, you need to have always a vision, a vision on the job that you’re doing, where you want to bring it. But you also need to vision where you want to be in 123 or four years, because without this vision, you will not move on, you will stagnate. And in the end, you will not be the best one on your job.
Hanne Lindbæk
Oh, that’s a lot of stuff all at once. And it’s really great stuff in there. I want to kind of anchor and unsay lo and behold about the Carol Dweck work of growth mindset. Of course, if you haven’t seen the TED talk, go see it. I love what she says about, you know, they give the grade, not yet to a bunch of students, don’t they? Have you seen that? They say, instead of getting a low grade for your mathematics tests that you didn’t do so? Well, you get the grade, you didn’t get it yet? It’s like IE it will you will get there. And that’s kind of what you’re saying about vision isn’t a tool that unless you actually dare to dream there to envisage that you will get somewhere or will be able to achieve something, you are actually much farther away from actually getting to whatever it is you are dreaming of.
Rolf Nafziger
Absolutely, yeah, you need to have three. And I think what you also need, and here we talk again, about the talent program and Talent Management, you also need somebody in the organization who is supporting you. Yeah, who is giving you trust, who is giving you the opportunity, that you have a field where you can grow? Yeah, that you can show that you can do more than you can do today. And, you know, it became to me so obvious. Two years ago, when I was on a hike. With my youngest daughter, she was 11 at that point in time. And she’s a great swimmer. And I asked her during this hike, how did it come that over the last two years, you’re such a good swimmer before you were more or less mediocre? And she told me, Well, you know, two years ago, there was the change of trainer, and I had to train her was believing in me and we thought you are not mediocre, you are more you can, can do more. And she taught me Don’t go swimming twice a week or three times a week, I believe in your you can do it. And I thought what kind of great self reflection of this girl. Because in the end is exactly what you also need in our organization. You need somebody who is believing in you is supporting you, who is giving you the room to improve. And you of course you have to fill this room at that point in time. And then you will grow.
Hanne Lindbæk
Oh, my God, what an amazing story. I think what you’re saying about that, then the role of the more experienced people in the organization suddenly changes for me. Because if I am for a second, if I call myself an elder, if we are becoming the elders here, the elders perspective on the young ones, if we help them dare to believe that they will be able to create what it is they want to create, that will certainly help them. That’s part of what you’re saying here,
Rolf Nafziger
Isn’t it? Absolutely. You can just confirm. Absolutely. And mentoring.
Hanne Lindbæk
And then that’s a brilliant that will bridge right there to the topic that we wanted to talk to you guys about because we are aware that actually both of you are fathers of daughters. Am I right? Yes, yes. Yes. And Mladen, so, I correct my perspective and the roles. You don’t only have the 11-year-old then you have four daughters Rolf. Am I right?
Rolf Nafziger
Me? Yes, I have four daughters. All this starts with one daughter. So let’s see.
Hanne Lindbæk
If I go to the one question in here, of course, to get a little bit real. You know, we talk about talent development, and we talk about like clamping in organizations. Can I bring the word gender onto the table? Can we talk about women and men? And the question that we wanted to ask you guys is like, how does this fit into how you raise your daughters?
You have any thoughts about that? You’re more experienced, okay.
Rolf Nafziger
This is definitely, of course, a topic I always carry on my mind. Yeah, especially when my kids are choosing subjects or doing sport, or asked me for advice, which is also happening. I always give them three topics. And the first one is golfer sports. Yeah, because I just explained how important sports is to really get this growth mindset and this ambition on what you are doing, always to become better. Yeah, this the best thing that you can learn when you’re doing sports. The second thing is go digital. Because of course, everything is software is digitalized. The third thing is go international. And there’s also a strong belief that internationalization that we see now with the hyperscalers in place, is going to take place in all industry that we have. And Germany, of course, being an export nation, this is definitely very, very important. And if you ask me, Am I successful with his advice? On the digital part? Unfortunately, not so much. But my youngest daughter is now taking coding lessons on the spot spot, yes, all of them are very, very active in sport. My second oldest is even in a soccer team, or me playing this boys, which are very appreciate and going international, my oldest daughter is studying in the UK, she really inhaled that. And she is she has a very, very international mindset, meanwhile,
Hanne Lindbæk
interesting. So I love your reflection on sports as a part of I guess what you’re saying is growing resilient? Absolutely. Yes. In terms of surviving in hierarchies, and in life, yeah, for me,
Rolf Nafziger
It’s more of this, you know, if you’re a runner, you run first five kilometers, then you run 10 kilometers. And then you say, I want to run these 10 kilometers faster. And then you say, I want to run a half marathon. And after that, you want to run a marathon. And this is exactly this aspiration you need in this organization, if you want to grow. Yeah, because if you’re a good sportsman, You’re never satisfied with your performance. There’s always more to go. And that’s why I think it’s a good education. For Kids.
Hanne Lindbæk
It’s just a darnold, good metaphor, it’s a good metaphor for actually keeping impatient and keeping forward leaning in your work. That’s great, great. So not a what would be your advice to your daughter?
Mladen Mitic
She’s still, you know, not even five years old. So it’s a bit early to fall sports or something else. But what we’re trying to do, and besides the things that she is super spoiled, and there is no competition, because she gets everything, whatever she does, actually, what we are trying to embed in her DNA is some kind of like integrity. Because for me, that was important, for my wife that is important. And also we would love that she builds her own integrity, because everything else that Rob was mentioning properly here, like it is, of course, given, but integrity is something that, you know, I would love to see that she’s not losing in time. And for me, that is super important characteristic that, you know, if there is something I can give to her is like some kind of education. And you know, that kind of sense of integrity, everything else to the environment will change probably in time. So let’s see how she will end up.
Hanne Lindbæk
It’s a limited matter, isn’t it, how much we get to influence these people?
Mladen Mitic
It is becoming at least my theories that we are becoming less and less significant in their lives. And then society, the platform’s and everything is becoming more and more essential. And then we need to find our way how to still influence, but that is my big fear as a father that actually, you know, there is not much we can do now,
Hanne Lindbæk
I want to circle back to that word, integrity, I think it’s a beautiful place to look. And if we look at the advice coming from it all about like growing resilient, and knowing how to challenge yourself and knowing how to grow. And if I mix that with integrity, nothing can I ask us to try to define what lies beneath the surface of that word? How do you teach someone integrity, for God’s sake!
Mladen Mitic
Being yourself being the best of yourself and not making the compromises on your values on your personal values, at least that is my top of my head definition, because I’m trying to reflect myself also. And that was my development in my career, also, not only the private life, you know, when my personal values were attacked, or in danger, that was the moment, besides being bored in some place to actually leave and to go because, you know, and try not to make the compromises with it. Because it’s not only about the professional life, it’s also about being you know, being able to look at yourself and then you know, feeling good in your everyday life and then having satisfaction with your business and with who you are there. You know,
Hanne Lindbæk
there’s a big correlation in statistics about burnout syndrome is a big correlation between burnout syndrome, and people having to lose their integrity at work. If you lose your integrity if you have to lie about something if you have to squeeze someone else down in order to survive. These are the kinds of things that will make you hit the wall, famously So that just speaks to me of like the importance of the topic we’re discussing. Yeah. So teaching someone to be having integrity and speaking your own truth and not compromising, and then having the courage to challenge yourself and go further. And like you said, don’t run the half marathon, go for the marathon, go for the next big thing, not allowing yourself to be complacent or, like boring, not being satisfied with boring, although this would be I guess, excellent advice for both sexes, right for both male and female. If we turn back to the topic of like female, like gender balance and female leaders, is there such a thing as growing talent in a gender way? In terms of the commercial world? This is just asking a real question here. I don’t know if anyone has an answer.
Rolf Nafziger
For me personally, yes. When I talk about, again, coming back to my advice to my kids, I would always advise to go into an area that is not if they are girls, it is not female dominated. Yeah, it is rather male dominated, and really to learn how to deal with that. And also bring in their values, their thinking in this environment. Again, if I was the soccer team of my second oldest, she’s playing in a different way, soccer than the boys. And this is the same if you have girls in your department. Yeah. And I have known many girls at home, but not so many women in my department, I must admit that. It’s a pity, it’s really a pity. And we are not liking girls in our leadership team, because we don’t want them but we don’t have enough applications. Yeah. And I would recommend women more to go into these topics like technology, like engineering, like coding, come from that perspective, and then really enter these domains and enrich these fields.
Hanne Lindbæk
I think, you know, that’s what the scientists are saying, now you can differentiate between, like the feminine and the masculine behaviors and qualities, and then the genders of women and men. So one man can have a lot of feminine behaviors, or one woman can have a lot of masculine behaviors. Would you agree? So what you’re searching for, you know, it depends on what kind of women you get. And what we don’t want is women ending up just behaving masculine in order to fit in, because that’s not going to bring diversity? Is it
Mladen Mitic
Through my belief about the good news, speaking about gender diversity, that is like a some kind of topic that is here and around. And luckily, I was in Scandinavia for last seven, eight years. And you know, it was somewhat better there at least, you know, in my case, I was having two female bosses in Norway, also two female bosses in in Denmark. So, you know, for me, that was not the big topic, or in those organizations, that was not a big topic, it was already solved. But I believe that, you know, the digital economy is actually bringing something new. And I believe that this generation will solve that problem or that question, because digital economy is such easy, diverse economy. And then I believe that, you know, this generation or the next one, just after us will solve that question. And we will not speak about that in, let’s say, 1015 years from now. But we need to do.
Svitlana Bielushkina
Let’s keep the fingers crossed for that. Yeah, I think that’s quite inspiring. You know, I want to share one observation, Hana. So you talk about the commercial talent, and the topic was a commercial talent. And what I hear with the scenes are coming up, and not very much technical, not very much commercial. So growth, mindset, resilience, integrity, passion. So it’s really very, very human. So you just need to find people with the heart for the commercial work for the work for the customer. And then what to get your professional opinion on that as my internal hunt for talent in dt. I hear very often the statement that we lack commercial talent, what do you lack? Do you lack passion? Do you like skills? If you can take me there? Like, what’s your perspective behind that?
Mladen Mitic
We’re lacking partly the talents because I already mentioned that at the beginning of the conversation that, you know, there is more and more industries fighting for the talents, and we see that globally, you know, if you stick to b2b, we are actually lacking the talents. Because it’s, you know, bigger and bigger problem, you know, in time, it will be even a bigger problem. But at the end, you know, I believe that, at least in b2b area, we’ve been constantly speaking about, you know, upskilling people, and that was more or less the only source of talent so, we’ll be thinking about like, Okay, we have the customer facing teams and then your path in b2b is going you know, in some kind of sales organization, then going up and probably b2b is not super open or was not super open for actually some kind of rescaling and then trying to accept the talents from consumers from other industries from Partner Network, etc. And I believe that is something that is changing and that is something that will change the structure of our talent pool,
Svitlana Bielushkina
The rescue in upskilling and engaging more people have passion for that, but can you explain a bit more and lots and what is missing? Not what exactly is missing that we are fighting for to get in?
Mladen Mitic
Well, I can start with the attractiveness how we are presenting our area to our talents. So if you look into the micro level, the b2b in telco it was always the smaller brother of b2c smaller business than b2c. And then you know, it is, let’s say, less focused and less light on that. So we need to somehow make those positions attractive, because at the end b2b is, I would say more attractive, at least I was changing from b2c to b2b. Half of my career, and for me, it was like, super exciting. Now, you know, it’s more things that are more interesting in b2b and b2c, because you know, you have more things to do you have more customers. Exactly. So it’s like, so it’s like attractiveness of it. And then, you know, with that, we will get a bigger pool of talents, and then it will be easier. But let’s talk to that.
Rolf Nafziger
Well, you know, I just switched with my department to the b2b area of telecom, Germany. And I must say, I did not observe that there’s a lack of talent, I think they are great people in this organization, great talents, in what they do. I’m rather concerned about the talent of the future. The question, are we hiring fast enough those skills that you need in the future? Yeah, around software automation around all these developments that are taking place right now like blockchain development, artificial intelligence, you need, of course, these very, very special skills, where we are competing with many, many, many big companies around the world. And you’re mentioned the hyper scalars again, yeah. And I already tried to hire somebody from a hyper scalar. And you see, well, and this run the attractiveness of Deutsche Telekom compared to maybe Amazon Web Services is different. Yeah, it’s different. And this is a little bit concerning me that maybe we are not fast enough to develop the talent skill sets of the future, and then we are lagging behind. Yeah.
Hanne Lindbæk
I, if I interpret the conversation, then that’s fascinating connection. For me, you’re saying, somehow the conversation goes in a circle, because earlier, we’re talking about interpreting the outside world, the interpreting the customer in order to understand what they’re going to need. Now, we’re also saying we need to interpret the talents out there and see what they’re going to want to see, in a company such as such a telecom, what will they be looking for, in order to want to come to you and spend their time with you?
Mladen Mitic
Purpose, purpose, purpose, anything else, I think it’s the biggest because you know, you’re not speaking with a different generation. So they’re not looking for the compensation only, as we have touched upon, they are looking for some kind of purpose and to make some kind of impact and to build something to create something. And then, you know, we need to make our industry even more attractive. And we need to understand what is the purpose of our industry, then somehow, you know, present it to them. Because at the end, if you think about the purpose of our industry, where we are connecting everyone, and everything, with the highlight on thing, so we think everything will be connected, and also bring the technology to the society. I’m not sure if someone has a bigger and better purpose than that. But maybe we should be a little bit better in saying that purpose, and attracting people to actually come to our industry, because we have all the fundamental ingredients to actually build something super significant and super valuable. And we’re doing that. But maybe we’re not talking properly about that,
Hanne Lindbæk
Haha. And also, I give you another word right back. And that’s the word integrity. Right? If I’m looking for a talent for an organization I want to work in as far as I understand that these are the kids I speak to these days, they are looking for corporations that have integrity, and then work on the right side of the sustainable development.
Rolf Nafziger
Yeah, absolutely. Integrity, of course, it plays a key role. But I would not be so much concerned about integrity when we talk about Deutsche Telekom. I’m more concerned about the become a back to growth. If I’m external talent, and I have good digitisation skills, software skills, and I have an offer from Amazon, and from Deutsche Telekom. I of course would value how fast can I grow in the organization? Yeah, what is the speed I can develop? And I think this is something we have to reflect how many doors are open at Deutsche Telekom to these talents, and how fast can we grow them within our organization? To be as fast as other companies are currently developing these young people?
Svitlana Bielushkina
This brilliant. This is also I think one of our ingredients to investigate for this is continuous learning. How can you stay up to date, how can you upgrade yourself? Yeah, so how you can Communication per se is fascinating, but what’s fascinating is how we’re ending with passion, integrity, resilience, and continuous learning to get the skills we need in the future. Yeah.
We are lacking what? How can we support people and develop them in such a way that, yes, we need to hire, but you also need to have an inside gig of people you know. Our team has so much to offer. How do we activate that and find people who are passionate about what they do and give them jobs where they can make a real impact? There is no end to what you could say. To dig deeper, there are many tools available. However, time is running out, and Deutsche Telekom is opening a talent hub. Currently, we are looking for talent who really cares about what they do, the commercial, the customer, and the technology. Thank you everyone!
