The power of change and growth: an interview with Erik Ringertz, CEO Netlight
The power of change and growth: an interview with Erik Ringertz, CEO Netlight
We are grateful and proud that so many in our network are reaching out and sharing their experiences in these unprecedented times. It helps to share different perspectives on what it means to do business as usual, in unusual times. We recently interviewed Erik Ringertz, CEO Netlight about his thoughts on modern forms of leadership, how they have successfully managed to grow at Netlight and to get his take on what lies ahead.
Below follows a transcript of the interview
What do you believe is the secret formula for leadership success?
The dull answer is to work hard and stay true to what you do but really there isn’t just one thing that you can do with a quick cheat. For us at Netlight we believed from the start in the power of growth and our ambition was to be bigger and able to take on more exciting projects and employ exciting people. So how could we create an organisation that was both large and tight at the same time? I have been working on this objective for 21 years now.
Netlight is highly regarded by talent for its great culture particularly in IT. How do you describe it?
The culture itself is a product of the people. And everybody who joins contributes to it. If I were to try and label it – its about common ownership. People assume ownership over their situations and assume ownership for each other.
You talk about your organisation as a flock?
The idea behind this - if you look at the sky you see a murmuration of birds and they look like one thing as they fly around in synch. They aren’t following a leader. Each bird is assuming their own responsibility and minding their own business – but every bird is also keeping a close eye on every other bird’s actions. One will see a predator and swerve and the flock will follow. It is about being a leader and a follower at the same time – not either/or. I title myself Spiritual Leader and Devoted Follower – because my work is about seeing exactly what is going on that is interesting n the business and then connecting that back into the organisation.
How has the flock performed in the pandemic?
Netlight evolves and we have looked at whether self-leadership works in a negative market? It showed that it was extremely efficient. We were super agile when the pandemic hit. My job was to reassure people that the system was still working – and across the geographies reinforce the notion that each office will support any office that was in difficulty. Communication was very important, we did much more informing about the utilisation rates and show that it wasn’t falling to give people the confidence to take responsibility.
It sounds like you have taken the Scandinavian principles of transparency, reduced hierarchy and consensus and pushed it further. How does it work in a non-Scandinavian setting?
Well, it is more action oriented than consensus and I don’t think of it as particularly Scandinavian. It’s not really decision making – its action, then reacting to reactions from that action and so on… And actually, it can be harder to explain the culture to a Norwegian than say a German.
Another principle in your organisational culture is around ‘pay it forward’. Can you explain that to us?
Common ownership in its basic form is like slicing up a cake, where 1 plus 1 = 2 but in that scenario, employees are fighting for scarce resources. Very early on we wanted to create some way of 1+1 making 3. The principle is that ‘I will do everything for you because I know that you will do everything for me’. With 1500 employees – everything I give I can expect that 1500 x back. That is how Netlight achieves it engagement levels – through mutual support.
Could any organisation adopt these principles – in industrial businesses for example?
I’m guessing of course, but I don’t think the product HAS to be knowledge and people centric. I know of a canned tomato producer who use the same principles. It is about empowering the people. I would have to try to know for sure.
How do you make growth and profitability important to every employee?
It goes back to success being measured through the best projects and the best people. Being super-profitable means we never have to compromise; we can be selective and choose which projects we will work on. We can also employ exactly the people we want – if we continue to grow then we can employ great people. If we only changed through churn, then we would be losing great people in order to change.
Where do you get your own inspiration?
I’ve always wanted to break boundaries, be rebellious and I get very inspired by creative people. David Bowie, the detail of Daft Punk – mostly artists, music and film. I was inspired by seeing a picture of a murmuration, and read around mutual altruism, then I realised there was an anarchic book called Mutual Aid in the early 1900s – so I read about anarchism – anarchism versus management. This is how I feed my brain.
So you want to be a rockstar in the IT consultancy industry?
Actually, that’s not such a farfetched notion. If I had any musical talent then I might have been a rockstar instead!
We are still in the midst of the pandemic – what changes has it brought about for your organisation and what do you see in your clients’ behaviours?
Obviously, there is flexible working, but I must say I’m a big fan of offices as well as a fan of working from home sometimes – so I believe in the mixture of both. What is the reason for an office? I believe they are for meeting people. Not simply sitting at a desk to work.
For a business so much about connectivity with others – how did you manage being so disconnected when working completely remotely?
By chance we had a lead theme of synchronicity last year in Netlight – i.e. meaningful connection through coincidence. We are all connected in the organisation because every person’s actions will have an impact on everyone else, even if we are different countries or never see each other.
As the pandemic struck, we reached out to everyone – not just messages but picking up the phone to make sure that everyone still felt connected and that mental health was prioritised and not stigmatised.
Instead of having our usual whole company summit we rented 24 castles all over Europe and had the same conference at the same time in each of the locations but with much smaller groups. This worked brilliantly, because people were able to get closer together than in the much larger summit, but still had the connection to the wider group.
So of synchronicity was the theme for last year? What is it now?
Beginner is the theme for 2021. Only by keeping the passion of someone starting out and can you keep engaged. Only by having the humility of a beginner can you avoid arrogance. Again, it’s also the dualism between learner and master. Only by learning like a beginner can you grow.
Erik Ringertz, CEO & devoted follower and spiritual leader of Netlight Consulting.
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