-: I'm sitting here today with Alexander Lacik,
the CEO at Pandora.
Welcome.
-: Thank you.
-: Can you briefly describe
Pandora's transformation program for us?
-: Even when everything was running hot
and the company looked fantastically successful,
there were lots of cracks.
So I think the foundational piece was the analysis
that essentially created a baseline for this program,
which we call Program NOW.
And this consists of three big themes.
One which was around getting the heat back into the brand.
The second piece was around creating better access
to people to kind of connect with our brand.
And then the third piece was a big cost reset exercise,
which essentially was funding
the activities in the previous two.
-: So what has been the impact of Program NOW?
-: From a financial standpoint,
we now have a business that's healthy.
When I joined,
our like-for-like development was negative 10%.
Now it's more positive than anything else.
So there's been kind of a big shift
in the momentum of the business.
So we've gone from a very shaky, declining situation
to now something which is stable and rock-solid
and is far more predictable.
Other than that, we've also built capability.
So one thing is, you can take some strong medicine,
but you also need to kind of get fit for the future.
So we're now a much flatter organization, much leaner.
We connect the countries with Copenhagen,
there's no filter in between.
So we try to "decomplexify" this whole thing.
So we are closer to the customer,
which I believe is going to be
a very important foundational stone for the future.
-: The cost side,
how important has that been to also gain credibility?
-: We've taken out something equivalent to
6% of our revenue base in cost.
We've taken that out,
but we actually reinvested all of it and then some.
So I think it's been a very healthy reallocation
of existing resources.
-: The human element of a transformation
is critical for success.
And you made a number of changes to the people agenda.
Can you share with us, what's your philosophy?
-: I don't believe you can make a transformation
of this magnitude without having a team around you-
a leadership team around you-that is completely in sync.
That's probably the first.
Then I think the second is you need to get enough disciples
throughout the organization.
Because again, ten people,
or however many were in the executive team,
cannot turn a ship like this around.
It happens through the organization.
Which then leads me to the third one:
You get what you measure.
And I normally also add incentivize.
So very clear metrics, which have some nice leverage to them
if people deliver on the task.
You need to identify some big bets,
which I think through Program NOW,
we were very clear on what those were.
And then put the energy behind them.
-: When you drive change management, there is resistance.
How have you dealt with that as the CEO?
-: The initial phase is very much,
at least it was in our case, a top decision.
You pick your team.
So we bought a lot of talent.
Then after roughly, I don't know, 12, 18 months,
we switched gears, and then we said,
now we move away from a buy strategy into a build strategy.
And that of course now is all about
retaining the good talent that you pulled through the door.
-: What can other leaders learn
from Pandora's transformation journey?
-: I think really doing the honest analysis,
especially if you're in a turnaround situation.
Get to the bottom of the problem.
Then I think it's about focus.
Pick a couple of bets.
So I need my 30,000 people
to kind of sing from the same songsheet,
to be clear on the purpose of the company.
That's actually where we started the whole exercise.
Do we know why we're here?
What's the reason for Pandora in people's lives?
And if we have clarity on that, which we do,
then a lot of things flow from that
and you have something which you can easily convey
to every single person that's employed by Pandora.
And also when you speak to people outside of Pandora.
So we're very clear on the reasons why we exist.
-: What would you like to be remembered for in Pandora?
-: I suppose that there are two or three things maybe
that would be good for the company to do.
One of them is we've tried
to change the perspective of being a quite insular company
and starting on the outside
to be much more consumer-centric.
I think that that's something
which I've been pushing very hard.
I think that we've established new values,
and I think values are a key component
of creating a company culture.
And which has, of course, much longer,
let's say sustainable impact on the company.
And I think we're trying to drive a very different agenda
within the industry when it comes to sustainability.
-: Alexander, thank you so much for coming here today
and sharing your learnings with us.
-: Thank you, and thanks to your entire team.
Without you, we couldn't have done it.
So big thank you.