When I joined the new enterprise-level position as a Strategic Lead for Digital Customer Experiences at Roche Pharma in early 2022, I firstly did an in-depth analysis of the internal landscape of customer experience (CX) tools, methodologies and initiatives in place. And what I found was a colorful bunch of innovative assets and committed individuals. But all more or less disconnected, and all one-man/woman armies. At the same time I had personally decided to change my own strategy to making Roche more customer experiences driven from preaching CX to executing CX. “From talking to walking”. To make it real in a world of fancy castles in the clouds. And I was interested in getting an external personal coaching by senior CX leaders from other industries who could help me finding the right path and being sparring partners. And then I realized the potential of pieces mutually reinforcing each other, and I decided to combine both activities. To use the opportunity to get a coaching by external CX executives (Exec #1) on CX execution (Exec #2) and invite other internal CX-related executive leaders (Exec #3) who I had identified during my internal analysis to join me and learn together. With the perspective to develop a better connected and true enterprise approach to CX for Roche Pharma. Together with colleagues across business functions, digital teams, support functions, HR and affiliates (who all self-committed and volunteered), we ran a Collective CX Exec Coaching provided by our external partner TribeCX for ~1 year (until a couple of people were impacted by a re-org). The learning path and joint growth in CX maturity was amazing to watch and participate in. Even provided the ideal outcome wasn’t achieved, learnings and connections continued to resonate and flourish in the company the months and years after. CLIENT:Roche Pharma(as a Roche employee)PROJECT TIME FRAME: July 2018 – February…

Over the last few months, since I had accepted the lead for the corporate Voice-of-the-customer (VoC, customer feedback) Program, I built and grew a cross-functional matrix team (squad), jointly delivering on developing and implementing the program at Roche Pharma The high-performing VoC Program squad unites colleagues from … … where a lean core team delivers day-by-day. And subject matter experts are pulled in punctually, where specific expertise is required. The VoC Program squad at ‘Global’ is also supported and guided by a steering committee (“VoC Experts Council”) being composed of representatives by affiliates and regions. What have been key success key factors for such a complex squad effectively delivering together … CLIENT:Roche Pharma Global Product Strategy(as a Roche employee)PROJECT TIME FRAME: September 2022 –…

One of the first things which happened after I had started heading the Medical Customer Experience department at Roche Pharma (global) … was COVID-19. Almost overnight, we all had been pushed into the world of virtual teamwork and collaboration. And all our sales reps and medical liaison in the field had been pushed from visiting customers at their places to … well, yes, actually being mostly disconnected. Vice versa, customers and patients were also substantially disconnected from us. As a reaction to this situation, my team and I went into the lead with ad-hoc initiating and setting-up a corporate ‘COVID-19 Situation Room’ in March 2020, shortly after the first lock-down had been declared. With the objective to cross-functionally & cross-departmentally align activities around how we can better serve the questions and information needs of our customers and patients in the COVID-19 crisis situation. The Situation Room had been closely linked to the COVID-19 Task Force as well as other related activities across Roche. Over time, business moved into a new normal, there was less and less need for a crisis management format. As a consequence, the situation room was closed EO June 2020, and what we had learned was transferred into day-to-day business. The Roche Pharma ‘COVID-19 Situation Room’ had been a true best practice example of short-term and highly effective cross-functional collaboration with regards to crisis management. Kudos go to a bunch of smart and highly committed people who jointly contributed and made it…

I joined Roche Pharma in Nov 2019 to build & develop the Medical Customer Experience department in the Global Medical Affairs organisation of the company. The Medical CX department is driven by the ambitions to … Based on truly amazing and excellent people, I have been able to develop a high performing, lean and value-chain-based team of Digital Engagement Leads, CX Leads, CX Insights Leads and Strategic CRM Leads. We jointly deliver on … CLIENT:Roche Pharma PDMA (Global Medical Affairs)(as a Roche employee)PROJECT TIME FRAME: November 2019 – January…

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.” Elbert…

I so far met basically three archetypes of human characters within – esp. larger – companies: Builders, Maintainers and Destroyers. Builders Building is their passion. They are restless. The status quo never is good enough. After the implementation is before the implementation. Builders are thinking forward, innovatively and constructively. They see changes as tools for improvement and development. But they set a high value on a well-founded and provable rational for any changes needed as part of their overall plan. Builders know that for being successful they have to convince others (like Maintainers) and bring them in. They are usually quite clever in positively influencing people, and they can be very inspiring and motivating for others. On the other side of the coin, Builders can be quickly frustrated by resistance to – in their view – obvious room for improvement. E.g., Builders have the tendency to underestimate the importance of politics, esp. when going beyond factual businesslike objectives. If they fail it is often due to a outflanking by games at work. Beyond that, Builders will always be strong drivers of innovation and development. Maintainers Maintainers merge into ensuring stability and consistency … of processes, services, tools, etc. They can do the same set of tasks over and over again, day after day, year after year. Continuity is their mission. As a convenient side effect, Maintainers are extremely good in identifying deviations and threads. So, Maintainers love the status quo. But they are not just resistant to changes, a common misunderstanding and complete misinterpretation. Factually, they just insist on a well-founded and convincing justification for a change. What is actually a fair approach! Factually, Maintainers are the backbone of most companies, ensuring business continuity. They bring overeager Builders back to earth, and steadily mop up behind Destroyers. Destroyers The dilemma of Destroyers is that most of them are deeply convinced they would be Builders. So, a mismatch between self- and external perception is definitely an issue with Destroyers. Well, basically they are right. Building often needs changes, and changes sometimes also need destruction. But they make 2 major – to my opinion – mistakes. First, they are biased and fixated on change. And second, they generally mistake change with destruction. Many Destroyers follow the illusion that the event of a change itself would be good. They are disciples of change. In their thinking it boosts organizational creativity and evolution. The origin of this misconception is an outdated and wrong sociological interpretation of the biological evolution paradigm. On top, Destroyers often undervalue the importance of sound change management – not in proclamation but in implementation. Then, destruction is not an intrinsic consequence of the change but of bad (or no true) change management. “Chopper managers” are typical Destroyers. So, you don’t know “chopper managers”? I am sure you do! “Chopper managers” are hopping from one position to the other, like tourist doing a helicopter sightseeing tour. They simply fly in (whence-soever), make a lot of wind when landing, create a maximum of confusion, and fly out again soon enough before they need to face the outcomes or take responsibility for long-term consequences. Unfortunately, Destroyers have the highest impact in many companies, giving Builders and Maintainers a hard time. So, what are you?! I found myself without doubt having a very strong Builder component. I love to develop, to implement and to provide new solutions. I can also be a Maintainer … for a while. But sooner or later this stops satisfying me, and I start looking for opportunities to do some “building” and improvement at least within my proximate range. I am also open to destruction, but I insist on well-founded and convincing rational as well as sound change management. And I absolutely hate destruction of a so-called “running system” without true need, or doing a change just for its own sake. Altogether, it looks like that I seem to be a Builder, with a secondary Maintainer facet, and only constructive Destroyer qualities. Builder, Maintainer or Destroyer … what are…