Interview with Monika Wiederhold: European Competitiveness
Collaboration in Europe: what does it take to bring decision makers together to reach a common consensus?
At the Fightback Summit in Berlin we were lucky enough to interview Monika Wiederhold — Managing Director, Amadeus Germany GmbH. We talked about Europe, digitalisation, startup-entrepreneur collaboration and what the Fightback Movement means to her.
Q: The Fightback Summit is about bringing different people together whether that is an entrepreneur, a senior executive or an investor, so they can exchange ideas and learn from each other in terms of creating a better future for Europe. In your opinion, what needs to happen for positive change to occur in Europe?
Monika: As a senior executive of a multinational organisation which serves all players in the industry, I know the value of cooperation and collaboration: across frontiers, across currencies, and across value chains. From my point of view, exactly these skills — cooperation and collaboration — need to improve and to grow. Secondly, I think we need to collaboratively venture more, to dare and take risks to create opportunities for innovation and growth.
Q: In terms of cooperation between tech entrepreneurs and corporates — how can both parties benefit from working with each other?
Monika: Startup entrepreneurs and large corporations have extremely different DNA. But this does not make them incompatible — to the contrary: They complement each other and can benefit hugely from working together. Both are categorised by features and capabilities which are missing in the other. Sharing and combining these features and capabilities can create huge successes. Of course, there’s risk involved, e. g. when different personalities clash. Sometimes it just doesn’t match and it doesn’t work. But if you make it happen, then it’s great and very productive. You can combine strengths and create something which is bigger than the sum of the parts.
Q: And what do you think can be done to incentivise both parties to work together, because it’s obviously hard for an entrepreneur to dedicate a lot of time to teaching different things to a corporate executive. What can be done to make that a more free flowing relationship?
Monika: There must be a clear benefit for the startup entrepreneur to engage with a corporation, and it must be clearly visible right from the start. The corporate management on the other side needs to be aware of the necessity to engage with startups to inject new ideas into the corporation. They are well advised to prepare for this and make it as easy as possible for startups to connect and to enter the corporate environment.
Q: I hope you enjoyed the Fightback Summit today. How would you describe the Fightback Movement in three words?
Monika: Collaboration. Energy. Europe.
Q: What’s your take on the urgency of these topics, looking at how advanced markets like Asia or the US are? How urgent do you think the situation is for Europe?
Monika: We are running out of time. The speed and development are amazing, both in the east and in the west. Europe across all industries, sectors, and governments needs to speed up now. Certainly speed is a very important topic.
Q: Who do you think is responsible for this change?
Everybody. I am deeply convinced that you cannot delegate change to some politician or some company. It’s the individual who has to take a stand what he or she can contribute in his or her environment. Whether I am at the top level of a company or just an individual — I can do something and contribute. So I would appreciate if every European takes a stand and does something and that would collectively drive change at an incredible scale .
