What's in a name?

Hans-Jürgen Bill talks about the human implications of turning two companies into one and why job titles just aren’t that important.

“I believe that cultural change or mindset change is an ongoing task for each and every company”
-Hans-Jürgen Bill

When Nokia Networks and Siemens Communications joined together to form Nokia Siemens Networks in 2007 the company instantly became one of the largest communication organizations in the world. Not only that, it also required that two workforces numbering tens of thousands of people in more than a hundred countries had to somehow form a seamless whole. Though some of this work had been done by the time Hans-Jürgen Bill became Head of Human resources in 2009, there remained plenty of work to do. It's a task that would have been daunting for even the most seasoned people professional. For Bill, the test was even greater. Despite a long and distinguished career in the communications industry, this is Bill's first HR role.

One of the biggest challenges of this new role is the continuing integration of workforces from two very different organizations, on a worldwide scale. Adrian McLean, a consultant hired by the new company to help facilitate cultural change, likened the merging organizations to a shoal of fish and super tanker. "In Nokia the dominant image was of a shoal of fish," McLean said. "What this represented was the values-driven, self-organizing capacity inside Nokia. A lot of people had a sense of having freedom, but the coordination occurs through adherence to some strongly felt and shared values." The driving force within Nokia was teamwork, with far less emphasis on the individual. By contrast Siemens, with its more rigid and hierarchical structure, represented the tanker, moving forward with power and momentum and possessed of numerous floors and levels.

According to Bill, the new organization is essentially a blend of its two parents. "It has more flexibility than the super tanker, but a little bit more order than the shoal of fish," he states. "But we are moving into some new fields. We are developing as a known company, with a heritage of two fine companies. We have our own values and our own company setup and our own company understanding."

Merging these two entities into an effective whole was a process that involved a certain amount of pain. Layoffs were unavoidable, with around 10,000 existing staff leaving Nokia Siemens Networks since its 2007 foundation. On the flip side, 15,000 new people have since joined the organization. Though this process has undoubtedly caused a great deal of upheaval, Bill believes that there have been upsides. "I even think it is rather positive that you have this kind of exchange of people, so that you get new ideas in," he says. "When you look where we have hired people, specifically in the areas where our markets are still growing, like India, China, the US and some other parts of the world like South America, that has been an advantage. 

"We have to also change the business, in that we are transforming from more a system and equipment led business, into also a software and services led business, which obviously also requires different skill sets and different capabilities and competencies of people."

Nonetheless, for those employees who weren't new recruits, the obstacles of instilling an entirely new culture remained. Bill seems largely unfazed by what looks like a major challenge, instead viewing it as simply another component of business development. "I believe that cultural change or mindset change is an ongoing task for each and every company, specifically in fast changing environment that we are in as Nokia Siemens Networks. 

"Of course, when you do an integration kind of merger there are some specific topics you need to look at.  But generally, you need to continue with that. The market is changing.  The environment is changing.  You need to adapt your capabilities, your competencies, your specific topics you're looking at in the company, your focus area. From this point of view, this transformation is an ongoing topic. I'm quite sure that it never ends.  And the environment we are in today is definitely different from the environment that was there when we made the decision to go into this merger."

Bill identifies the move into this new business environment as a far bigger hurdle than simple cultural alignment. The requirement to effectively balance immediate and future goals is central to being prepared for whatever lies further down the road. "At the end of the day, you need to find the right balance between short-term and long-term measures and short-term and long-term success," he explains. "Each company needs to survive in the short term as well, and that is what we are trying to balance out with different incentive systems we have on the short-term and long-term view. 

"But what is even more important, from my point of view, is that we're balancing also between the 'what' part and the 'how' part in our performance evaluation for our leaders within the company.  So we have, on one side, a focus on the 'what' part. That's the numbers, the milestones, the revenues, whatever you're judging there. The 'how' part is the behavior of the leaders.  And the behavior is, of course, something that needs to be very sustainable, at the end of the day.  What we're doing is to balance that out. So that means if somebody is good at the 'what' part, but not good at the 'how' part, he is not going to be successful within this company in the long term."           

People power

A constant question asked of HR leaders is how much their work truly affects the wider actions of the business. Bill is adamant that he has a major part to play. "I think the human resources department has a huge impact on the overall strategy," he says. "We are part of the strategy and we are part of the business. We are supporting the business. With the right talent interaction and retention, with the right values, with the right leadership, I think there is a quite huge impact to the overall company strategy, at the end of the day. That is what we are doing daily. We obviously have kind of a people agenda, which is a base for, also, part of the overall Nokia Siemens Networks strategy. It's a very important cornerstone."

Bill's view of business and HR being inextricably linked comes as no surprise. With a degree in telecommunications and economics and numerous previous management roles at NSN and Siemens, he is an HR executive with an unusually strong grounding in the corporate world. "HR should be part of the business and HR should support the business," says Bill. "One of the preconditions for that is that you understand the business you are in. We think that here, it's an advantage, that somebody coming from the business and understanding the business is also driving the human resources part of the company, and would contribute more to the success of the company."

But could there be disadvantages to someone without specific people experience being in a role like this? "Somebody not coming out of an HR function is not very much in all the all the HR processes, all the HR needs," concedes Bill. "At the beginning, that is something somebody obviously needs to learn. But we have a lot of HR professionals within Nokia Siemens Networks who are definitely covering all these topics as well."

A top priority for Bill's HR organization is fostering talent and ensuring that the Nokia Siemens Networks' internal population mirrors that of the many territories in which the company operates. "One of the major topics is definitely leadership," he says. "We think that it's going to change a company, and that it's definitely needed to transform a company into the new areas where you are active. The second point is talent, which also takes in diversity. We're investing more in gender diversity. And though we aren't perfect on national diversity, we are doing quite well in that area. Looking into our executive board, for example, we have six different nationalities within this executive board. We are also investing in youth. So getting new people on board, having close cooperation with universities in different countries of the world. It's also kind of an investment being active in this. At the end of the day, I think what is necessary is that you have a quite balanced workforce with experienced people and with younger people with obviously more drive. And that is what makes a company, in the medium and long term, successful."

Despite this interest in finding and supporting the next generation of workers, Bill believes that demographic issues are not the most important when it comes to having a cohesive and effective workforce. "From my point of view, it's very much based on the values we have as a company," he says. "That is independent of whether somebody has been in the company for a couple of years already, or is just joining new.  We feel that people appreciate that this company has values, and that we live the values as much as we can. And it's also a bit dependent on the growth areas we see in the different regions of the world. That also means that we're shifting workforce into the areas where we're doing more business, where there is more growth. Specific to the growing service business is that is a very regional, a very local business, so service people need to be close to our customers. I wouldn't say that it's really an age issue, in terms of that. It's rather an issue of where your business is located or where your growth areas are. 

What's in a name?

One of the more unusual features of Nokia Siemens Networks' organizational structure is the way it has done away with much of the hierarchy of job titles that has come characterize the corporate environment in so many companies. In its place is a far more streamlined set of roles that apply across the entire business. While this process was largely welcomed, it did run into resistance in certain areas, notably the US where attachment to the tangled network of SVPs, EVPs, Presidents and Chairmen was more profound. "It was an issue," Bill explains. "If you do such a major cultural change, you will inevitably find some resistance. There were some areas and some regions in the world where people were very much used to these kinds of titles. We had a quite a clear line on it at the beginning, though we were also making certain exceptions."

Ultimately though, time was invaluable in people settling into this new structural culture. "Time really helped us very much here," Bill continues. "People just developed into it. At the end of the day, what really counts is the competency of your business partner - and not the title. Our customers got used to it.  Our sales - which are equally important - got used to handling this no title policy. There might be still some areas in the world where we have the odd exception. But I think with 90 percent of the company, we are definitely handling that, as it fits to our culture. And at the end of the day, it's, of course, not so important what's on your business card, but what you really can deliver, and what your contribution is to your customers' success."

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Global network, local approach

How Nokia Siemens Networks handles its worldwide workforce

The challenge is that on one side, you need a global set of values, a global set of measures for the entire workforce you have throughout the company. But you also need to be regionally relevant.  Of course, you can't compare people from China now with people in the UK, for example. 

There is a different setup needed there, different requirements in terms of developing the people in a different environment, and in a sometimes more or less competitive environment.  We try to get a balance between the global requirements we have and the regional needs.

We don't have global research for example. These kinds of things we do on a very regional level and we try to adapt to the needs of the local workforce. 

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Nokia Siemens Networks - big numbers

More than 60,000 employees in 150 countries

Serves 600 communication service providers globally

1.5 billion people connect through the company's networks

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Hans-Jürgen Bill was appointed Head of Human Resources, Nokia Siemens Networks, on 20 April 2009. Prior to this role Bill was Head of West South Europe region for the company. In that role, he led the company's operations and activities in a diverse market comprising of 30 countries, working with many of the world's largest global operators. He held this position since the formation of Nokia Siemens Networks in April 2007, building a strong team and organization for the region.

Prior to Nokia Siemens Networks, Bill held a range of diverse roles at Siemens which he joined in 1983. From 1994, he was Head of Siemens Mobile Networks in Indonesia. In 1998, he became Head of Region Central-East and North Europe for Siemens Mobile Networks and then served as Head of Operations and later as Head of Asia Pacific for Siemens Mobile Networks.

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This article was first published in HRM magazine under the title of Making connections: www.hrmreport.com/article/Making-connections.