The habit of change: the Acciaierie Bertoli Safau experience
The equivalent of an Eiffel Tower produced every day and a half. This is the amount of steel sold by ABS, a division of Gruppo Danieli of Udine specializing in the production of special steels. Comparing these figures, it turns out that the entire annual production of ABS steel mills is equivalent to 30,000 Boeing 737s. These figures place the company at the top in Italy and on the podium of European producers.
Alessandro Trivillin, CEO of ABS and CO-CEO of Gruppo Danieli, does not lose his smile when he is asked to reflect on the complexity of doing business today.
“Markets change super-fast. For example, in recent years, with the collapse of oil prices and the blocked oil wells, there has been a massive reduction in orders from the Oil & Gas sector. This is just one example of the volatility of the markets that require even a steel mill like ABS to be able to respond promptly to the needs of change by evolving.”
Companies must be able to develop new habits
Flexibility, speed, change: a challenge for any type of company, even more so for a steel mill. What answers is ABS finding to cope with changing market conditions?
The very nature of the steel industry is not characterized by the word flexibility, but in light of the most recent economic developments that have affected the world economy, the need has arisen to be ready to respond to the needs of change, not so much in relation to a different direction to take, but rather to the creation of an organization capable of evolving and continuously adapting to changing circumstances, changing people’s mentality and orienting it to the ability to adapt.
In particular, the Lean Lifestyle® path I personally undertook last year made me realize how fundamental it is that people in the company can develop new habits, such as the ability to adapt to markets that are increasingly smaller, competitive and demanding.
However, being responsive to change must find its strength in a profound sharing of values: what actions has ABS taken in this direction?
To broaden the vision of the people and the company, an Envisioning process was launched: after identifying our Vision and Mission, we focused on our founding values. Then we continued this activity with a Top-Bottom strategy, and we went down to all company levels to “defeat” individualism and make everyone feel our values as their own. It is not enough to declare our values to be agents of change, but we must put them into practice to understand what the goal is and where we want to go.
What helped you in this process of sharing and involvement?
It was a great help to give us a method and use the Hoshin Kanri tool. We involved all levels of the company towards a single goal and in this way, we generated strong energy. And again, the skills developed in the Lean Lifestyle® course helped me achieve results first and find solutions to changes.
Below is an excerpt from from Alessandro Trivillin’s speech at the Executive Workshop “The power of habits in the company”, March 9 2017 (Udine)
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