This is the 40th in a series of business tips from industry leaders that Enterprise Times has interviewed. Wolfgang Kobek is Infor’s Executive Vice President & GM of International Business. I interviewed him a few months after he joined the industry-focused ERP vendor last year. It is his second stint at Infor, having worked with the company during its formative years. He spoke about why he rejoined and his ambitions and challenges at the company.
As with other leaders, I wanted to find a tip where he could share the knowledge he had gained during his varied career. I asked him what he would have done differently as he rejoined the firm and what advice he would give someone joining a similar firm.
“It’s an interesting question. If you ask for a tip for someone joining a business, it really depends. Are you joining a startup business? Are you joining a business that is broken? Are you joining a large organisation with a reasonably well-managed business, as I did?
“In my case, as this is not broken. My tip really would be to take your time to assess processes, take your time to assess people. There is no need to rush and make an immediate decision, unlike if you join a business that’s in trouble. Lay out a plan of how you want to evolve the business and bring it to the next level. That takes a couple of weeks. This is what I did. I didn’t make any rash decisions. I didn’t make any changes in the first 60 days because it was not needed.“
What is changing now?
At Infor, Kobek revealed he is investing in building a partner ecosystem. This means building the resources and the people to deliver partner enablement and invest in the channel with the appropriate infrastructure already in place. Kobek concluded,
“Take your time to get an overview of your business. There is no need to make a decision, just to make a decision. There’s no need to change, just to make the change. It all has to be reasonably thought through and make sense at this particular, point in time.”
Returning to the title of this piece, Joining a new business, what to change first, the answer may be nothing.
