Bestowing confidence

Mr Endress, how has the coronavirus pandemic changed your life?

Endress: Being outside, getting exercise, mindfully enjoying nature: these are things I have been doing my entire life. I’m simply doing more of this because of the pandemic.

How about you, Mr Altendorf?

Altendorf: My situation is similar. I get outdoors to do my exercise and let myself be stimulated by nature. What has helped me is discipline. I have the same rhythm regardless of whether I am working from home or at the office. What I sorely miss are the cultural activities: concerts, exhibitions, theater, all of the things that usually inspire us.

How does this impact your job?

Altendorf: As the chief executive of a company, I cannot afford to lose my confidence. I have to be optimistic, yet stay realistic and objective. This balancing act becomes more difficult in the absence of interaction with the outside world. That’s why I always seek the long view: a strategy, a long-term goal. This long-term perspective helps me to stay positive.

How does that long view shape up at Endress+Hauser?

Altendorf: We said from the start that we want to focus on protecting people and do the best job possible of serving our customers. And without being able to foresee the impact
of the pandemic, it was nonetheless important to us to sidestep short-time working if at all possible, and avoid layoffs. At the same time we decided not to cut back on any of
our large-scale investments. We stuck with all of this. But we thought through scenarios in terms of their economic impact on the company.

What does the pandemic mean for solidarity within the shareholder family, Mr Endress?

Endress: We held a meeting between the inner circle of family members and top management right at the beginning of last year. After that, practically all in-person encounters were canceled. There is a large flow of information, but the physical presence is missing. That wears you down!

Mr Altendorf, how is the coronavirus changing the world of Endress+Hauser and that of the customers?

Altendorf: I see four major elements. One point is the future of sales, the interface to the market and customers. In the image of the tree that Mr Endress likes to use, this is the crown. We need a larger surface that can absorb the sunlight in order to close the gaps and achieve a greater presence. In this case we have to utilize every available opportunity in the interaction between the analog and digital worlds.

Endress: Digitalization and online platforms create additional access to the market
and customers. The further we branch out, the better it is for us. The digital world will not replace the physical sales environment, however. People always need people. The terms ‘knowledge’ and ‘warmth’ are incredibly important: knowledge can be digitally transported, but warmth requires closeness. When the media says home working is
the future, that’s wrong. Employees miss interacting with other people when they work from home.

Altendorf: The way in which we work together will nevertheless change – and that’s another element. When people are all physically present in a room, collaboration is different than if they are collaborating in a mixed or fully digital environment.

Is there anything else that we can learn from the crisis?

Endress: After the crisis is before the crisis. During the financial crisis we discovered
that biotechnology and life sciences were continuing to boom – precisely the areas where we were not performing well. We changed that. We invested, made acquisitions and strengthened our expertise in the field of analysis technology. We also moved into the laboratory business. All of these things helped us tremendously over the past year.

Prior to Covid-19, protection of the climate and the environment dominated public discourse. What happens next?

Altendorf: People have developed a different awareness of issues such as health, nutrition and protecting the environment. And climate change is not going away. It’s something that must and will occupy all of us as humans. Government policies create the framework, such as the European Union and its climate objectives. And I see lots of efforts by industry to reduce the carbon footprint.

Endress: Coronavirus will help us to become more sustainable.

Looking to the future, do you think the most difficult times are still ahead of us when it comes to the pandemic?

Altendorf: The pandemic will certainly keep us and society occupied for a very long time to come. The first nine months of this year will likely be a struggle until larger segments of society gain a sense of security and confidence through vaccinations. Vaccinations are the only thing that can return us to a sense of normality similar to what we had before. The old normality will never return… but I do believe the economy will then experience a certain degree of momentum.

Endress: Confidence is the key. Without it, there are no investments – and no growth. But I’m confident we will reach our targets, because within the company there is much that has been created and further developed over a period of decades. We have tremendous people and first-rate offerings. And we’ve never had so many great product innovations as we do this year!