Schwabe AG
True North Workshop
Our Customer
The printing house that printed Luther's Bible
Today's Schwabe Verlag dates back to 1488, making it the oldest existing publishing house in the world. Schwabe has been publishing books for over 530 years, bringing Martin Luther's writings to Basel, for example.
Today, Schwabe Verlag stands for a program in the humanities and cultural sciences that meets the highest standards. Digitization has also found its way here with a powerful e-library, expertise in editions and online projects as well as practical experience in open access projects.
For Schwabe, digitization means once again adapting to the market.
The Challenge
Due to the particular pressure on the print industry in the age of digitalization, Schwabe had to undergo a profound change. At the same time, managing director and owner Ruedi Bienz retired at the age of 65 and sold his shares. The natural caesura of succession opened up many opportunities. Furthermore, there was no plan, everything was open-ended.
The task was to "get an idea of where things could go" without having to or being able to follow a fixed plan. Another basic requirement was to involve as many people as possible in the process in order to create a resilient structure. It was important to proceed iteratively, i.e. care was taken to ensure that modules (training courses, workshops, etc.) were delivered as completely as possible. This approach means that there are few dependencies and a functional and completed state is achieved as often as possible. This means that directional and development decisions can also be made during the process.
Our Approach
The first step was to fundamentally clarify what the dangers of such far-reaching changes are and how they can be dealt with.
Once the management and the Executive Board had decided in favor of the iterative approach, i.e. moving away from ready-made solutions, the "tools of the trade" were gradually provided by sitegeist. One of the first steps was to support a group of people who accompanied the process (transition team). This group was cross-functional and was involved in this context alongside their actual work - in other words, these people were working on their own initiative.
sitegeist the Transition Team provided the Transition Team with tools of the trade and accompanied them through the "first steps" as well as the "stumbles". Once this group had established itself, it was possible for these people to recognize where a problem was arising. If tools, advice or an assessment were needed to tackle the problem, this was provided by sitegeist.
To ensure continuity, at least one person within Schwabe was needed to accompany the change full-time, i.e. to provide a reliable point of contact and know "where the shoe pinches". This person was trained iteratively by sitegeist.
How we supported Schwabe AG
Workshops
- Becoming decisive as a team and making good decisions
- Gradually adapting current processes and structures
- Kanban
- True North - bringing together all results to develop a common vision
Trainings
- Training: Creating change - How to change the world and survive the journey
- Training: Agility - from buzzword to just doing it
- Training: Agile Change Management
- Company Offsite: Quo vadis - Worldcafé with all employees
- Moderation of team retrospectives
- Simulation: Stop starting, start finishing - reducing the work in progress to achieve results faster.
The Result
Schwabe has acquired all the skills needed to successfully manage the change process from "the print shop that printed Luther's Bible" to a digital company.
In the beginning, more know-how transfer and help from sitegeist was certainly necessary, but Schwabe is now mastering the path very well on her own - what is not available is learned.
Gina is extremely happy to have made herself unnecessary and at every meeting everyone involved has a tear in their eye.
In order to involve all employees, to give them the opportunity to get more involved, to give them the chance to ask questions or simply to "get their worries off their chest", a World Café was organized with all employees. It was run by the Schwabes transition team and Gina from sitegeist - so apart from the expertise and experience of sitegeist, nothing else was needed.
Our project on television.
The digital transformation project that sitegeist carried out for the traditional Swiss company was such a remarkable success that it was even reported on Swiss television.
Kanban workshops
When the transition team started too many initiatives at the same time, this was intercepted by learning Kanban, which is why Kaban workshops were held. In addition, simulations of the "work in progress" made it very clear which behaviors had which effect.
As more people began to participate in the change process, it was necessary to clearly formulate the existing vision. To this end, sitegeist coordinated the preparations for bringing together all previous initiatives and supported the management and the transition team in the alignment and resulting formulation of the True North:
"Responsibility is our basis, love for everything new is our tradition. Together, we inspire with bold and unconventional results and change in order to remain ourselves."