Interview with Hendrik Hucke
Tell me, what do you actually do with us?
I’ll try to summarise it very briefly: The tasks are very varied. In particular, I have overall responsibility for strategic issues, growth and the associated success of the Group. To ensure success, I bring together the various interests and stakeholders that have an impact on our company, such as employees, customers and investors, and build a sensible corporate and team structure and corporate culture. Another important part of my role is to work alongside my colleagues on all issues relating to M&A (mergers & acquisitions), i.e. the purchase and integration of companies.
What advantages does the group of companies actually have?
The idea is to promote co-operation between the companies and to be better together than the individual company. For example, we have set up a great service for our subsidiaries in the form of a central HR department, which supports the companies in a wide range of recruiting tasks. We also work centrally on topics that make us better as an employer and company for our customers. These are often topics that don’t happen in smaller companies due to time constraints and can be spread across several shoulders here.
What do you find exciting about the Greenovis Group?
We are operating in a very forward-looking industry. This means that a lot is happening at the moment, and it won’t be boring in the future either. I really enjoy supporting the companies with these developments, from the initial meeting with us through to integration into the Group. What I find particularly exciting within the group is that many different personalities come together. This brings together a lot of knowledge, experience and professionalism and makes it available to the group.
Which companies do you think are best suited to our group?
It is important that the companies have a certain level of professionalism, quality standards and structure. It is also very relevant that the entrepreneurs who join us have a desire to develop themselves and their company further and position themselves in a future-orientated way. This makes it much easier to make the transition from a sole proprietorship to a group of companies.
HENDRIK HUCKE
What do you think is the biggest challenge in the industry and how can it be overcome?
There are many challenges. However, one of the biggest challenges is definitely the shortage of skilled labour in our industry. In my opinion, the only way to counteract this is to come up with clever concepts to attract and retain the younger generation and career changers in particular. We are working on concepts to make this work for us.
If you look at our group: Where are we right now?
With our acquisitions this year, we have reached a good size and found ourselves as a Group. We are now in the process of growing even closer together as a group. This means that we are harmonising our processes and systems so that we can make even better use of the strengths of a group. However, we are still in talks with companies that want to join our group. The journey is far from over!
What are the plans for the Group and what is coming up in the near future?
One major project that will be rolled out in 2025, for example, is our Greenovis Academy. We want to use this to develop a further training programme for all employee groups. The aim is to offer existing employees the opportunity for further development as well as to provide new employees, career changers and foreign specialists with a good opportunity to familiarise themselves with the company. This will help us to counteract the shortage of skilled labour mentioned above.
Of course, we will continue to look for suitable companies that enrich our Group and try to attract them to us. To make it easier for them to join us, we want to optimise one or two processes. For example, we are working intensively on topics such as the pooling of purchases of machinery, vehicles, work clothing, etc. as well as ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance), i.e. sustainable management in the areas of the environment, social affairs and corporate governance.