(0:03) Welcome to the Supply Chain Planning Podcast, where we speak to supply chain professionals (0:07) about their experience in planning. (0:09) I'm Ben, co-founder of Horizon, and Wim is our co-host. (0:13) Hi everyone, I'm Wim, I'm Managing Director of Lanark. 

(0:16) I'm also pleased to welcome Pieter Tillon to the podcast for today. (0:19) Hi Pieter. (0:20) Hi, good afternoon. 

(0:22) For the audience, maybe to start with Pieter, it might be good to give a brief overview (0:26) of the kinds of companies that you worked for and which types of roles you had in those? (0:31) Yeah, sure. (0:32) No problem. (0:33) I consider myself as a generalist in supply chain, so I've actually tackled all the boxes (0:39) of the supply chain, the score model, which is source, make, and deliver, and the planning (0:45) on top. 

(0:46) I did roles in consulting, in project management, and in operational lead, mainly in a company (0:52) called Miele, famous tumble dryers and washing machines and kitchen apparel. (0:57) Next to that, I was consultant at the S&D Management Consultancy, which is now PwC Strategy (1:03) and Operations. (1:05) And I did some operational leading roles also at Miele, but also at Omega Pharma, which (1:11) is now Perrigo, and also at Edgard & Cooper, which is a scale-up company, and also for (1:17) Daikin. 

(1:17) Then I worked back in Europe, and last but not least also for Klarabot. (1:23) Impressive broad experience over all aspects of supply chain, as this is a supply chain (1:28) planning podcast. (1:29) Where do you see supply chain planning fitting in an organization, and how is it linked to (1:34) strategy? (1:35) Oh, yes. 

(1:35) So I believe that if we start from the score model, and that you have the planning module, (1:40) but actually everything is also planned individually, so you can plan your purchase, you can plan (1:45) your production, and you can plan your delivery part. (1:48) But the overall planning, the orchestration of it all, is what I refer to as the supply (1:53) chain planning. (1:54) I don't know if that answers your question, more or less. 

(1:57) Which part then do you see fitting to a company strategy, or how does that filter through (2:03) in those different aspects? (2:04) Yeah, so I think it's very important that planning is not a standalone island, but is (2:08) actually connected to your business strategy. (2:10) For that, I always refer to the model that Tracy and Yusma in 95 already proposed. (2:16) So you have three axes on which you can differentiate yourself from your competitor. 

(2:21) You have a product axis, so if you want to be a product company, like Nike, like Apple (2:27) is, then you differentiate on the number of products you have, the innovation, the R&D. (2:32) You can also have, let's say, operational excellence axis, which is actually the cost (2:37) leader, then. (2:38) Typical example, supermarkets is Aldi, for example, or Lidl. 

(2:42) You can also have McDonald's, which is also very structured, very standardized. (2:46) It's also an operational excellence company. (2:48) And then you also have companies who focus on customer intimacy, who are more into, let's (2:52) say, the make-to-order, the customizing, or the experience. 

(2:57) Flying Ryanair, cost leader, compared to flying Emirates, for example, is something different. (3:02) So those companies. (3:04) So you need to know your business strategy. 

(3:06) From that, you can also derive your tactical strategy, meaning, are you going to make something (3:12) or source something? (3:13) Are you going to make-to-stock, make-to-order, assemble-to-order? (3:17) This is all tactical elements, which can be decided into a process, which is called S&OP (3:23) or IBP now, so often related. (3:26) So you have your business strategy, then you have your S&OP layer. (3:29) And then below that, there is more the operational planning ongoing, which in an S&OE, a sales (3:35) and operations execution process, you can capture this. 

(3:38) But if you don't have the strategic and the tactical level correct, it's very difficult (3:43) as a planner to plan, of course. (3:45) So this is how it links for me, the global business strategy that you have, the tactical (3:51) one and the operational one. (3:53) And the operational one, planning translates itself into, okay, I have this operational (3:58) plan, so I need to buy this and that and that and that timing. 

(4:02) And I need to make this and that and that in that timing. (4:04) So this is how it fits for me. (4:07) Have you had experiences in those previous roles you just mentioned, where there was (4:11) a disconnect between those levels? (4:14) There was a strategy talk at, I don't know, a strategical level, but the operations were (4:19) pushed in another direction. 

(4:20) Did you encounter that and what did that bring? (4:23) Yeah, well, I would say the most often made mistake is that companies think they have (4:28) to be best at all, which leads to various contradictions in planning. (4:33) The most often one I've encountered is that you say, okay, we are a make-to-stock company, (4:39) but that when a customer orders something and it's not on stock, that we directly start (4:45) with make-to-order. (4:46) This is something I have encountered quite often. 

(4:50) Talking about those different layers, different levels, I think at Miele you had different (4:54) roles on a planning level. (4:56) Where were you there? (4:57) Was it regional? (4:58) Was it global? (4:59) What did you do there? (5:00) It was regional. (5:01) For a few affiliates, I was responsible for the, let's say, mainly the deliver part. 

(5:07) We had warehouses and we needed to deliver to the customers, but also part of it was actually (5:13) input demand planning. (5:15) What we organized there was demand planning. (5:18) Just demand planning or also as an S&OP? (5:20) Well, to start with, I would say it's demand planning, later it evolved to an S&OP, but (5:25) we started off, and that's also my advice for everyone, start off small and just do (5:30) it. 

(5:30) Go and find what you can do, because S&OP requires, let's say, lots of more parties (5:35) to join and also on a higher level, while if you start demand planning, let's say it's (5:41) always my principle is garbage in is garbage out, and let's say the biggest input in your (5:47) supply chain is your actual demand, not sales demand. (5:51) I hope that distinction is clear for everyone. (5:53) We started off with demand planning in the affiliates at Miele. 

(5:58) When I arrived, we had this fantastic program, SAP APO, which some of you might encounter. (6:05) What we had to do is to enter manually each month the forecast in there, per SKU, per (6:12) month, 12 months rolling. (6:14) There was also a proposal from the system, moving average, which is not bad, by the way, (6:18) but okay, moving average, and this needed to be challenged. 

(6:21) When I arrived, what was the challenge? (6:24) None, actually. (6:25) Each month, someone pressed the button. (6:27) Okay, what APO suggests is good. 

(6:30) What did we face? (6:31) We faced a lot of inventory, but also a lot of stock outs at the same moment. (6:35) We decided, okay, we need to get more input than only a statistical value based on historical (6:42) sales. (6:42) We need to have more market introspection. 

(6:46) What did I do? (6:47) I started asking around in the organization, sales, marketing, because they're closest (6:52) to the customers, and finding out, what do you have? (6:55) Recycling, another tip, what do you have? (6:58) They shared all kinds of Excels with me, and I said, okay, do you guys also meet each other? (7:03) Yeah, we meet monthly, so how can I join? (7:06) I started to get to know sales, marketing guys, and then at a certain moment, I said, (7:10) okay, you know what? (7:11) I know that our sales is quite stable, but only if we do marketing campaigns, our sales (7:17) goes up and down. (7:18) I need to get those people around the table. (7:21) Those were the product managers. 

(7:23) I decided, okay, guys, look, what's in it for you, if you sit together with me for once (7:28) a month, one hour, is that you'll have less out of stocks, but in return, I would like (7:33) you to what you already have, to consolidate that, because what I had was, I had a lot (7:39) of data, but it was almost per individual customer, and actually, for APO, I didn't (7:44) need that. (7:45) So I decided, okay, if you guys deliver me that, and we sit together, and we can make (7:49) a better supply. (7:51) We did that once a month, and we started off just by sitting together, and gradually, we (7:57) came to an agenda. 

(7:58) So we repeated everything and said, okay, next time, we might discuss our forecast accuracy, (8:03) because actually I found out we have, in APO, we have a report which contains that. (8:08) We also said, yeah, we have 500 SKUs, but actually, the only problems we have is phase (8:13) in items, phase out items, and the promo items. (8:16) So we came to a few dozen. 

(8:18) So gradually, we made it smaller, and our input was better and better. (8:22) So we managed to get our inventory down in one year time with 20%, while maintaining the (8:29) customer service. (8:30) And that was something very gradually, then, that you set up. 

(8:33) Like you said, you would sit together, then next time, you would discuss something else. (8:36) It was not like upfront, you said, this is going to be the approach. (8:40) It was really incrementally, in that sense. 

(8:42) Yeah, and why did I do that? (8:44) That depends on your company culture. (8:45) So Miele is a German company, family company, very traditional one. (8:49) So if you come out with breaking ideas and push it right through, you will get a lot (8:54) of resistance. 

(8:55) So it depends on, yeah, the situation you're in. (8:58) So I felt that was the right approach to do at that moment. (9:01) And it is also, you know what, you just get started. 

(9:04) What's there, take it, and use it to your advantage. (9:08) Add little steps, always, and in the end, you get a huge result. (9:11) For me, everywhere I started and everywhere where I was responsible for supply chain, (9:16) and this is what I also mentioned in the beginning, the focus for me was on demand planning, why (9:21) garbage in is garbage out. 

(9:23) So you can have a bad demand planning, but a great supply planning. (9:27) But yeah, if the demand is not good, you'll never be able to match it with your supply. (9:31) So I advise everyone, make sure your demand, not sales, demand is under control. 

(9:37) And I had the same everywhere. (9:39) How do you go about that? (9:40) How do you find your real demand? (9:42) Sales is easy, but how do you find your real demand? (9:44) Yeah, I think, first of all, to give it with a small example, if you're out of stock and (9:49) your sales is zero, doesn't mean that your customers don't want your product. (9:53) I use the same example that Nikolaus van der Putt uses, which is quite a good guy to follow (9:59) on LinkedIn, is if you sell ice cream and your vanilla flavor is really the demand, all the (10:05) children want vanilla and you're out of vanilla, it doesn't mean that the other children who (10:09) are waiting don't want vanilla anymore. 

(10:11) The demand is the children want vanilla, the sales is, okay, what can you sell? (10:16) And so if you're out of stock, your sales is zero, but your demand remains. (10:19) So very important to notice that. (10:21) And how do you go about finding your demand? (10:24) Well, that's the true art of demand management, of course, is finding out what you and me as (10:29) a consumer wants and what is not. 

(10:32) If you're a B2B company, you don't want to know what, for example, at Daikin, you work (10:38) with your headquarters in Europe, you work with affiliates, which are countries, countries (10:44) have wholesalers, wholesalers have installers and installers finally meet the end customer, (10:50) want the air conditioning or the heat pump. (10:53) So these different stages of your supply chain, they influence the picture you have on the (10:58) real demand because sometimes they buy stock because there are cheap prices. (11:03) And then you think as Daikin Europe, ah, demand is going up. 

(11:06) No, no, sales is going up, but demand might remain the same. (11:10) So you need actually to bypass, let's say, all the noise, which your own supply chain (11:16) creates. (11:17) You're looking for external factors which can influence demand. 

(11:21) So you need to find the link there at Miele. (11:24) Indicators. (11:25) Yeah, that's indeed. 

(11:26) So at Miele, for example, what they could do, and I hope they now they do it is for their (11:31) kitchen business, you could actually say, okay, I'm going to buy the data of building (11:37) permits that are delivered. (11:39) And based on that, I can know, okay, I have this market share. (11:42) So I know my potential, my demands for my appliances will be about this. 

(11:48) So it's crucial that you find data, external data, which is linked to your demands. (11:55) But that's not an easy thing to do. (11:56) No, indeed. 

(11:57) The difficult thing is to get quality information and also to have it linked to certain times. (12:01) That's why I also said, start simple, start with your sales. (12:05) I know it's not the best. 

(12:07) You will need to correct for out of stocks, etc. (12:10) You need to do that eventually. (12:12) And with new technologies emerging, with data lakes, etc., where you can dump in the external (12:18) data, you can find with machine learning certain links. 

(12:21) It's already advanced, of course, but that's what I would say is the way to find your true (12:26) demand rather than your sales. (12:29) And in the other companies that you worked for, in Perigo, Daikin, Edith and Cooper, (12:33) to what extent were you also there involved in this case and then demand planning? (12:37) Yeah, at Perigo for demand and supply, we had a system that was being implemented. (12:43) Demand and supply role could be implemented. 

(12:45) I could be one person because it's one tool, easy to switch, etc. (12:49) So it made the process easier to integrate end to end. (12:53) But the organization was grown as they have demand group separate and a supply group separate. 

(13:00) So with the introduction of a new tool and the new processes that accompanied that tool, (13:05) the major difficulty there was people. (13:08) But so there you say, demand planning and supply planning actually got combined into (13:11) one person, one department, okay. (13:14) One person, well, we had different brands and per brand we defined, okay, we do end demand (13:20) and supply. 

(13:21) Okay. (13:21) I can imagine that that also happened for other companies because I've often, I've mostly (13:25) seen the reverse, right? (13:27) People or companies when you're small and need someone responsible for both, but then (13:31) they always try to split it up and keep it like that. (13:34) I think it has pros and cons both ways. 

(13:36) It depends a bit on the size, the specialism, what kind of products do you have? (13:41) Is it totally different or is it a bit the same? (13:44) How does your complete chain work? (13:46) So yeah, I prefer always that people have a more end to end view. (13:51) Rather than in small, sliced and diced, you can specialize. (13:55) But actually what I did was I said, okay, you had specialists in demand planning. 

(13:59) They were not very eager to take on supply planning, but okay. (14:03) But I still said, okay, but you will be the expert when it comes down to demand planning. (14:08) So you will remain a kind of key user or expert or while your colleagues might not be. 

(14:14) I do believe in as broad as possible. (14:16) Of course, not everyone is also capable or the interest, but you can give people other (14:23) roles to say, look, you're the specialist in demand. (14:25) So if something changes or if a new tool is implemented in your area of expertise, you (14:31) will be the one taking the lead, but in the operational day to day work, you will also (14:36) do some supply. 

(14:38) It's interesting because I need to think like end to end or having the full view is definitely (14:42) beneficial. (14:43) I'm just more thinking of, is it feasible to do in customer demand planning perspective, (14:47) typically interacting with sales and marketing, supply planning, more with operations, buyers, (14:52) things like that. (14:53) So it's a bit traditional split. 

(14:54) So that's maybe also why I have it in my head like that. (14:56) But it is a fact that it's not easy to find someone who can do both in a good way. (15:01) But that's why I also chosen that team to have like these specialists can coach and train (15:06) the others. 

(15:07) It's not that you're on your own. (15:09) If you start switching that those people and now you do demand. (15:13) And by the way, the specialist will never help you again. 

(15:15) No. (15:16) So that's also something as a manager that you have to facilitate. (15:20) When in your early roles, were you doing both as well, like all of these different parts? (15:25) Yeah, exactly. 

(15:25) I was listening to Peter explaining. (15:27) I've gone through the same. (15:28) And my first role was called market planning, which is a combination of demand and supply (15:33) planning. 

(15:33) And I'm a bit of generalist like Peter as well. (15:36) So I really loved it because that's the role where you see the full supply chain. (15:40) On one hand, you talk with marketing and sales and finance because your forecast eventually (15:45) drives the budget that sales and marketing can use. 

(15:48) And on the other hand, you have that whole supply chain operational machine that is running (15:52) that gets your product into the distribution centers where you need it to fulfill the customer (15:57) orders. (15:58) And as Peter say, if you do your demand planning job right, you have an easy life in supply (16:03) planning. (16:03) If you screw up your demand planning, you know, you're going to be fighting firefighting (16:07) constantly. 

(16:08) So I'm a big fan of combining it. (16:11) But with the caveat, as Peter says, you need to find the people and you need to get scopes (16:16) of products which are manageable, either similar or at least just in a number of products that (16:20) you can wrap your head around it. (16:22) Yeah, definitely. 

(16:23) I agree. (16:24) Yeah. (16:24) At Ediort and Cupra during your time there, while they were scaling up, I think you were (16:28) also responsible for MRP and DRP, right? (16:31) Yes. 

(16:31) Were there different providers, demand planning from them, your MRP and DRP? (16:35) I would go for best in breed. (16:37) I think SAP is good for transactional data, for gathering a sales order entry, etc. (16:42) So no doubt about that. 

(16:44) I also think they're evolving towards more flexible things. (16:48) But I must say that I have better experience with smaller local providers who provide more (16:54) assistance in cloud tooling than with SAP itself. (16:58) So I would go for best in breed if it comes down to specific solutions, demand planning, (17:04) so transport planning. 

(17:06) It's all available in SAP, of course. (17:08) No problem. (17:09) But if you're a small company or a dynamic company, I would not recommend the big software. 

(17:14) So I do believe in that these kind of systems like SAP have a role. (17:18) They're the transactional backbone of your company. (17:21) But to plan with them, MRP is for me, it's planning the sourcing part, planning the production (17:29) part. 

(17:30) That I could still believe. (17:33) But let's say planning the overarching things, strategy, tactics, but also it's more difficult. (17:40) You have these experiences in both big multinational companies like Daikin and Miele, and also (17:45) work at more local scale-ups like together with Cooper. 

(17:48) What are the big differences there that you've seen? (17:51) The major difference for me is in people and the company culture. (17:56) I think at Cooper with a young bunch of enthusiastic professionals who are willing to go for it (18:02) and who do not actually see any boundaries and okay, what do I need to do, what not. (18:06) So it's while in an established company, you have more roles, you have more silos, you need (18:11) to go slower to reach the finish line with everyone. 

(18:15) It's mainly the people. (18:16) So the systems, the tools, the processes, I mean, demand planning is the same for a small (18:22) company or for a big company, whether you sell 10 or 10,000, you need to predict it anyway. (18:28) You need to put in the effort. 

(18:30) So that's not really a difference for me. (18:32) It's all about culture and people. (18:34) Talking about people, that you finding the right people for that. 

(18:38) How do you look for that? (18:39) And secondly, how do you train them or how do you manage them? (18:42) How do you find them? (18:43) I think it's the most difficult part of these days, right? (18:47) Did you look at specific diplomas when you were recruiting or was it more on attitudes (18:52) that you looked or what were the things that triggered you to hire somebody? (18:57) I never look at the diplomas and I never look at, well never, the secondary skills, skills (19:03) you can teach. (19:04) That's no problem. (19:05) So for me, it's all about personality and attitude to see if it fits the culture, yes or no. 

(19:10) Of course, you need to have some knowledge to a certain extent, of course. (19:15) But for me, the first thing to look at is, is there a potential match in the team, in (19:20) the company culture and between the employee and myself. (19:24) So it's really, yeah, if I'm in an interview, I mostly ask for example, situations in which (19:31) the person has been to see how they react towards certain situations. 

(19:35) Very concrete. (19:36) I don't want to hear, yeah, I was responsible for sales order entry. (19:40) Okay, great. 

(19:41) Yeah. (19:41) I mean, no, you can do that check, but okay. (19:44) Can you tell me last time you had an angry customer at the line? (19:47) How did that make you feel? (19:48) Or what I often also ask as a question, after the working day, when you close the door (19:54) at work and you say, yes, today was a bad-ass day, yes, yes, yes. 

(19:58) What did you do? (20:00) What gave you energy? (20:01) What gave you energy? (20:02) And then also the opposite, because it happens in every company. (20:06) What's the shitty day? (20:07) What did you do then? (20:08) What happens? (20:10) And that's how you get to know people. (20:12) And that's, for me, the most important thing. 

(20:13) I can teach them how to work with SAP, APO or whatever. (20:18) That's no problem as long as the attitude and yeah. (20:23) It also makes me curious, attitudes and those kinds of things. 

(20:26) I'm younger, right? (20:27) I'm from a different generation. (20:28) Yes. (20:29) Yes. 

(20:29) Well, it's obvious. (20:30) But I'm curious, how do you look at it, people years ago versus now? (20:34) Because there's often this social comment about younger people not being willing to (20:39) work or learn as quickly or as hard. (20:41) Do you notice any of those things? (20:43) I do notice that my father worked far too hard. 

(20:48) But okay. (20:48) I mean, there's a time for everything. (20:51) So I do believe right now the generation has a different approach of work, but I'm sure (20:56) that they want to do their job in a good way. 

(20:58) But it's important to clearly align expectations. (21:02) For me, I don't expect people, planners, to be available 24-7. (21:08) If you give the best you can in those eight hours that you work, if you say I've given (21:14) everything in those eight hours, I'm happy. 

(21:17) So yeah, the older generation would be willing to work harder or to do more outside the working (21:24) hours. (21:25) Yes, probably. (21:26) But it doesn't matter for me. 

(21:28) It's a given also. (21:29) And the view towards supply chain or supply chain planning, do you find it more difficult (21:35) to get more people in the field? (21:36) And also a question to you, Wim, I think, because you also have plenty of experience (21:39) in that domain. (21:40) So maybe both of you. 

(21:41) Planning, I think, is a very ambiguous job as a planner. (21:45) You want to be structured. (21:46) You want to have a plan. 

(21:48) But at the same time, from the moment the plan is created, you have to accept that it is outdated. (21:53) So you have to continuously be able to adapt. (21:57) So you are a planner. 

(21:59) You want to plan and have structure. (22:00) And at the same time, you have to be a dynamic personality as well. (22:04) I think it's rare amongst people. 

(22:08) So planners and that aspect, I would say good planners are difficult to find in my point (22:14) of view. (22:15) I fully agree with Peter. (22:16) And the other challenge in finding the right people is planning. 

(22:19) A lot of people link with analytics. (22:21) And I can work behind my computer and make a model and make the numbers add up. (22:27) But once you really get into planning, you'll notice it's really a people job, right? (22:30) You need to, if you're in demand planning, talk with sales and marketing. 

(22:33) If you're in supply planning with customer service, with the plans, with transportation, (22:38) you're much more interacting with people and trying to save the day or influence things, (22:44) which for people that are more blue, more number oriented, is from time to time difficult. (22:49) So it is a rare breed or a rare animal that we're looking for, the good planner. (22:55) Yeah, indeed. 

(22:56) And I totally agree. (22:58) And the higher up you want to go, so if you want to make a career in planning, I advise (23:02) not to take trainings in analysis, etc. (23:05) But more into presentation skills, convincing skills, influencing skills, because as Wim (23:12) said, that's what it's about. 

(23:13) The higher you go, all of course, based on objective numbers. (23:17) Did you have the luck or the luxury to see people grow and develop in those teams that (23:21) you led? (23:22) And how do you go about that? (23:24) Of course, there's a potential of the people, but for sure, you play a role in that. (23:28) Can you give a little bit more insights in how you allowed people or enabled people to (23:33) grow? (23:33) For me, the first thing is attitude. 

(23:36) So I look for people with the right attitude. (23:39) And sometimes I do little tests. (23:41) I'm sure that some people who have worked for me will find it quite recognisable, but they (23:48) will think it's quite recognisable. 

(23:50) So I do little tests in the beginning when I'm there to see, OK, what's the kind of person (23:55) I have here? (23:56) But it's all situational. (23:58) For example, on Friday evening, six o'clock, I remember still we had to do something, it (24:02) was in COVID also. (24:04) And then I said, OK, but now I have the time to see if this planner is willing to go an (24:08) extra mile. 

(24:09) So I, at six o'clock, called her and said, OK, could you do that before the weekend, (24:15) please? (24:15) And she did it. (24:16) So I knew then, OK, she will do a good job. (24:19) She's willing to go for it. 

(24:20) Friday at six o'clock, that's courageous. (24:23) Yeah, yeah. (24:24) Little tests. 

(24:25) If she wouldn't have done it, I would have said, no problem. (24:27) But you see, because she did it, I knew, OK. (24:30) And once it's establishing also, I like Lencioni for that. 

(24:34) You should have to model the five different functions of a team. (24:36) The trust is the first thing that we have to trust each other. (24:40) And from there on, we build. 

(24:42) And what I often do is I do one-to-ones with everyone of my N minus ones. (24:47) I do that every week. (24:48) I don't care if you have a topic or not, I plan it in upfront, one hour upfront. 

(24:54) If we don't need the hour, we can skip it. (24:57) If we need more, I'll make time. (24:59) And it's not only about, OK, what are the tasks that you're doing, but also about how (25:03) do you feel, what happened at home, whatever. 

(25:06) I use that. (25:07) I want to stay in touch with the people. (25:09) It's not an hour in which I discuss, OK, Monday you did that, and then you did that, and then (25:14) you did that. 

(25:15) No, that's... (25:16) You know when you work together. (25:18) But it's more about, OK, I saw you were kind of absent, something going on, or these kind (25:24) of things. (25:25) And by doing that, you get to know each other. 

(25:27) By getting to know each other, you trust each other. (25:29) And you can work your way up the pyramid, a team, and get to results. (25:33) And I leave a lot of freedom for the people. 

(25:37) I am the one that says, I trust the people that they want to do a good job. (25:41) I worked for companies, and a lot of companies do that. (25:44) They say, trust is good, control is better. 

(25:47) I am not a fan of that. (25:49) I do it the opposite way. (25:51) And I leave people freedom, and I push them, I tickle them from time to time to push them (25:55) outside of their comfort zone. 

(25:57) It's also a way to see how they handle that. (26:00) If I say, would you like to do that? (26:02) Yeah, but I don't know how to. (26:03) Yeah, but try. 

(26:04) Give it a try. (26:05) Do you have a practical example of that? (26:07) Let's take, again, the one with supply and demand. (26:10) Yeah, but I don't know how to talk to the salespeople. 

(26:13) Just give it a try. (26:14) Just try it. (26:15) Getting contact, I will bring you in contact. 

(26:18) And up front, I will address the sales guys. (26:20) Let's make it in a context, it's the first time she does this thing. (26:24) And I will pick out the right person of sales also to interact with. 

(26:28) And yeah, let's see how she or he reacts to it. (26:32) And then we have our one-to-one. (26:34) And then, oh, you had a meeting last week with sales. 

(26:36) How did it go? (26:37) How did it make you feel before, after? (26:40) And if you see they're starting to pick up and become enthusiastic, then you can see (26:45) people grow. (26:46) It's fantastic to look at, to see how people grow. (26:50) Are there any other things that you would recommend to people to grow besides that you (26:54) already mentioned, like you can develop presentation and persuasion skills? (26:57) I like reading books, management books. 

(26:59) Not everyone likes that, but okay. (27:01) I could recommend. (27:02) But those are more general ones. 

(27:04) Chip and then Heat. (27:05) I don't know if you know the Heat Brothers. (27:07) Fantastic. 

(27:08) Fantastic books. (27:09) You should try them. (27:11) Was it with the elephant and the rider? (27:16) So your brain consists of the elephant and the rider. 

(27:19) And the rider is the rationality and the elephant is the emotion. (27:23) But if you're not able to control your emotion, an elephant is a bit stronger than a rider. (27:27) Emotional beings, humans. 

(27:29) So we all have our elephants. (27:31) We try with our rationality to control the elephant, but yeah, if the elephant is loose, (27:36) it's loose. (27:37) So those kinds of books, and they give very precise advice also on, okay, how would you (27:43) then want to direct the elephant into the good direction, for example. 

(27:47) And they do that with compelling examples and stories. (27:51) Great to read. (27:52) Page turners. 

(27:53) We'll share some of those resources. (27:55) And if people want to connect to you on LinkedIn or ask you any questions, are you okay with (27:59) that? (28:00) Can we put it in show notes? (28:01) Yeah, no problem. (28:02) Yes. 

(28:03) Okay. (28:03) Perfect. (28:04) Thanks a lot, Peter, for all of the insights.