#13 | Released from the cage. Why freedom and individual responsibility improve performance

Many projects and bureaucratic structures give us a framework in which to act, but they don’t provide motivation according to Oliver Sowa, CEO of the Beutlhauser Group. Seven years ago, after a workshop with management guru Dr Reinhard Sprenger, he and his fellow directors abolished all bureaucratic obstacles in their company. Among the many resulting changes, holiday leave applications are now a relic of the past, and regional decisions are made locally. The company’s senior management created an action framework that gives employees the freedom to make decisions and the sense of acting on an equal footing. All these things have improved the atmosphere, the spirit and, more importantly, performance, said Sowa in an interview with Georgiy Michailov, Managing Partner at Struktur Management Partners. This is mainly because of the insight gained at Sprenger’s workshop that you can’t motivate people. You have to give them an environment in which they can motivate themselves. The expert for transformation and change in the high-end SME sector went on to explain that this was also the reason why they abolished the sales commission model when the new management style was introduced. As a result, the sales team is now far more client-centric and bolder in its decision-making. By making these changes we have disproved all common assumptions that the sales organisation only works if individuals are incentivised by monetary rewards, said Sowa proudly. In their latest podcast, Oliver Sowa and Georgiy Michailov also discuss why a company has to operate like a good host, why it’s important to treat employees as adults and allow them to act like adults, why unnecessary complexity slows everything down and the impacts of Reinhard Sprenger’s theories at the Beutlhauser Group.

*Video only in German