One team, one goal @IPCOM Bouw Belgium
You joined IPCOM in June 2018 as Managing Director for Isowill, Besides this role, you also got the overall responsibility for “IPCOM Bouw Belgium” since mid-2019. For the colleagues who are not familiar with this structure, can you explain what “IPCOM Bouw Belgium” is about?
Under the "Ipcom Bouw Belgium" flag, we understand all Belgian companies active in building insulation. These are Waeyaert-Vermeersch, Isolteam, Isodirect, Caremiso, Crosslink and Isowill. With a consolidated turnover of over 80M€, our Belgian building insulation activities have a significant market share and are a major stronghold within the IPCOM Group. Year after year, our companies succeed in achieving strong results in a very competitive market, in often unpredictable and turbulent market conditions. We are rightly proud of that!
The idea was to strengthen the collaboration and synergies between the Belgian companies. “One team, one goal” How did you put this into practice? When you look back at the past 2.5 years, what is the strength/benefit of having such organization with central leadership?
The key words here are trust and open communication. As a result, "one team, one goal" is not an empty slogan but a principle that is really strived for. The different companies retain their own identity but try to help and support each other wherever possible. Even though Covid has unfortunately prevented most of the physical meetings from taking place the past years, we notice that people from the various companies find each other more easily and exchange information.
Also, the "Bouw Belgium" structure has allowed us to cover a number of "shared services" positions - such as Finance, HR, Marketing and IT. This does not only reduce costs, but also ensures greater uniformity.
You mention some great accomplishments already. How do you look at the further development of “IPCOM Bouw Belgium”? Which opportunities do you still see? What are your targets for the next year(s)?
The objective remains to further strengthen cooperation between the companies. Furthermore, considerable improvements can certainly be made in the field of automation/digitalization and logistics.
What do you consider as the biggest possible threats for “IPCOM Bouw België” and for meeting these targets?
As the clear-cut market leader in a highly competitive market, we have to deal on a daily basis with competitors that attack our market position. Being responsive and flexible in dealing with this remains a constant challenge.
We are at the beginning of 2022. Typically, many people start a new year with good intentions. Do you have any good resolutions for the year?
My good intentions are not original 😉 more sport and less food/drinks so that I hopefully lose some weight.
Who do you look up to? And why?
There are too many to mention but as a passionate music lover, I look up to people who can make music and make people happy with it.
We asked the Bouw Belgium team members on the picture (Nico, Carlo, Hendrik, Simon, Bert, Roselien) to describe you in 1 word. Which words came up, do you think?
Gosh... difficult. Small and chubby are two words, right 😊
We would like to say this was a close guess, but let’s reveal the words they had in mind:
Social, team player, professional, calm, reliable, motivative, pleasant, versatile (meaning he’s combining professionalism, sympathy and leadership). It seems that you’re living the proof that you don’t have to be bossy to be a great boss! Thank you for the interview!
