Transcript

Sven Sommerlatte:

I had the intuition that I wanted to become chief HR officer one day, but I didn’t know anything about it.

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Hi, I’m Sylvie Milverton, CEO of Lynx Educate. This is Talent is Everywhere. We’re here to talk about how to keep talent and how to develop talent in order to build a strong business. We’ll interview leaders to hear their best experiences of how they invested in people.  Today our guest is Sven Sommerlatte who is the Chief Human Resources officer at Boehringer.

 

And before that, he had a long career at Sanofi, where he moved up a series of jobs in HR to finish VP, head of human resources for the global consumer health care business unit. He has in common with me that he’s half French and also half German. So welcome to the podcast

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

 Bonjour Sylvie.

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Great to have you.

 

So today we’re going to talk about different ideas that you’ve shared in a book you’ve written, about career strategy specifically for HR leaders. And then I wanted also to link that, you know, your ideas in the book and how you’ve been able to apply that to the way you’re building the HR function at Boehringer. But back to your book that’s called ¨Successful Career Strategy and HR Practitioners Guide to Reach Your Dream Job”. And my first question is, and I guess maybe this was maybe what inspired you to write the book, but you kind of feel like HR leaders, you’re like the experts of career strategy, the experts of guiding people and sometimes the expert spends all the time helping everyone else and doesn’t help him or herself. Yeah. It’s just interesting you know, what inspired you to write the book and how do you think of the goal of it? 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Yeah. Well, that’s a great question Sylvie, and as a matter of fact, I applied the content to my sales, or I would even say my own experience inspired me to write this book.

 

You know, for example, I moved up the ranks of the HR function fairly quickly at a relatively young age. I was Vice President for what was called the intercontinental region. It was, I had 50,000 people, to say in that scope of responsibility. And someone said to me, Sven, if you want to become one day HR or Chief HR officer, then you need a country experience and you need to think about your experience base.

 

And that’s what I did. But it meant moving three steps hierarchically down. But it was necessary, you know, for me to then be able one day to be credible, for that top job. And so I think that’s what career strategy is all about. And I learned it, so to say, through my own experiences.

 

Sylvie Milverton:

And what made you realize, like, you should write a book about this. Like what? What do you think that HR practitioners are looking for that you need to teach them? 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Yeah. Of course, in my job as HR, I speak to hundreds and hundreds of individuals who seek for advice. But on top of that, I also started a YouTube channel, and I engage with thousands of people in social media.

 

And I really understood that people lack of guidance to manage their own career. One interesting thing I noticed is that even people who spend a lot of time to think about the strategy for the company they work for, or for a product that they take care of because they are in charge of it. Yeah. So they are familiar with strategic tools, and they know about the importance of thinking strategically about the future. Very often they don’t apply it to themselves, you know. So, for some reason, people don’t do that enough to think strategically about their career. But it is really important if you want to be successful. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

And so what like so what is your sort of methodology for doing this like if you think of like the young, the young Sven who has been given advice to, you know, go counter to all of, you know, we’re all driven people. It’s all like up, up, up. And so, you know, if you think back, what is the kind of practical advice you’ve put in your book that you would have given to your young self? 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Yeah, I mean, there is a methodology, first of all. And secondly, there are a number of tools that I describe. But there are also a few guiding principles.

 

And maybe Sylvie I can, first allude to those. The most, the most important one, I believe, is to understand what do you feel passionate about? And that was also something that I experienced myself because I started my career after a management consulting, in a high potential program to become a general manager. And I noticed one day that I had a different passion.

 

I noticed one day, that, I was really energized from interactions with people and that I could never really get enough of it when others thought, okay, I’ve had ten interviews in the context of a specific project, I have enough of it. I don’t want to see anyone that I was still eager to meet more people, and not only to understand, you know, directly the topic that I was interviewing them for, but I was in parallel, so to say, describing their personality and more and more I was also used as a sparring partner for people decisions. And so that helped me. I was luckily, having that experience early in my career. And then I made the bold move to say I stopped this general management career pathway and I move into HR because that was my passion. And ever since I can’t get enough of it every day, you know?

 

So, the first and most important principle, I believe, is to try and understand: what is your deeper desire. And it is not always so easy because in school and, through family or social environment, you know, you are steered in a certain direction, which is not always the one that really gives you true fulfillment.

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Mhm, that’s interesting.

 

And do you find that a lot of HR professionals are, you know, motivated by helping people and engaging with people, or they can come at it from a lot of different angles.

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

You can come from it at a lot of different angles. But I still believe, and I do hope and I observe in my own team, at least I believe a lot of passion for people.

 

We have that even as our motto in HR, we call it passion for people. You have to have an intrinsic interest in people. I believe when you do a job, I mean, the HR job or, you know, and it is it is true for other areas as well. You need to have that intrinsic interest.

 

But then, of course, that is not enough. And I believe that the second, guiding principle, is to think about what would be your dream job, you know, what is your career aspiration, this ability to project yourself. And, and it is not always easy to do because we don’t know so much about certain other positions.

 

You know, when I was still a junior in the HR function, I had the intuition that I wanted to become chief HR officer one day, but I didn’t know anything about it. So it was important for me to find that out. And that means that you interact with people who have that type of responsibility. Ideally, you even shadow them.

 

And then and then you really find out, does this really meet my expectation? Is this really what I want to do? You know, because suddenly you discover there is a lot of stress related to it. There is every trouble related to it. Leadership roles can really, you know, be extremely time consuming. You have to want to go the extra mile and, and that, for example, in my case, was something that was important to understand. Otherwise you’re headed in the wrong direction. You know, and, and so what is the dream job that you aspire to? Is the second important principle, I believe. And I, I think it is interesting, people don’t invest enough time to find that out. And very often they come to see me and they say, no, I don’t really have a plan. I think it is better to do it in a more opportunistic way. And I am not against grabbing opportunities, but it is so much better if you can assess opportunities in light of a –

 

Sylvie Milverton:

And also to have information, because I feel like I take a few things from your comment. I mean, one is to figure out what your dream job is. And so sometimes one’s dream job is like the imaginary job that you see someone else having on LinkedIn and you think, oh, what an amazing life does this person have? I wish I had that role, I wish I had all these accolades, but then when you start to see like the day to day of the life, you can, you know, reassess. Which also makes me think, you know, I worked a long time in big companies. And what happens when you have big jobs and big companies is you fill up your whole calendar with a lot of internal networking, and often it means that your exposure to a variety of dream jobs is sort of limited. And so there’s something about reaching outside and building a network of people outside your internal networking, so that you can get more information about what would be your dream job, what’s it like? What is the person live? And I ask a lot of questions. 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Absolutely. I think you’re absolutely right. It is really important to understand: Does it match my personal and personal needs? They are important. You have to clarify that. And does it really fit to this professional aspiration that I have. I can share with you good news, Sylvie.

 

In my case, you know, when, approximately four years ago, I was recruited for this, chief HR officer job at Boehringer Ingelheim. And I was wondering, I still had an interrogation in my mind, and, you know, I was wondering, am I going to be absorbed in operational day to day problems? Or am I going to have this space, the possibility and also the support from the company to really implement the things in HR that I feel passionate about, which are learning, which are career advice, which is creating a great working environment and so on.

 

And, good news, I must say, I have that space. So it, you know, it does not always so to say, go in the opposite direction of what you ideally aspire for. I think I was even surprised to what extent I had possibility to shape things. Gestalt is what the Germans, you know, you have the Gestalt Psychology, which is basically this, spirit of shaping things, which is which can be extremely fulfilling. I really love it, to do that with my team. But, yeah, you have to check it first. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Yeah. And then to. And then once you realized, I suppose, okay, this is where we want to go. And let’s say that, you know, so we have two guiding principles so far.

 

One, it’s like your passion. Second, you know, figure out the dream job. And then I imagine that some of the third piece would be, you know, map out the plan to figure out where am I today and where am I going to be tomorrow, and how much time do I have to get there? 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

And that is so right. And I think you’re you’re you’re spot on. I mean, concerning time, I made an interesting observation through many career counseling conversations, people very often overestimate the time that they really have. You know, you have the feeling my life is, so to say, forever. But if you say to people, look, an average duration in job is 2 to 5 years ideally not less than three.

 

Let’s take an average, at around 3 to 4. You know, let’s say four years and maybe, and then you divide the time you have till retirement by four, and then you know how many steps you have ahead of you to reach, actually, your dream job. And usually people are very surprised because they thought, without really reflecting about it more deeply, that they would have many more opportunities.

 

No, it is only so many. Now think hard. How do you want to use that time? You know, you can’t really waste. Usually people are more advanced already when they even start to think it, and then they can’t really waste any step. And therefore, the third principle really is try to understand as precisely as you can the experience components, skills, knowledge, experience that will be required for you to be selected one day for your dream job.

 

I mean, put yourself into this competitive situation – usually there are other candidates. What are the skills,  the knowledge, the experience that will be required for that job. What is, as you just said, the gap between where I’m standing right now and, you know, that requirement and how can I most efficiently fit the gap. And that is a good career plan.

 

It’s nothing but knowing where do I want to go? Knowing what are, what is the experience base that I need to build up in order to be selected? That’s really, I think, you know, what a career strategy fundamentally is about. It’s not rocket science. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Yeah. And it reminds me, you know, when I, you know, read a lot of CVS and people looking for a job and what’s their objective? And so many people write, you know, to find a job where I can add value and best, you know, utilize my skills. But that means nothing. In fact, almost what you’re saying is that as individuals, we should each sit down and say, what is the value I want to add and what are the skills and connect the dots for yourself and then be able to communicate it to your boss, to your company and say, this is where I’m going, and therefore help me get there.

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Absolutely. And this is why, you know, to be in the driving seat. I call this to be the CEO of your own career. I mean, you would expect from the CEO of a company to have a clear plan and to know how to get there and to be proactive in it and to drive it and not to wait for it to happen, through opportunities that would fall from the sky.

 

They don’t. And you can influence things. I encourage people every day. I did that just today to say, look, be proactive. You can make it happen. But you need to know what direction you want to take. You know, today, again, I interacted with the person, and we agreed that there would be those three different routes that are possible, but, you know, at some point in time, it’s no longer an advantage to have lots of opportunities.

 

You have to, you have to, take control of your destiny. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

And so what do you recommend to people to do? Like just in practical terms, kind of have like a working document or sort of check in with themselves, you know, every January? Is it like every quarter? Like what? How should we, because like this a lot is also resonating with me.

 

I mean, I’m on a path, but, you know, one needs to like, not just let the time evaporate. Yeah. So practically, how does one do it? 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Yeah. I mean, I’m a big fan of writing things down. Descartes, the French philosopher, I think, said, what is written well is also thought through well. You know, writing it is, is is important.

 

But and I would also very much recommend that people don’t do that by themselves. In my book, I describe, you know, a career counselor. What does that mean? It is to bring a group of maybe 2 or 3 people together. Maybe someone who knows you personally very well, but with two people who know your industry or your functional area very well.

 

And, it is very, very helpful to bring that group together maybe 1 or 2 times a year, first to share your plan, ideally in a written form, but then, regularly to update it, you know, I have been offered this type of position externally. What do you think? Would that be a high risk route to take or and so on and so forth.

 

Because, you know, please get me right. A plan is not to be established and never then challenged again. Eisenhower, the American president, I think, said, plans are nothing. Planning is everything. It is about the process of planning it. So career strategy is not a static thing. The assumptions that you have made, the opportunities that you see, all of that should be updated on a regular basis. And ideally it should be a basis for discussion with your career counsellors. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Yeah. And I’ve noticed, like in the moments of my career when I was going to make a change, when I was able to write down, like, I’m looking for a position doing this in this sort of company, in this sort of place. First of all, you articulate to yourself, but then you can tell other people because your network, you know, they want to help you.

 

And if you just say, you know, I’m looking for a job where I can best utilize my skills and, like, but what do you do? What kind of job, what kind of place? And so by focusing it, it’s I feel like it focuses yourself and then helps people help you. 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Absolutely. I cannot agree more. Once you have defined the criteria, once you have defined your aspiration then you will have these criteria in mind and you will be able to analyze the world through a clear lens.

 

And that helps a lot. I do agree. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

And then how have you sort of, shifting a bit to your role, your CHR role, like all of this philosophy about how people should grow careers and develop themselves, like how have you implemented that in terms of the way, you know, you’re building the function and especially, you know, just thinking about career development and learning and strategy around HR, how are you linking it?

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

I mean, the first, thing is, you know, when I arrived, I said to my HR colleagues, we should spend 50% of our time interacting with people because knowing people, being in contact with them, that’s, that’s of crucial importance. It was a bit of a shock. And, people still ask me, well, how to do that with all of the workload, but fundamentally and this is connected to this passion for people, I would also say, you know, the ability to assess individuals is, in my eyes, the core competence that HR people have to have.

 

And that is not an easy one, because there is nothing more complex than assessing individuals. I mean, I am together with my partner, for example, since, 30 years. And I still don’t understand him, really. You know, you it takes it takes very long to to really understand an individual. But we need to be very skillful in that.

 

But beyond that message to my dear, HR colleagues, we have established an HR strategy, a very clear again, you know, as you said, what is well reflected can be well written. And, and, we have established that plan. We got the endorsement from the board of the company, two years ago. We are now implementing it.

 

We have structured it in different ways. We’re just finalizing with one, where we put a lot of emphasis on learning and skills management. We have created a Boehringer Ingelheim University. We have implemented a virtual campus, which is a digital learning platform. In addition to that, and we are building up academies, we are really encouraging people to grow their skills.

 

And we are encouraging leaders to manage the skills development within their teams. You know, people say, skills is the new gold. I mean, maybe that is a bit of a slogan. But, we are in a fast moving world and, I absolutely do believe, that especially in knowledge based industries and the pharma industry is a highly knowledge based industry.

 

And the skills that you are able to build in your organization and the ability to respond to new skills requirement as an organization is a massive competitive, the success factor. And so, you know, we are building that muscle and, and people are very thankful for it. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

It’s so refreshing to hear like HR issues like at a board level. I mean, I think every board talks about HR issues, but to really make it like a strategic priority is unique. So I sort of have a question about, you know, how you’re, able to do that and then a follow up, if it in terms of the level of detail you can go into, like I always thought of, pharma is already like a very highly skilled, kind of industry where a lot of people are going to have a PhD and where you’re going to have a lot of skills.

 

So tell me about this, like board level, important skill shift of what I perceive as like an already highly skilled industry. 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

You’re right. It is a highly skilled industry. But just to give you an example, we have discovered a few great new molecules. They happen to be in three therapeutic areas that we’re not operating in at all. Currently, it is the area of mental health where since 30 years, new therapies are lacking. And our researchers have found great molecules that seem to be of benefit for patients. It is a breakthrough in 30 years. It is fantastic. It is. And this is also so incredibly fulfilling. You know, the purpose that we are pursuing to to, to help people get better and to save lives in many cases.

 

So, I mean, mental health is one area, oncology cancer treatment, specifically, for example, in lung cancers, again, we have a certain, we have certain new indications with new therapies that are very promising and the area of obesity as well. So, I mean, we are operating currently in many other areas, but these three big new therapeutic areas are opening up.

 

I mean, can you imagine, the intensity of learning to bring 53,000 people, to become knowledgeable in their different functions but sufficiently knowledgeable, from production to research, to support functions to, to actually, activate, these opportunities. So that’s the kind of challenges that, that are ahead of us, right. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

And that, you know, it’s so inspiring because that’s like what HR should be.

 

It’s like especially in this, you know, world of AI, presumably we’ll have many tools to do all these tedious manual processes that we don’t like. And this whole strategic thing to say, okay, this is a strategic shift in the company to these three huge opportunities. And HR is fundamentally is like an enabler for that.

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

It is an enabler for that. And it was yesterday, as a matter of fact, that we had very, very intensive, interaction in the board also about the company culture, you know, and, how do we want to shape this, this company culture? And, I mean, that is also an important area where, where we are very active.

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Right. And then maybe, you know, sort of finish up the arc and, you know, thinking of starting on, like, the individual career and, you know, the, up to the high level of the strategy, just like the role of leadership. I mean, we all say leaders need to be involved in learning. They need to support, but like, what actually should they do?

 

Like, for, you know, if you think you got 53,000 people, all of these, you know, leaders and managers and they know it’s important and they also have busy days. And so how do you think about your advice to leaders like, okay, learning is important. How can they really help their team? 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Absolutely. And it is true that leadership is a tough task.

 

It’s not an easy thing. I do believe that leadership is a lifelong learning journey. You will always grow and you are always hopefully confronted to new challenges. I do believe maybe this is a slightly provocative statement, but I do believe that leadership is in reality all about self awareness. Great leaders, and great leadership, I think is based on deep self awareness.

 

And the more challenging leadership situation you are confronted to, the more you can learn about yourself. So it is a circuit. You know, you learn about yourself and then you become a better leader and then you’re exposed to new situations. And personally, I think that’s one of the reasons why it is a great privilege to be in leadership responsibilities, because you get exposed to those many learning opportunities.

 

And it is, I believe, extremely fulfilling. Every little step you make where you understand that you are, that you are more grounded, that you are more serene, but with yourself that that that, that you know yourself better and that this is the platform for you to be able to help others to grow, to support others, to, to maybe be a role model in certain areas.

 

I mean, we need to be very modest, and, and to give, others more space to provide to others more support, to be able to step back, to take distance, to give people space to, to grow and to experiment, maybe even to dare to share some advice from time to time, being very careful because it’s not about I know things and I teach you it is much more about I give you space to grow yourself.

 

But that’s what I think leadership is all about. Ultimately, it is about growing as a person. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Yeah, that’s really well said, right? The privilege that we all have, to help the people, and, you know, in our teams grow. And when we think back to the people that helped us get to where we are, where we are now.

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Exactly, absolutely.

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Great. Well, this has been a great pleasure. Thank you so much for joining us. And if people want to find you, I guess they can look for you on LinkedIn and and YouTube. 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

Absolutely, yes. Very happy to interact. 

 

Sylvie Milverton:

Great. Thank you very much. 

 

Sven Sommerlatte:

My pleasure. Sylvie, thanks to you.

Sylvie Milverton:
Thanks for listening to this episode of “Talent is Everywhere”. Make sure to subscribe if you like what you heard and give us a follow on LinkedIn to continue the conversation on all things career mobility and talent development.

Is there a topic you’d love for us to cover in a future episode? Or a guest you’d recommend? Drop us an email at hello@lynxeducate.com

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