Snippets with Leon Goren

An Unusual International Move: Miele Australia and New Zealand's Yves Dalcourt

May 31, 2020 Leon Goren, PEO Leadership Season 1 Episode 14
Snippets with Leon Goren
An Unusual International Move: Miele Australia and New Zealand's Yves Dalcourt
Show Notes Transcript

From fires to floods to a global pandemic, the journey in January from Toronto to Australia was nowhere near typical for Yves Dalcourt, the new Managing Direction of Miele Australia and New Zealand. In today's session, Leon Goren speaks with PEO member Yves about remote learning and employee management (with 170 employees working from home in 6 days!), and the quick onboarding required to adapt forcefully to the pandemic.

If you’re interested in one of our The Way Forward live webcasts, please visit https://peo-leadership.com/

If you’d like to listen to some of our past webcasts, we have recordings on our COVID-19 resource page (https://peo-leadership.com/covid-19-resource-centre/). Guests have included University of Toronto’s Janice Stein, Harvard’s Rosabeth Kantor. We’ve talked about such topics as mental health, rent negotiations, the stimulus package and a host of others. 

If you’d like to find out more about our leadership community, please feel free to reach out directly to lgoren@peo-leadership.com

If you enjoyed today’s podcast, please subscribe and give us a review on Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.  

Leon Goren :

I'm Leon Goren, president of PEO leadership, a peer to peer leadership advisory firm. We're an amazing community of CEOs, presidents and senior executives. Ask yourself are you learning as fast as the world is changing? It's time for Ontario business leaders to band together for counsel and support. It's time for you to tap into the business with some of our peer groups and unlock new ways to grow. I want you to come out of this COVID crisis a better leader and your organization ready for what's next. Take the first step at PEO-leadership.com Today on our Snippets podcast, we have Yves Delacourt, Managing Director Miele, from Australia, New Zealand. As you'll find out shortly from Yves' accent, he's very much a true Canadian. And before his journey down under he ran Miele Canada. He thanks for joining us today.

Yves Delacourt :

Good morning. I guess it's good morning for me but good evening to you.

Leon Goren :

Exactly. I still have 12 hours to enjoy your you're already head ahead of us.

Yves Delacourt :

Just about the weekend for us almost here.

Leon Goren :

Well, it's awesome to have you here and I in what I thought I wanted to talk a little bit about your experience, both from planning and from landing in that new environment. So just to give our members that sense that, you know, often our members get these opportunities to sort of travel elsewhere, take on new positions, and you're sort of living this. So maybe my first question is in the planning stage, and I remember being with you in the planning stage. What did you need to consider? Like what are the top three things you have to think about and planning whether you're going to do this or not?

Yves Delacourt :

Well, the number one is family, the impact on the family because, you know, my wife also has a long career as a family physician, and the decision is, do we want to do this because it's great for me because I go into another country. I you know, I'm familiar with the company with the business But she needs to leave everything behind. And that's the first decision once we went through that and realize that this is a nice journey for for the both of us and you say okay, the kids as well, what impact does that have on the kids and the extended family and being the kids are in their 20s it made a little bit easier because they're almost call it on their own to a certain degree. But then it's also the extended family of, of parents, you know, obviously older age, you want to make sure that are they okay for the next five to seven years? Give or take? So that's that's the first consideration once you pass that and you realize that Okay, I think we can make this happen then is the decision of does it make sense financially, to to go overseas? What do we do with our home in Canada? Do we keep it we rent it, we sell it, and then it's the adventure of living in the country where to live and what you know, the unknown for For instance, so, so the first step the family was okay with and the girls that both encouraged the both of them encouraged us to make this move, it would be a chance of a lifetime. From Natasha's perspective, she says, You know what, I probably need a change of scenery as well. So that was okay. And of course, the parents, you're never going to have a good answer from them. They're just going to say, well, we don't want you to leave. But at the end of the day, they're all going to be okay. And then we decided to sell everything back home in Toronto. If we are going to go into this journey, let's go both feet in. So it's not about having something leftover at home to go back to, but let's just really take this journey and take it on. So that's what we've done. So I landed here in in January, and Natasha still hasn't joined me she'll be joining me in in August. And then the journey together if you want begins in September, August, September when she gets here.

Leon Goren :

You're, by the way, we better qualified This is not a normal journey here when you went down and started sharing that with me, I was gonna ask, even before I ask you what the first hundred days is maybe just share the stories of January. Then what came next? And then what came after that. So we're in the third segment here but well how did it Yeah,

Yves Delacourt :

Of course. Well, it's you know, when be before I left, I left in early January and if you recall what was happening in Australia, there was a lot of news articles and and the it was it was about Australia on fire. And I came in with with forest fires I remember landing in Melbourne and smelling a bit of the smoke and getting emails and and text messages. Are you okay? Are you on fire and, and that subsided? maybe two or three weeks after I arrived, and shortly after it was a major flooding across the country as well, that they hadn't seen in over 100 years. So we dealt with that for a couple of weeks. And then, literally, a few weeks later, we deal with this pandemic of a virus. So it's been, you know, a trial by fire to a certain degree.

Leon Goren :

I think that's, that's typical of anybody going overseas and accepting a position.

Yves Delacourt :

I guess so. Yeah,

Leon Goren :

Go ahead.

Unknown Speaker :

It's been an interesting journey here so far, but we've managed okay. You take it one day at a time and you move forward.

Leon Goren :

Well, I think you've got Mother Nature there going, giving you a few hints about about potentially climate change. All three incidences are related to Mother Nature.

Yves Delacourt :

Exactly. Exactly.

Leon Goren :

So what's other than all the natural stuff going on? What about the first hundred days there for you? How did you settle in and now what's been Yeah,

Unknown Speaker :

selling in was was was okay. You know what, literally, you you land into another country. You know, you have to get a bank account. Simple things that You don't think about whether it's a bank account a driver's license, anything, you know what normal that you would have back home, just trying to get a credit card is literally a you have no credit whatsoever. So it's literally coming starting from nothing. So besides a visa, a working visa that I had, you have nothing. So I stayed in the apartment for for three, three weeks, found a home to rent. And then you start to rebuilding and you hope to start rebuilding a network, which is the most important part part for me. And unfortunately, you know, the pandemic hasn't hurt hasn't helped because networking is within my own office, which is okay on one end as well. But the first hundred days, I would say have been interesting. So despite all of the challenges around us from an office perspective, you know what it got me into understanding the business and people very, very quickly, specifically in the last 10 weeks where the pandemic They came in, they were looking for leadership. And they were looking for, you know what the direction specifically. And I was able to really take the ownership of the business and build trust within the organization very, very quickly. And how I did that was literally communicating to the entire company on a daily basis of here's where we are, here's where we're going. And here's what we're going to do. But the first first thing that we did overall was established two guidelines as an organization. One was, the number one priority was the health and safety of every single individual. And number two was, how do we keep the business going despite the challenging times ahead, and those were the priorities. And I was very impressed early on that over 170 employees were working from home in a matter of six days. So we made some very, very drastic moves in order to protect the health and safety of every employee. So that was that was a Great learning for us of resiliency first and foremost, but capability as well. So overall very, very pleased with how we've, we've managed through this, this journey. And it's funny because I had you know, my boss was actually asking me it let's let's sit down and talk to me about your first hundred days and, and essentially is I got to know the business very very very quickly and in areas of of opportunity at the same time, but allows you to focus on different things within the business during the during a time of crisis

Leon Goren :

is the middle of business Australia, New Zealand isn't as big as Canada,

Unknown Speaker :

bigger than Canada's metric. It's it's double. So it's a very, very big business. Mila has been in Australia for the better part of 40 years, and it's a very well known brand. So the brand awareness is very, very high. The brand loyalty is very, is very good as well and Australia is Number three in the world for Mila. So it's a very important country for for us globally.

Leon Goren :

Wow. And you guys are ahead of us like I'm thinking about where Canada is today in terms of we got way more cases on the COVID-19 we're still most of our office are shut down. You guys are now as you and I were quickly chatting, I mean, the number of cases you have a day is is minimal. So it's almost like things are back to normal there. How is business recovering? Like what are you seeing that hasn't been a quick v type of shape recovery? Or maybe that's, you know, just so we get a sense of where we're going to be going,

Unknown Speaker :

maybe that will be helpful. Well, it's interesting. So let me take in two parts, because I'm also responsible for New Zealand and New Zealand took a completely different approach where they've completely shut down the entire country. Retail was closed. Literally as martial law. You could not go outside for the for the better part of three weeks, they reopened last week and literally a V shaped recovery very, very quickly. And I've seen our sales come back to almost regular levels very quickly in a span of two weeks now, whether or not that continues on that path, we're not sure. But the outlook for the month of June July is still not done. And so the construction is is back as well. So we seem to be faring well in that area. In Australia. The difference is retail never shut down. It was very, it was a very well organized from from the country standpoint where you can still go at retail. online businesses increase drastically. But quite frankly, early on, we never missed a beat or sales actually never went down. We continued on the same path. And from a recovery standpoint, I don't think it's literally a recovery. It's just how can we accelerate business from now until the end of the year? So two different two different business cases, if you want one is a V recovery in New Zealand, and in Australia, nothing stopped.

Leon Goren :

That is absolutely. So I don't know if you're hearing what's going on in North America, but that's very different than what people are predicting here. Yeah. In terms of, we've seen a V in the, you know, public markets, but in terms of businesses, it's been it's really difficult. Most of these, a lot of our businesses operate around 20 to 30% of their normal, normal sales. Did Australia, New Zealand where their layoffs were there is the unemployment numbers high or

Unknown Speaker :

RPF course. So they put in place a job keeper in a job seeker program, very similar to what Canada did and government subsidizing layoffs. So they've done this here as well in this this is going to keep by belief till the end of July and they're planning Now perhaps on extending it a little bit. So, the hospitality industry has really been affected by this as you can imagine, Australia New Zealand or, or countries, you know what they live by, by tourism. So that industry specifically is is is the one that's likely going to be impacted more than more than others. casinos, you know, hotels, restaurants that has all been closed so from that perspective, that is going to likely be affected and probably going to hurt for a little bit longer.

Leon Goren :

But you don't necessarily think it's going to impact your sales like you guys are thinking about growth.

Unknown Speaker :

Well go this way I'm, you know, what I seen helped me already and so it's all about being a little bit more aggressive in the marketplace. We're definitely play an offense and our defense. We have a very good product line. People recognize it. But we're also have some very strong product offerings over the course of the next six months that we are, in some cases accelerating. And in other cases, taking advantage of opportunities such as areas where maybe my competition, I've had some factory closing where stock is is is unavailable, where I'm able to take a little bit of advantage of, of some of the stock charges from my from my competitions. So for the foreseeable future, if you want.

Leon Goren :

Yeah, no, that's amazing. For those that don't know, you Eve, I know you're a driver. So you're right, this, for those that are listening, never takes the foot off the pedal here. So that is also helpful in driving growth and accelerating through, especially through difficult times. Right. Absolutely. Going out the other side. So here's the big question, I guess. Other than all the craziness, your family's not there. meeting your expectations is the adventure as exciting as you are thinking It was gonna be

Unknown Speaker :

Oh my god. Listen I fell in love with Melbourne right away. I'm an outdoorsman as well so you know being able to go on my bike every day there's running paths there's a walking path there is the ocean literally a 10 minute walk from here. Yeah the adventure has been absolutely wonderful. You know before the pandemic we're able to go into do hiking in different areas of the of the state here and I make just to get back at their views. Leon are incredible. The environment as a whole is just spectacular. So I'm really anxious for Natasha get here so we will be able to enjoy the country together but stunning is is the only words I can say. I was able to go to New Zealand as well before the the whole closure and again, you know, you see pictures but it's nothing like seeing it life. Absolutely fantastic.

Leon Goren :

Did you find yourself a biking grip?

Yves Delacourt :

Not yet. Because with a pandemic, everything shut down. So

Leon Goren :

sounds amazing, actually, hopefully you don't encourage all these listeners here to get on a plane now and look for a new job outside of Canada. It's not a bad place to be, I can tell you. No, that's awesome. Well, thank you so much for joining us today and sharing your insights. If you're interested in our live webcast, the way forward live and any other snippets please take a moment and visit us at our site at vo dash leadership Comm. You'll find on our site various pre recorded webcasts and snippets and you'll find some of the speakers around Professor Dennis Stein, Harvard's Rosabeth Cantor, Harvard's Michael beer, discussions on Mental Health Leadership, world reset government stimulus package and a host of others. Thanks for joining us today. And this concludes our session.

Yves Delacourt :

Thanks Leon.