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Foreword to the German edition

‘Are you meant to be for the company

or is the company for you?’

Are the employees meant to be for you

or is the company for the employees?

Are the customers meant to be for the company

or is the company for the customers?’

When I was a young businessman, a consultant asked me these three questions and added, ‘Depending on the attitude you consciously adopt you see the world differently, and that’s how you’ll respond to questions.’

Every manager has a certain attitude, which they act according to. The only question is whether they are conscious of doing this or not. Currently, too many managers are still unclear about the attitude they take towards their employees, their customers and their company. If you open the business section of a newspaper, you mostly get the impression that the people are there for the company.

But if we ask ourselves why we do what we do and what it’s all for, we will realise that the goal of it all is people. Without people there would be no economy. People, then, cannot be the means – people are the purpose of everything we do.

Who is meant to be for whom? – The company is meant to be for the people! A company is an arena for all those involved in it to help them to realise who they are and create their own biographies.

I warmly recommend this book to all managers. Reading this book allows you to become conscious of your own attitude and the way you treat your employees. This is more crucial today than ever. A manager cannot be successful for the long-term if he or she misses the mark in answering the question ‘Who is meant to be for whom?’

The most important job of those bearing executive responsibility is to mould the company in such a way that it attracts innovation – that means creating conditions that bring forth new initiatives. All those involved must have room to develop and contribute their own ideas.

The more the people at a company realise what needs doing themselves and take initiative on their own, the more entrepreneurial it will be. If you want to adopt this realisation for yourself, reading this book will be an important step on the path.

June 2013 Prof. Götz W. Werner