Ricola is using coaching to drive success through top-down mindset change, keeping its caring culture but adding more daring. Lisa Collinson reports
Ricola is a story of a family-run business made good. Founded in Laufen, Switzerland, in 1930, the company grew around the production of ‘speciality candy’. Driven by a founder, Emil Richterich, who was fascinated by the healing properties of herbs and other plants, in 1940 the brand developed its iconic 13-herb mixture cough drop, which is today exported to more than 45 countries worldwide, along with other Ricola products.
However, when a brand has been in operation for almost 100 years and expanded so widely, it can be difficult to avoid productivity traps. And it can be harder still to create a feeling of company-wide cohesion. That’s why, in May 2019, Ricola appointed its first-ever CEO from outside of the family: Thomas Meier. The aim behind the external appointment was to help secure Ricola’s position as a global player, by enhancing leadership culture, cohesion, and structure.
When Meier joined, the “pace increased”, says HR officer, René Schori. And so began the transformation from a “typical Swiss-centred SME company towards a global company with a high orientation and results – it’s not only the effort that counts, it’s the results that count,” he says.
CEO Meier says, “Ricola traditionally has a very caring culture, a family culture. People are nice to each other. And at the same time, we can do more of what we are as a business. There’s a lot of opportunity out there.
“It’s really the challenge now for us to transform the company to be 100% caring but add the 100% daring element to it, and say, let’s go for it and achieve the mission we set out to achieve.
“Leadership for me is the magic ingredient that we need to bring this caring and daring culture alive, and bring the company forward.”
A new partnership
To support the company to achieve its aims, Meier enlisted the support of TheNextWe®. The reasoning was that any other organisational changes could only be put in place if managers across the business were able to develop the necessary mindset.
“We all know we don’t get leadership taught in universities or schools. I think it all starts with mindset and how you very consciously decide to put the right mindset in focus. Because first you lead yourself before you can lead others,” says Meier.
Mindset can be a difficult area to define. It can be an even harder area to investigate. Especially in a company with such a far reach. As well as the headquarters in Laufen, Ricola has executives based in the US, Singapore, Italy, France and Belgium. Inculcating a company-wide mindset suited to an international operator would involve not only the cooperation of the board, but of every individual manager throughout the company. So Ricola reached out to TheNextWe, which stands for collective mindset change. Founded in 2017, TheNextWe supports companies of all sizes to make successful transformations, offering scalable, app-based business coaching.
TheNextWe’s 12-week programmes measurably drive innovation, engagement and business success, as evidenced by numerous case studies and customer feedback. In addition to Ricola, TheNextWe customers include Nestlé, Pfizer, Douglas and Viessmann.
The role of TheNextWe was to initiate an individual management development programme designed to provide coaching sessions for everyone – from the board of directors down. The aim was to help employees not only to develop the mindset necessary to help the business achieve its goals, but to uncover their own personal mindset blocks in order to maximise their own potential.
Mindset coaching
The aim of mindset coaching is to encourage individuals to seek answers to the question, What’s stopping me from taking this step?, replacing their reservations with positive beliefs and changing their behaviour to benefit themselves and others. Of course, this unleashing of their talent adds value for their company, too. With 90% of its products exported around the globe, in 2019 Ricola was an export-orientated Swiss SME. It’s now becoming a global company with a play-to-win mindset. And it has undergone that transformation by changing the outlook of every single manager within the business.
TheNextWe began with the executive board – without exceptions – and continued through the company, working with all Ricola executives in Laufen, the US, Singapore, Italy, France, and Belgium. TheNextWe team’s 12-week mindset programme supported and guided individuals as they sought to uncover their own internal barriers. It enabled them to understand their personal reservations and develop new mindsets on the topic of leadership. Each person was assigned their own coach for this, ensuring a truly individualistic approach. At the same time, they were guided through inspiring exercises, coaching discussions, and the setting and tracking of personal milestones. Everything happens in one app (see image above), so everything necessary for true change is always at hand. TheNextWe helped establish a new collective mindset across all areas, one that befits the pioneering character of a global player.
Any new behaviours resulting from this mindset work was practised and consolidated for the following eight weeks. TheNextWe app served as the central space for the coaching, where the participants were also guided through inspiring exercises, coaching discussions and the setting and tracking of personal milestones.
The impact
How do you measure mindset change? How can you monitor the impact of something so intangible in a business setting?
At Ricola, the coaching participants were happy to share their views. Together, they noticed a collective change that resulted from being freed from self-limiting mindsets. Executives reported they were now better able to raise difficult issues directly and use the talent in their teams more effectively: helping individuals be their best – for themselves and for the business.
The workload is shared much more evenly. Each person is contributing more – freed from the fear of imagined criticism or personal ineffectuality. The workplace has become energised and much more fun. As humans, we know we all learn and work better when we’re enjoying ourselves, when the working and learning experience ceases to be a chore. So while personal mindset change can be hard to track, its impact can be seen. It results in visible transformation at individual and team level.
One leader shares how they had become much more open as a leader, including to others’ ideas. Another shares how trust has increased as a result of taking part in the programme: “Since the programme I invest a lot more time to build trust in my team. Trust is everything,” says Engin Kilic, factory manager.
Mindset change for Ricola was about preparing the brand for the challenges of growth, for the challenges of not just supplying an international market but becoming a leader in that space. All without losing sight of the integral family ethos that has guided Ricola thus far. Because while Thomas Meier is indeed an interloper, the first Ricola CEO unrelated to Emil Richterich, the brand’s history and ethos remains the same. The role of Meier – and TheNextWe – was to facilitate the transformation of Ricola, giving it the tools and support necessary to become a global challenger, while maintaining the familial togetherness that has served the brand so well, and is so important to the surviving family members.
Changing mindsets can be both proactive and bold, but without being unnecessarily disruptive. It can empower businesses to take decisive action, not through technology, recruitment, or process changes but through supporting team members to become their best. Unlocking barriers, and finding new solutions.
About the author
- Lisa Collinson is country manager UK and chief people officer at TheNextWe® :www.thenextwe.com