Management thinkers often use the metaphor of ‘snow melting at the edge of an organization’ to highlight the phenomena whereby top management in large organizations cannot see threats or change happening quickly enough.
It is often said that people who work close to customers in the field – such as engineers, sales and project managers – can see change coming faster than senior managers. This can be a big problem to get the whole organization to move its activities before they are disrupted.
But there are also good examples of leaders of global companies who are curious enough, out of passion and necessity, to be able to identify conditions for change on the horizon, and then mobilize resources and partnerships to take advantage of them.
An offer we couldn’t refuse
Developing and maintaining an organizational culture of sustainable resilience is a common practice among the farmers who feed us. So what happens when you have a farmer whose family farming heritage goes back over a hundred years, who at the same time leads one of Europe’s leading industrial companies focused on agriculture, energy and housing?
Well, we wanted to learn more about this, so we asked Niels Dengsø Jensen, the chairman of DLG Group and AP Pension, about how his roots in agriculture help his DLG business expand its markets in a sustainable way.
Niels’ answer was: “Well, come to my farm outside Viborg in Jutland and I’ll show you around some of our robot innovation activities and we can have a discussion about my philosophies for partnering and innovation!”
You don’t often get offers like this from the chairman of the board, so we went with Tech Mahindra (part of the global Mahindra Group company) to spend two days with Niels.
Reaching out for excellence
I had met Niels a few times before, so I knew what to expect. He is straightforward with his practical opinions about managing his companies, but also intensely curious about new technological and process innovations that are coming over the horizon. So with Niels you can expect a lot of questions and direct feedback about the possibilities of using new innovations in the real world.
The DLG Group is one of Europe’s largest agribusiness companies, and it has employees and activities in 18 countries with a turnover in 2021 of 7.93 billion euros. Totally owned by Danish farmers, this is a very focused and practically managed company, with an acute sense of collaboration and technological innovation as well as a balanced approach to risk management.
With this mix of attributes comes the attitude of reaching out for expertise to help solve existing and more importantly future business opportunities. To demonstrate this, Niels took us on a tour of his farm to show us the various robotic machines he has in operation – each of which contributes to the company’s core processes. Some of these robots have been part of the business for many years, such as the milking machines and the feeding robot in the cowshed. Others, such as AGROINTELLI’s Robotti, are being tested in the fields as we speak.
Artful balancing act
Of course, Niels does not only deploy robots on his farm out of love for new technology. The farm is a complex operation that requires both long- and short-term planning and decisions. It is also one of the first links in the food value chain and therefore crucial for so many other organizations whose processes start with feeding communities. So experimentation with new technological innovations must be run carefully and be cost-effective. You cannot jeopardize a season’s harvest yield. Therefore, innovation in the farm’s operation, as in DLG’s larger agricultural business, is a balancing act between risk/reward.
And that brings us to the partnerships. One of the things that Denmark is known for globally is their robotic innovations on land, in the air (drones) and at water. Many of these innovations continue to come out of research collaborations with Denmark’s leading universities and research institutions in Aarhus, Aalborg and Odense and, of course, DTU. What these institutions are looking for are industrial collaborations where they can test their new robotics and data analytics capabilities in the real world.
And with farmers (and chairs) like Niels Dengsø Jensen, they have access to business leaders who are prepared to offer their activities to consortia of research teams and companies to test their latest innovations.
Innovation in action
While walking the fields of Niels’ farm, we got to see these latest robot farmers in action as the AGROINTELLI Robotti followed its carefully programmed journey across his fields, using its various sensors to navigate the optimal path. And of course, the drone can be the eye in the sky, keeping an eye on the operation of the farm to speed up decision-making and allow farm workers to focus on higher value activities.
These robots also produce a lot of data that allows the farm team to monitor their activities in the crop production life cycle, and this allows suppliers, such as AGROINTELLI, to get valuable test data to improve their products. All this is of course closely followed by Niels and his farm manager. While being open to new technologies, there can be no interruption of the critical timing of harvesting the crops.
All the innovations we saw on Niels’ farm have a number of key components that must balance investment decisions. One of them is that sustainable production must drive commercial growth. It’s actually the only way to go. And we also see this reflected in the DLG Group’s strategy.
Leaders who inspire
Our tour of Niels’ farm culminated in a longer discussion (link in online version) about how his philosophies of partnering, innovation, sustainable resilience and leadership are based on practical approaches to running highly complex businesses, using external expertise to keep ahead of the competition.
One of the other realizations I came away with was how sometimes in this industry competitors in one field or country can simultaneously be partners in another. This requires a sharp assessment of partnering strategies.
Thriving in the agricultural industry, with its complex demands for sustainable resilience and cost control, requires a flexible and practical mindset – one that knows how to take advantage of new innovations and partnerships and is able to spot gaps or dangers in the weather on the horizon. Niels’ passion for both his DLG group and agricultural business shines through and inspires those who enter his circle to come up with new ideas.
Curious leaders are also welcoming leaders. And managers need their teams to come up with new sustainable ideas to help the business thrive. It was very clear after my two days on the farm with Niels Dengsø Jensen!
Source: The Nordic Page