In now 11 years we and our target companies have made many experiences;
we have come together, have worked together, have learned together and have developed together.
As you can see, we mostly are installing four teams working together with partners of the target company. So, after we have left the target company in late autumn, the partners are able to introduce the ideas, suggestions. And always other members of our work group are head of the teams. So we are learning to work together with colleagues from different countries and responsibilities.
Experience 2025:
Zbych-Pol&Mobet, Mogilno, Poland
And in 2025 we are again in rapidly growing Poland: Zbych-Pol&Mobet is our partner for 2025. „Zbych-Pol&Mobet is building the future“, what a great combination with our international work group!
Zbych-Pol & Mobet is a manufacturer of building materials, a family company with many awards for innovative solutions.
Visiting „Mobet“ in Mogilno, we learned a lot about beton production and processes. Together with our partners we decided to work on the following topics:
1. Market and Business Model & Rebranding
(team leader Peter Janković)
2. Cost calculation (team leader Vladimir Matewski)
3. Segment Controlling, Reporting System for Management
(team leader Anna Wieloch)
4. Needed data for ERP (team leader Jasmina Očko )
End of september 2025 the members of the ICV work group met in Castelldefels nearby Barcelona to talk about the work progress.
Being in Spain, we naturally enjoyed spanish hospitality – and late summer.
Experience 2024:
Schwarzmann, Ljubljana, Slovenia
Schwarzmann is producing halls for Slovenia as well as for export to middle Europe.
First action after saying hello had been a tour around, followed by defining the topics for the four teams, consisting of ICV-work group members and staff members of schwarzmann:
1. Process and capacity management for projects (team leader Olga Rudenko)
2. Project management, process, communication and learnings (team leader Borut Kadunc)
3. Identify and analyse cost/profitability variances in projects (team leader Roger Maurer)
4. Cost of flexibility – worth or not worth? (team leader Edyta Szarska)
On saturday in september 28th we have presented and discussed the results of our four team-works in Frankfurt/Oder. Lots of discussion, many learnings…
The day before, we met in the evening, visited the „Oderturm“ (Odertower) and had a great view upon the Oder, being flooded with very very much water. This flood caused extensive damage in Czechia and southern Poland.
Afterwards we have been enjoying italian dinner nearby our hotel.
On saturday afternoon we walked along the Oder, still being impressed by the flood, crossing the Europe-bridge to Slubice, the polish neighbouring town of Frankfurt/O. A very fine italian dinner in Slubice finished our meeting.
Final presentations in Slovenia on Saturday, Nov. 9th: the four teams presented and discussed their final presentations to the owners, the CEO and his management team – followed by a discussion.
Boštjan Bevec, CEO: “ I didn’t initially realize where our journey with ICV would lead us or what we would accomplish through this project. Now, we have a fresh perspective on our current challenges and a wealth of ideas—some of which we’ve already put into action—that we will continue to implement.“
Experience 2023:
York, Poznan, Poland
Having had three years of video-meetings we will come back to normal work. As in 2015 – 2019 we are travelling from all over Europe to a new target company to give them ideas to make a better job.
Up to oct. 2022 we had five candidates and our leading-team will reassure with theses companies the potential dates in 2023; then end of 2022 we have decided
„The winner is YORK from Poznan, Poland…“
For three years, we in the English-speaking international work group of the ICV met only by zoom because of Corona in 2020 and 2021 and because of the Russian attack on Ukraine in 2022, but now the common, finally analogous work in personal togetherness started again:
On Thursday, 30.03.2023, all 13 participants arrived at the hotel in Poznan in the evening, arriving by plane or car. The dinner lasted so long, we had so much to tell each other – a circle of friends that has grown over the years!
But also our new working group member Olga, who comes from Kiev in the Ukraine, was immediately warmly welcomed; we in the international work group, like the EU, are growing together…
On Friday, 31.03. in the morning, according to our work group motto
come together,
work together,
learn together,
develop together.
We drove to our „target company“, the family business York, which had won our tender. Together with eight colleagues from York, we set ourselves the task of producing ideas for York – ideas and approaches to solutions that would then be further processed or implemented by York employees after our visits to Poznan from the end of the year.
Filip Makowski, York CEO, showed us around and introduced us to the company, which produces cleaning utensils (see: https://york.global/). Especially in the production area, we were shown how to produce in an innovative and sustainable way.
After getting to know each other personally, we exchanged suggestions for topics from York. The following topics were chosen:
1. profitability analysis for (operational as well as strategic) projects
(team leader Johannes Vollmer)
2. setting up a responsibility-oriented budget process (team leader Karol Sikora)
3. developing a contribution margin system for decision making
(team leader Axel Ehberger)
4. successful strategy implementation to increase staff motivation
(team leader Peter Janžekovič )
On 23rd September 2023, we met for a one-day meeting in Mataró near Barcelona to present, comment on and coordinate the results of the individual work group teams. We had been extremely happy that even our collegue from Russia came for a stopover from Dubai to be with us! And one evening our collegue Xavier Subirats, who helped us in 2019 to work with TUSGsal in Badalona joined us.
Many hours of discussion, but also nice moments, having lunch or dinner together in this vivid town. And of course some of us used the nice weather to have a bath in the mediterranean sea!
To have an impression about the intensity of work, here are the meeting dates of team 4:
Teams-meetings, not longer than one hour with topics
1. March 31st and April 1st in Poznan – Starting in York
2. April 20th 18:00 – ideas for staff-motivation
3. May 25th 17:00 – recommendations for mgmt-leadership
4. June 21st 17:00 – needs for basic responsibility
5. July 27th 17:00 – figures for more effectiveness
6. August 22nd 17:00 – ideas for product innovation with new methods
7. September 15th 17:00 – first discussion of final presentation
8. September 23rd Internal meeting of ICV in Mataró (near Barcelona)
9. October 5th 18:00 – discussion of final presentation
10.October 27th and 28th in Poznan – Back to York
… and many subgroup-meetings in between
Of course, we cannot publish the things we have learned, the ideas we had at York.
But: some of our ideas have already been implemented during summer / autumn 2023 with success!
Filip Makowski, the CEO seemed to be very satisfied with the results:
„Last week we finished a project we started in March 2023 in cooperation with controllers from ICV which was an interesting and exciting journey. It was a great occasion to exchange experiences and know-how with people representing different countries, cultures, and industries. I am sure that the implementation of the recommendations worked out by each team will bring positive results to the efficiency of our processes.„
But surely the coworking collegues from York have got many ideas to change processes, to get better decision-information.
We hope that York, that the whole staff will be happy about the common results!
Experience 2022:
War in Ukraine
Due to the invasion of the Ukraine by Russian troops and the follow-up for the economy of many companies in nearly all countries of Europe we have decided not to meet in 2022. Let us hope for peace – to have a better situation in 2023!
Two topics, each work for half a year:
1. Canvas jan – march (team-leader Luiza Arcab)
2. ICV Work Group – Business Model may – oct. (team-leader Dragica Erčulj)
Experience 2021:
still Corona
Nevertheless, we learned together; the following topics have been discussed in various video-sessions:
First half of year 2021
1. Working with MS TEAMS presented by Dragana Mujanovic
2. Company-Change presented by Herwig Friedag
3. How do I sell my trainings and services? presented by Valentin Usenkov
4. Using AI to find potential customers presented by Peter Janžekovič
5. Excel-macros for beginners presented by Borut Kadunc
6. Sales Controlling presented by Jasmina Očko
7. Working Capital Management presented by Anna Wieloch
8. Controlling in SME presented by Mariusz Rzeznikiewicz
9. Talent Management presented by Dragana Mujanovic
10. Sensitivity analysis presented by Edyta Szarska
11. Scrum presented by Jasmina Očko
12. Agile Manifesto presented by Johannes Vollmer
13. Projects according to lean six sigma presented by Karol Sikora
Second half of year special topic: Scrum:
lecture 1: Scrum manifesto with Questions & Answers (Q&A)
lecture 2: Scrum-roles and first steps with Q&A
lecture 3: Scrum-sprints with Q&A
lecture 4: what will be done afterwards with Q&A
lecture 5: what is special with scrum ? with Q&A
You see, many topics! Learning from each other…
Experience 2020:
Corona
During the first Corona year we worked on these four topics:
1. Liquidity (team-leader Jörn Ney)
2. Business model (team-leader Peter Janžekovič)
3. New technology (team-leader Karol Sikora)
4. CSR (team-leader Johannes Vollmer)
Experience 2019:
TUSGsal, Barcelona
2019 in Badalona near Barcelona – a new task:
We have worked with and for a public transport company in Catalonia/Spain: TUSGsal which offers transport in Badalona and to Barcelona: Every day, TUSGsal puts about 250 buses on the road, to comply with the 40 routes offering it’s services to the citizen of Barcelona, Badalona, Santa Coloma de Gramanet, Sant Adrià de Besòs, Montgat and Tiana. TUSGsal is owned by the staff!
As usual, we brougt in ideas and proposals for a better controlling as well as management hints.
Our public transport-project with these topics for the mixed teams of ICV and target company:
1. Engagement of staff – stop the silo-thinking in the culture (team leader Jörn Ney)
2. General corporate standards for structure and figures (team leader Anna Wieloch)
3. Measurement, criterial, figures for sustainability and CSR for a better position in tenders and a better future (team leader Luiza Arcab)
4. Dash board as single source of truth (team leader Peter Janžekovič)
Some days later Mr. Fabregas, CEO of TUSGsal wrote his impressions about our work and the results:
“Throughout 2019 our company TUSGSAL has carried out a collaboration with ICV (International Association of Controllers) that has given us the great opportunity to have a broad external vision focused on four main axes of the management of any company, but in this personalized case in the particularities of our company. A vision reinforced by a large group of professionals from different countries, cultures, professions and experiences.
What has surprised us most is the effectiveness and efficiency in decision making and work performance, the simplicity of the proposed actions and the consensus of the components of the different groups for proposing solutions or actions to be implemented based on objective data that allow us to learn from the past to focus on the near future and allow us to reach other horizons.
In conclusion, the project itself has been a great experience that gives us value in its proposals and its subsequent implementation, but the great lesson has been an effective and efficient teamwork, united by common sense and consensus on proposals. simple but enormously useful despite distance, culture, etc..”
Experience 2018:
AutoDOC, Berlin
What a company: Founded in 2008 the owners built up a trade house with more than a billion turnover in less tha 15 years, selling spare parts for cars, being now the biggest seller in Europe.
We discussed the following ideas for improving processes:
1. Ideas and recommendations to start B2B-business (team leader Mariusz Rzeźnikiewicz)
2. How to improve logistics (team leader Borut Kadunc)
3. the needs of a modern controlling system for AutoDOC (team leader Jasmina Očko)
4. Purchasing as a very important factor (team leader Edyta Szarska)
“It was an inspiring and extremely collegial collaboration with the ICV’s international work group, which resulted in numerous valuable pointers for the further development of our strategy, processes and our controlling systems.”
Alexej Erdle, CEO and Executive Partner
Experience 2017:
MDM, Ljubljana, Slovenia
These are the topics for our partner in Slovenia:
1. Ideas to change company’s culture (team leader Jana Štelcer)
2. Bring awareness to the people (team leader Roger Maurer)
(cleanliness, speed, working-capital, client-orientation)
3. Excellence in performance / processes (team leader Anna Wieloch)
4. Cross-communication inside the company (team leader Luiza Arcab)
“The purpose to connect with ICV was mainly control the departments financially, in a mathematical way. But immediately we figured out importance of traditional values, leadership, relationship and emotional intelligence – so figures became as a consequences due to a proper execution of mentioned four facts. Thank you all the ICV team.“
Rok Drašler, CEO and owner
Experience 2016:
LUG Light factory, Zielona Góra, Poland
We discussed the following topics:
1. Integration of customers’ needs in sales and production processes,
ways to reduce the portfolio, the number of products – if & how
(team leader Mariusz Rzeźnikiewicz)
2. Market design for LUG in 2020: questions to be discussed
(team leader Valentin Usenkov)
3. One motivation system for all LUG-people +
Ideas and ways to improve reputation and internal communication
(team leader Jasmina Očko)
4. New organisation with better information / controlling (team leader Romina Oreskovic)
„We know: you don´t solve our problems. But you gave us a new view how to manage our company. And this is very important for us. And what is the most important: That we change our company from an executor strategy to a responsibility strategy…“
Ryszard Wtorkowski, CEO and owner
„I strongly believe that these days with ICV will have a big impact on our organization in the future“
Eryk Wtorkowski, Managing Director
Experience 2015:
Nomax Group, Piekary Śląskie, Poland
The target-company in 2015 has been Nomaxtrading from Piekary Śląskie near Katowice in Poland.
The company’s origins date back to a family business called Nomax, which was founded in Piekary Śląskie in 1989. Since then, the owners and staff have been constantly searching for comprehensive solutions for the meat industry, resulting in the implementation of many innovative products. Initially, the company was a family business supplying butchers and sausage makers with sausage nets, casings, spices and all kinds of ingredients. Since then, this company, which consisted of just a few people, has developed into a dynamic group of companies employing almost 300 people.
Three teams, each consisting of members from different countries analysed these topics:
1. European markets (team leader Jörn Ney)
2. Sales controlling (team leader Anna Wieloch)
3. Management KPI´s dashboard (team leader Luiza Arcab)
The target-company Nomaxtrading has been very satisfied with our work:
„summary of our experience. We would like to say thank you to all of the ICV team as we are highly im-pressed with their engagement, dedication and hard work. They are wonderful, open and cheerful group of people who’s ambition leaves a strong lasting impression. The team was able to quickly ascertain our strengths and weaknesses which we hadn’t seen or didn’t want to see. Through this joint cooperation the ICV team had a very positive input on our business.
Thank you one more time!„
Lukasz Janus, owner
Visiting the Nomax premises