It is extremely important to find ways to stay effective in conditions that are constantly changing and unpredictable
Mykola Siutkin
You do business, we mitigate risks | Business Investment Risk Advisor | Co-founder of S&P Agency | Attorney | Co-publisher LDaily | Ironman
Kateryna Biloblovska, CEO of Electrolux in Ukraine and the Caucasus countries, spoke to LDaily readers about the successful experience of the company's operation during war, how mutual aid and care for people not only give the strength to work under difficult conditions but to also take part in socially important projects.
Kateryna Biloblovska, CEO of?Electrolux in Ukraine?and the Caucasus countries, spoke to?LDaily?readers about the successful experience of the company’s operation during war, how mutual aid and care for people not only give the strength to work under difficult conditions but to also take part in socially important projects.
LDaily: What was your experience of running a business during war? What changes took place in your company, what challenges did you face and how did you overcome them?
K. Biloblovska:?A full-scale war posed a great challenge for everyone. The concept of work-life balance has been replaced by a new one – balance between work and war. Operating in a wartime environment is a unique experience that we gain independently and cannot borrow from anyone, because there has probably not been a war of such scale and global impact since World War II.
Throughout March, we were engaged in safety issues – helping employees evacuate, supporting each other to more easily accept our new reality, setting up technical provisions to resume work so that people could work from any location.
By April, we had fully restored operational activity and adapted production to working under war conditions. We did not dismiss any employees because we understand how important work is during a war both for people to maintain decent living conditions and for a country that needs resources to resist the enemy. Also, for employees who evacuated abroad, we provide local contracts to resume work whenever possible, because we realize that the standard and cost of living in European countries and Ukraine differ significantly.
We developed skills of flexibility, mobility, achieving results under remote working conditions during the coronavirus pandemic. So, from this perspective, we did not face additional difficulties in setting up business processes.
Flexibility and adaptability are key principles of our work today. I believe the direct experience of applying these skills is unique to every business. It is extremely important to find ways to stay effective in conditions that are constantly changing and unpredictable.
LDaily: Did you halt production? Did you reduce its volumes?
K. Biloblovska:?Production was halted when the full-scale invasion began. After implementing appropriate safety protocols, we resumed operations at the beginning of April. Yes, with reduced capacities, reduced working hours, additional safety measures – but work was resumed.
It was particularly difficult to work during the cold period. Because to the air raid alarms, during which work stops and the team has to stay in shelters, power outages were added. However, despite all the obstacles, goods are being produced, sold, and exported.
LDaily: You export your products from Ukraine to many countries. How has the supply chain changed and what challenges have arisen here? How did you overcome them?
K.?Biloblovska:?The supply chain has not changed significantly, but it was adjusted in accordance with sanction laws and taking into account safety requirements. These innovations in no way complicated the work and did not hinder our activity.
LDaily: How difficult is it to attract new customers during a war?
K. Biloblovska:?Our current task for ensuring stability is to balance the portfolio of markets, maintain our position in the domestic market, and under the current circumstances, to strengthen them in the most stable niches for us, including the markets of the Caucasus.
LDaily: In your opinion, what helped the business to overcome difficult challenges and stay afloat? What were the key factors for success under such conditions? What percentage of your business has been restored?
K. Biloblovska:?Currently, we are working at full capacity. All processes are fully restored. Despite a certain change in the format of work, taking into account safety issues, relocation of some employees abroad, etc., the team is very united and engaged in the work, the morale is kept high. Everyone at their place works with maximum dedication for our common victory.
Adapting to new realities was greatly assisted by the support of our cluster management and company headquarters in Sweden. We immediately established a crisis working group, set up direct, continuous communication with the local team. This open, straightforward, and professional communication fully ensured the efficient and prompt adoption of all necessary decisions for the team’s safety and the safe resumption of work.
Our partners also provided significant support for the business. We are incredibly grateful to them for their understanding, resilience, loyalty, and willingness to continue working despite any obstacles. They all quickly resumed work, and we were able to continue our cooperation.
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I also want to share an observation: as we work directly with the end-user, we are very pleased and inspired that today, in extraordinarily difficult times for the entire country, despite all the threats, Ukrainians do not lose faith in the future, strive to maintain, as much as possible, a normal life, arrange a comfortable everyday life, and care about home comfort.
LDaily: Have you managed to keep your entire team? What challenges have you faced during the war? How do you maintain your team’s morale during the war? What approaches do you use to keep their motivation and work efficiency in unpredictable conditions?
K. Biloblovska:?We made a principled decision from the very beginning: not to reduce the team under any circumstances. At the same time, we lost a few specialists who decided to leave on their own. These were personal circumstances: someone moved abroad and decided to start a new chapter of life, someone transferred to work in other offices of the company.
When the full-scale war began, one of our biggest challenges was dealing with the emotional reaction to the situation and maintaining team morale in the face of uncertainty and unpredictability of unfolding events. The ability to talk openly with each other as much as needed, providing those people in the team who were already morally and physically ready, with understandable and positively routine tasks helped everyone, so to speak, feel the ground under their feet, stabilize, see a perspective, and find the strength to move forward despite everything.
The next difficult period was the shelling of energy infrastructure – again a lot of uncertainty, the need to look for new solutions… However, our flexibility and adaptability, which we honed during the pandemic, also allowed us to find effective solutions in this situation, adjust operational processes to difficult realities. The team received financial support from the company, conditions for work were provided, as well as heating during power outages and in case of problems with heating.
However, the war continues, and therefore, moral fatigue and exhaustion from people living under constant stress continue to accumulate. Colossal mutual support within the local team, support from the leadership team, as well as from colleagues around the world help to withstand the stresses. The company’s loyalty to the situation in Ukraine, flexibility regarding how and under what conditions the local office works, is a manifestation of great humanity in contrast to the stereotype that business is always only about money, and people are secondary.
LDaily: Can you talk about recent projects or initiatives that Electrolux has been involved in Ukraine?
K.?Biloblovska:?In partnership with the charity foundation “Dobrodiy Club”, we are currently providing such necessary support to children from Kherson region: basic sets of clothing, food. Also, using the funds transferred to the foundation in the winter, warm packages (sleeping bag, warmer, and a hat) were ordered for 2,000 children. These packages went to displaced families in the Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv regions.
At the beginning of the full-scale war, together with the Red Cross, we transferred 300 washing machines to modular towns where internally displaced people were resettled in the Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, Chernivtsi, and Transcarpathian regions.
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