Out of tunnel vision via Skype and Teams
Sten Terwan and Robert Zeeuw are not only colleagues, but also cousins. Sten lives in Woerden and Robert in Cannes in the South of France. Both work in the IT department of Floral Trade Group.
Robert: “After mastering the Florisoft software programme, I became the IT support for all French companies. I like to create good IT solutions and software that then helps colleagues to work more efficiently. ”
Sten: “Last year, I started at FTG as a graduate student, then I continued as a developer. At the moment, I am mainly busy developing new features for iCRM (dashboard for salespeople) and the floral.nu dashboard. For this, we are always looking for new features to make work easier for our colleagues. ”
Robert: “The collaboration goes great; we work every day via Skype and Teams. Sten prefers to work on creating functionalities, and I prefer to make the functionality more user-friendly and beautiful. ”
Sten: “When you run into a certain problem, you are sometimes stuck in a tunnel vision. Then I find it useful to call Robert to find a suitable solution together. Robert is very knowledgeable about the processes and knows immediately what users mean by their questions, whereas I sometimes have to guess at the user’s questions… So we also complement each other optimally! ”
Differences in character create strong cooperation
Marco Maat & Silke Vofrey work together for ExtraFlora in Germany. Every Sunday, Marco flies to the hub in Schoneiche near Berlin. From there, he drives to the hub in Magdeburg, and also travels regularly to Eelde.
Silke: “Together with Marco, I have been managing Extraflora for about 16 years. We supply supermarkets, and it is nice to see that we have been growing for years! ”
Marco: “Our collaboration is good, although we don’t always agree with each other. We both have our own focus; I do the buying/selling, and Silke takes care of the financials and maintains contact with the supermarkets’ headquarters. ”
Silke: “We differ in several respects, Marco is impulsive, and I am more of a control freak. By talking about everything, we usually come to the right decision.”
Marco: “It is important to respect each other. I am more of a doer and like to take risks; sometimes, I say ‘yes’ too quickly. Silke is the person who sometimes puts on the brakes or takes a day to think things over. So we complement each other nicely! ”
20 years of trust
Bas van der Tang from Rijnsburg and Ronny Kämpf from Barchfeld/Thuringia have been working closely together for Van der Plas in Germany for many years.
Ronny: “Due to the direct, long-term good cooperation with our Dutch colleagues, we always exchange our experiences. ”
Bas: “Our cooperation is based on a relationship of trust that has developed over the years. Differences of opinion are part of it, but the intention is always to come to a mutual understanding. I have always appreciated Ronny’s positive approach in our cooperation!”
Ronny: “If a customer has questions about orders or transport, vehicle problems or the like, we are always in touch. Due to accurate information about the driver’s departure time, it is possible for us to determine the exact delivery date for the following night. Bas and I have known each other for almost 20 years and have always been able to rely on each other. ”
Bas: “Because we continue to think in terms of solutions, a lot is possible. “
