Leadership Profiles: Bram Berden

Leadership 

How would you describe yourself as a leader?

“I call myself a social leader with a business mindset. I’ve got a long background in sales – so I like to set my goals/targets whereby the social aspect is very important because we have to do it together. I’m the guy who has to manage it, to make sure the team is happy and of course our customers too.”

How does Etteplan support leadership and growth?

If you look at Etteplan, they are helping me as a person and a manager.

“I get coaching, training and I’m involved in leadership programs. This year I have also be invited to join the sales development program.”

Bram also enthusiastically shares his appreciation for the level of trust and freedom within Etteplan.

“There is also a lot of freedom and responsibility in my role, and I reflect this on my team, achieve our goals together. This freedom is important to get our customers happy and targets are reached.”

Getting more involved in the industry/market is important to Bram, this year he created Tech Doc Day. Short for Technical Documentation Day, this day was created as an inclusive event that will become an Etteplan tradition in the Netherlands. From the Tech Doc Day in 2021 came a multi-day and multi-national event that teaches, shares, and brings people together to talk about the importance and value of Technical Documentation.

“Part of it is learning what we do and part of it is marketing. My manager then gave me the freedom – but one thing is that you always have to keep the business in mind. Everything that we do is for the wellbeing of Etteplan and the wellbeing of the people – considering also targets and budget, and if I can do that then I have a lot of freedom.“

Culture

How would you describe the culture at Etteplan?

“The one thing that really surprised me was how honest this company is. For me trust and honesty are the basis for everything”

Bram joined Etteplan in 2020 and has since been working in Technical Documentation in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. While honesty and trust are strongly valued, Bram wants to create an environment  where people are open and as passionate as himself.

“I think we could be doing even more with employee branding and showing people how proud we are working for Etteplan. Colleagues have a good attitude and I really appreciate that”.

In what ways do you feel you have an impact on the company culture?

“I think that I can have a great impact, my team is about 40 people so I really make sure we are collaborating together. We try to connected in many ways with my team and make sure people are happy and utilized - but always bringing it back to the business.” Trust plays an important role in leadership and culture for Bram “If you give people responsibility then they will be committed to do the things we have to do together. This is how I manage my team”

Values

Our values are: Customer oriented, attractive and proactive. What do they mean to you?

“Our values should be printed in our heads. As mentioned, it is the customers who pay the bills. A happy customer is a good customer. So attractiveness and proactiveness are basics for customer oriented thinking.”

How are the values seen in practice?

“In my mind the customer is a partner and we have to work together” Bram shares how the values are seen both internally as well as with the people and companies that we work with.

“Of  course these values, they mean a lot to me” as both an employee of Etteplan as well as in a business sense, “I am always customer orientated because at the end of the day the customer is paying our bills and if they pay our bills then we can pay our people and if our customers are happy then our people are happy and the other way around.”

Attractiveness as a partner, and employer Bram believes “We have a beautiful story” and “we are attractive yes, but we can do even more” 

Growth and development are part of Etteplan DNA, and there is always room for improvement, “We can be more proactive for our customers and our people – not waiting for them to ask us something.”

Wildcard: If you could offer one piece of advice about anything, what would it be?

“I think the most important word is trust. but that’s more of a general topic.”

“We should tell that message much more clearly. I have only worked here for 1,5 years now and I’m really proud. It’s about honesty here, I want people to know about our story.”