“Times like this produce dreams”

Oliv­er Blume: We’re being guid­ed by the cen­tral val­ues of our Porsche cul­ture. More than ever, what we want to do is work for the ben­e­fit of soci­ety and our fel­low human beings. We want to take care of each other and take respon­si­bil­i­ty –like in a fam­i­ly. These val­ues extend beyond our fac­to­ry gates. Right now we’re con­cen­trat­ing on where we as a com­pa­ny can be of help. For exam­ple, experts from our two con­sul­tan­cies, Porsche Con­sult­ing and MHP, have been sup­port­ing cri­sis man­age­ment teams for the states of Baden-Würt­tem­berg and Sax­ony over recent weeks and were instru­men­tal in procur­ing per­son­al pro­tec­tive equip­ment from China. We’ve also been encour­ag­ing our employ­ees to do vol­un­teer work, and we’re send­ing dona­tions to char­i­ties around the world. That’s all part of how we view our­selves as a com­pa­ny.

Blume:Porsche has a long his­to­ry of pro­mot­ing non-prof­it ini­tia­tives. Sol­i­dar­i­ty and social respon­si­bil­i­ty are just part of what we do. This cri­sis affects every­one, and gov­ern­ment, busi­ness­es, and the pub­lic are all called upon to con­tribute. I am con­fi­dent that we will deal with the sit­u­a­tion suc­cess­ful­ly by work­ing togeth­er. And it’s expe­ri­ences like this that can have a last­ing effect on our society—to everyone’s ben­e­fit.

Blume: Our goal is to get through this crit­i­cal peri­od in a sys­tem­at­ic and respon­si­ble way. That includes how we respond­ed very early on. As soon as we saw what the virus was doing in China, we con­vened a coun­cil of experts at Porsche. This coun­cil is mon­i­tor­ing the sit­u­a­tion around the clock, and has been mak­ing quite a few deci­sions. Our high­est pri­or­i­ty is always on pro­tect­ing the health of our employ­ees. This means that every­one who can work at home does so. Our con­fer­ences are held online, and busi­ness trips are can­celled. The few excep­tions are absolute­ly nec­es­sary. And for these, who­ev­er returns from an inter­na­tion­al flight has to self-quar­an­tine for two weeks. We make no com­pro­mis­es in this regard. The health of our com­mu­ni­ty is of para­mount impor­tance.

Blume: Each indi­vid­ual team mem­ber imme­di­ate­ly had to set his or her inter­nal com­pass on han­dling this prob­lem. And I’m proud to say that it worked with­out a hitch. My col­leagues are doing out­stand­ing work. The cri­sis man­age­ment team met daily. The exec­u­tive board held spe­cial ses­sions every other day. Togeth­er we dis­cussed hun­dreds of ques­tions. Like where will we locate the dis­in­fec­tants for our employ­ees? How will we change the serv­ing pro­ce­dures at the cafe­te­rias? After stop­ping pro­duc­tion at our plants in Zuf­fen­hausen and Leipzig, what will we do to start it up again? What steps are need­ed before desk work­ers can return to their offices?

Blume: At first we planned to stop pro­duc­tion for only two weeks. But it ended up being six weeks. One of the rea­sons had to do with bot­tle­necks in the glob­al sup­ply chains. That was very painful. But we won’t be deterred: we’re look­ing ahead and want to get back up to speed as soon as the cri­sis is over. I see major oppor­tu­ni­ties for Porsche in the future. Over the last few years we’ve launched a huge prod­uct cam­paign, includ­ing the Tay­can at the end of 2019. It gives us a superb foun­da­tion to build on.

Blume: Right now we’re con­cen­trat­ing on essen­tials. For the sup­ply chains, that means think­ing about which trans­port routes are real­ly nec­es­sary, and how we can reduce com­plex­i­ty in our logis­tics. Porsche will end up being even more robust in this regard. At the same time, we’re also look­ing at the big pic­ture and ask­ing our­selves how sus­tain­able our sup­ply chain is. To answer this ques­tion our cor­po­rate group has devel­oped a rat­ing sys­tem for sup­pli­ers, which includes both envi­ron­men­tal and social cri­te­ria. It is part of the eval­u­a­tion process for award­ing con­tracts.

Blume: When dif­fi­cul­ties arise, you don’t just turn your back on long-term part­ners. That too is part of our cul­ture at Porsche. Our sup­pli­ers know that they can count on Porsche to be a depend­able part­ner. The mes­sage we’re send­ing is that we’ll get through this togeth­er.

Blume: Absolute­ly not. We’ve been pur­su­ing a clear and sus­tain­able prod­uct strat­e­gy at Porsche for years now. We’re going to keep fol­low­ing this path. Not only that—I think this cri­sis will sharp­en our aware­ness for a lot of things, and that we’ll be see­ing a marked increase in the pref­er­ence for elec­tro­mo­bil­i­ty. Many peo­ple are already putting more thought into what makes life worth liv­ing. I antic­i­pate an even greater con­cen­tra­tion on low-emis­sions tech­nol­o­gy. That’s one of the rea­sons we’re con­tin­u­ing to invest a lot of resources into future-ori­ent­ed tech­nolo­gies.   

Blume: No, we’re stick­ing to our CO₂ tar­gets and not budg­ing from our sus­tain­abil­i­ty strat­e­gy. We’re receiv­ing expert advice on this. Over the next five years we’ll be invest­ing 15 bil­lion euros in areas like elec­tro­mo­bil­i­ty, sus­tain­able pro­duc­tion, and dig­i­tal­iza­tion. The corona­virus will not change this in the slight­est.

Blume: Gen­er­al eco­nom­ic and pol­i­cy con­sid­er­a­tions will con­tin­ue to pose chal­lenges over the next sev­er­al months. We’re gear­ing up for them at Porsche. That includes tak­ing steps to increase our effi­cien­cy. Over the longer term we’ll be mov­ing into new prof­itable busi­ness fields. And we’re con­tin­u­ing to pur­sue our strate­gic goal of a 15 per­cent oper­at­ing return on sales.

Blume: We don’t yet know what the actu­al effects of the corona­virus pan­dem­ic will be—either for Porsche or for busi­ness and soci­ety at large. The task at hand is to jump-start the econ­o­my. We’re fac­ing an eco­nom­ic cri­sis and have to pre­vent a down­ward spi­ral. Now is not the time for debates on prin­ci­ples. We need to focus on the econ­o­my and take action prompt­ly; oth­er­wise, time will work against us.

Blume: The opti­mism I see in so many peo­ple as they go about their work. Every­one is focus­ing on the essen­tials, and sup­port­ing each other. And it’s times like this that pro­duce dreams and needs. There might even be a greater need for sports cars when the cri­sis is over—that at least would be my wish.