Audi: One on one with Dr. Winterkorn

BusinessWeek has an interesting interview with Dr. Martin Winterkorn, Audi's CEO.

BW: Audi's latest models, from the A3 compact to the A8 luxury sedan, are boosting sales and profits, stealing sales from luxury rivals, and polishing Audi's image as a premium auto maker. What's the next step?
Dr. Winterkorn: We have to grow. Our challenge is to extend the strength of Audi's brand in Europe to customers around the world, especially in the U.S. Our new products have shown we can develop very desirable and emotional cars which customers will pay a lot of money for. The next models will build on that emotional character and will be even sportier. They will have better handling, better brakes, and better gas mileage.

BW: Audi is improving both quality and profitability at a time when rivals such as Mercedes are stumbling on both counts. What's the key to top performance in a tough global auto market?
Dr. Winterkorn: You have to listen to what's going wrong [inside a company] all the time. There are always problems -- problems on the finance side, on the sales side, on the product side. You have to take them seriously. At the end of the day, it's product, product, and product.
You have to listen to what the dealers are saying too. Audi's culture is very product-oriented, unpolitical, and focused on the fundamentals. We have a culture that endorses internal debate and argument. As a manager you have to be able to fight with colleagues on an intellectual plane without feeling attacked personally.
This is especially important when it comes to discussing mistakes that are made. Everyone makes mistakes, even me. The worst thing is to make people feel wounded. They have to feel their contribution is valid in identifying and solving problems.

GermanCarBlog, Audi

Source: BusinessWeek, picture by AudiWorld

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