This crisis has revealed the vital importance of our service professions. Once again, I want to express my sincere gratitude to our teams for their exemplary engagement throughout this most unusual year. »
This is why our own recovery requires that we forcefully reaffirm the virtue of these oft en ignored professions, which are suffering from the current context but are so instrumental to the smooth running of schools, universities, offices and hospitals – and even society at large.
Our mission to improve quality of life has never made more sense. Faced with the pandemic threat, at a time when protecting health and well-being is at the forefront of everyone’s minds, including in countries where that seemed like a given, I know that our know-how and our diverse, complementary assets give us a powerful advantage. It enables us to be a step ahead by creating a cutting-edge off er, in line with the most ambitious and advanced scientific research.
The disruption required from us also involves structural changes that will enable us to truly put consumers at the heart of our model. The pandemic and lockdowns have amplified consumer trends that had already begun, and on which we were already working: we are now speeding up. Innovative business models geared towards increasingly flexible, digitalized and sustainable dining options, revised production modes adapted to new consumption patterns, focus on the most profitable markets with a still tighter country portfolio and a targeted and modernized Facilities Management offer: it’s up to us to make the right choices, with Denis Machuel and Sodexo’s entire leadership team, and with the support of the Board of Directors. It’s up to us to focus our efforts on the areas of highest value. I am convinced that we will bring our revenue back up to pre-crisis levels, but its nature and composition will be different.
Transforming our model also involves further developing agile, decentralized working methods, in keeping with the new situation. It involves combining global vision and strategy with the autonomy to execute at the local level. Indeed, in the heat of the moment, with support from our transversal teams, our operational teams were able to find concrete solutions to meet the unprecedented challenges faced by our clients and suppliers, in all the countries and environments where we operate. Our employees adjusted to the situation from one day to the next to implement enhanced sanitary measures and new service off ers, to lend their support to their colleagues on the busiest sites, all the while caring for the most vulnerable. In this urgent situation, common sense prevailed over the bureaucracy that threatens any multinational. We were able to refocus on priorities, work differently, and give employees the freedom to take initiative. Not only is there no going back, but I also want to accelerate and further streamline the rebalancing of our organization towards the local level, so that decisions keep being made as close to the fi eld as possible. Aft er all, this is where our true value is created, in the daily contacts with our clients, consumers and suppliers.
Our return to sustained, profitable growth is closely linked to the acceleration of our supportive approach, in which generating wealth simultaneously benefits all of our stakeholders and ecosystems. This goal has been at the heart of our mission since 1966 and is an integral part of our performance requirements. But it is more relevant now than ever. If all corporations are now expected to show their ability to take action to address world issues, few are able to have a social and environmental impact as significant as Sodexo: we are present in 64 different countries through our 420,000 employees, serving 100 million consumers every day.
Sodexo is the world leader it is today because ambition, courage, and the ability to adapt quickly in an ever-changing world are an integral part of who we are.
Our success is supported by a solid foundation: our mission, the founding values that are the basis of our identity, and our financial independence. We also have one priceless advantage: our teams. They are the ones who make Sodexo the great company that it is, and their sense of service shines through every day, particularly under exceptional circumstances. It is thanks to their determination, their commitment and their courage that we have weathered the storm. Once again, I want to express my sincere gratitude to them for their exemplary engagement throughout this most unusual year. I also want to express my full confidence in our ability to create the conditions that will support the future development and growth of our company .
I am convinced that the key to our future success now lies in the implementation of an innovative management model that allows each of our employees and our clients to be both proponents of and players in our company ’s transformation, and in the transformation of the world.