At Sonett, management is not thought of as “top-bottom” but rather “inside / outside”. Inside has to be regarded in a multidimensional way, however. Inside, in the centre, professional competence is combined with corporate identification.

A further central quality is the need of reciprocal complementation and cooperation. This includes the continuous working on the shared objectives and on understanding the spirit of Sonett. 

Consequently, Sonett’s management is structured in circles. The centre is formed by the executive management; every two weeks meets the extended executive management, a group of 6 employees who feel strongly bonded with Sonett and have managerial responsibilities. In this meeting, all fundamental issues of the plant are being discussed and developed.

The third important management circle is the conference of the heads of departments.

The heads of departments are also organized, where possible, in partnership-based way. Responsibilities for development projects are set up at interdepartmental level.

More and more we are getting away from assigning offices and titles. The decisive point is who will take the initiative and responsibility in a given situation and with whom will he do so. Therefore, said management circles act more and more as framework only, in which we have to become aware of the tasks to be tackled. 

The Executive Management

Since 1992 Beate Oberdorfer, graduated food chemist (Dipl. Lebensmittel-Chemikerin), and Gerhard Heid, business graduate (Dipl. Kaufmann), are jointly at the head of the Sonett company. For us modern corporate management means to work together as partners in the spirit of our company. This includes intensively cultivating meetings, making the decisions on a consensual rather than on a hierarchical basis, or at least striving to do so, no matter which sector of the company is concerned, thus making certain that people are convinced of what they are doing. Our continuous work on Sonett’s guidelines and initial impulses serves as essential basis towards this end.

Equal opportunities for men and women, –
non-discrimination and equal treatment

Sonett has always expressly treated women and men equally, and without discrimination on account of their gender, racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief. And one of their special concerns is to foster and integrate disabled people. In addition, Sonett strives to facilitate combining family with profession by offering flexible working hours and parental leave periods.

These aims are obtained thanks to the staff’s almost equal number in female and male employees. Out of 60 jobs, 31 are held by women. The enterprise is headed by a man and woman with equal rights. The women at the level of Heads of Departments make up 40% – and this in a chemical factory in which manual labour and technology play a dominant part. In our office, 4 women with school-age children coordinate amongst themselves their working hours in which to do their part-time jobs. We pay subsidies for the kindergarten. With our approval, parental leave periods are made use of by female as well as male employees. It also happens that employees take a sabbatical and continue working afterwards fulltime. The age of the people working in the factory ranges from youngsters who have just left school, wanting to work for a few months only, and those of pensioners.

It is a pleasure for us to employ people of most diverse nationalities, at present these being America, Armenia, Bosnia, Eritrea, Ghana, Gambia, Italy, Croatia, Nepal, Nigeria, Austria, Poland, Russia and Slovenia. At Sonett we do not practice equality and equal treatment based on religion, belief or sexual orientation only, we rather consider diversity, in every respect, as enriching a lively and good working atmosphere.

It is especially the people and employees from the Lehenhof and the daily contact with them that are a delightful enrichment for all involved and enhances the mutual respect, support and appreciation.