The key to success

She did so because she wanted to be able to work more closely with management, feel a true sense of team spirit and create her own business structures. Working at Nordmann has afforded her these things.

Melda is aware of the challenges in accounting and finance and doesn’t shy away from them. Considering the high inflation rate and fluctuating exchange rates in Turkey, she says it’s crucial to be financially prepared – and so far, she has already managed to improve the reporting tools her team uses and bring in new knowledge for financial forecasting, budgeting, corporate financial planning and liquidity. This has been a tremendous success, but Melda is not resting on her laurels: “Learning is a never-ending process, and I still want to keep improving.”

What she appreciates about Nordmann in particular is the global exchange of information and the fact that its international teams don’t just meet virtually, but also in person on a regular basis. For Melda, the benefits of this global collaboration are clear: “Recently, I was invited to take on new tasks as a member of a worldwide team, and I gratefully accepted. Having these new responsibilities and tasks gave me – and continues to give me – the opportunity to develop new management skills and alternative perspectives to add to my entrepreneurial mindset.”

On top of the exciting professional incentives and challenges Nordmann offers, Melda is proud to have an employer that assumes social responsibility to support young people, children and female entrepreneurs. For her, Nordmann is a company that is characterized by fairness and respect; it’s somewhere employees enjoy making long careers, she says. “It never feels like a burden to come to work on Monday, but instead like you’re going to meet your friends and loved ones. That sense of connection motivates us to achieve more together.”

Ana Weinand started as a part-time office manager for Nordmann US Inc. four years ago. Since then, she has become a leader in customer service for Nordmann’s growing US business. For her, the keys to success are perseverance and being able to rely on the Nordmann team’s support.

Initially, it was assumed that Ana would be able to cover all the customer service work as just a part-time office manager – but the job evolved into a full-time position for Ana within just a few months. Doing double duty as the office manager and customer service representative for coatings, monomers, elastomers, plastics and optics, her day-to-day workload was suddenly twice as heavy and required her to take on a completely different area of industry. Ana had to go from retail technology business development – which she’d done in her previous job – to chemical distribution. “I viewed it as an opportunity to learn new skills, but it was challenging to say the least. For the first 18 months, as the lone US customer service representative, I worked on my own with support and guidance from our staff in the UK,” Ana says of her early days.

She said she was encouraged to ask questions, make suggestions and offer solutions. Before transitioning to customer service, she says she found non-compliance issues challenging and burdensome; nowadays, Ana herself can hardly believe it when she says, “I’ve become someone who sees non-conformity as a puzzle to be solved. But I know that I wouldn’t feel this way if I hadn’t had training and guidance from the UK.”

Since late 2021, Nordmann’s US office has been focusing exclusively on sales – leaving Ana to become a full-time customer service representative. While this gave Ana a bit of breathing room, it also meant additional training from the UK office for her new role. “I’m open to change. I’m good at time management and I take advantage of the training opportunities that are offered. Being able to be flexible and keep a positive attitude lets me view any challenge as an opportunity. This makes my role at Nordmann one that I enjoy,” Ana explains.

In the past few months, there have been changes at the US office and Ana has appreciated the positive influence of Nordmann’s new intranet and the company’s informative newsletters. Connections like these make every employee feel valued, which is key to the success of a good employer. Explaining her sense of connection with Nordmann, Ana remarks: “It used to be that Maidenbower, England was just an unknown town for me, but now it’s where my friends work! I enjoy reading the stories and seeing photos of colleagues from around the world participating in charity or cultural events.”