Putting theory into practice for more than 30 years

June 2021

A conversation with Johan Mutsaerts has the feel of an expert class in which he smoothly builds the connections between business strategy, IT transformation, and enterprise architecture. Always to the point, very down-to-earth, and based on his years of experience in an international context. His search for strategic assignments on Belgian soil - “eventually every hotel room looks the same” - brought him to Myreas in the autumn of 2020.

Top Gun in engineering

"As an engineer, you are by definition driven by technology," is how he explains his studies as a Master of Engineering in Computer sciences at the time. But if he is sincere, he has to admit that engineering was only a second choice. Should his eyesight have allowed it, he would have been a fighter pilot. From an early age, he was incredibly captivated by all things aviation. It can't be a coincidence that the comparison between Top Gun and Myreas appealed to him so much.

In any case, he did travel a lot. But only in the context of his management roles within international organizations. His travels have given him a wealth of cultural experience and the sixth sense of people's sensitivities. Something that, according to him, far too few companies pay attention to. Working virtually with a very diverse project team was also nothing new to him. Even years before there was any question of a pandemic.  With all that baggage, Johan was able to go all out at Myreas from October 2020 onwards. A conscious choice to work closely with an enterprise-driven organization such as Colruyt Group. And within the talented team of Myreas, where there is plenty of opportunities to grow.

Looking for synergies

 As a first assignment, he was involved in the participation of Colruyt Group in the data specialist Daltix. Some of the topics addressed there were: What capabilities do you need to market your value proposition? How are you organized to ensure further growth? How can Colruyt Group support internal processes so that Daltix can continue to focus on its core business? In collaboration with Colruyt Group's Business Analytics and Insights team, concrete synergies and opportunities emerged, allowing the Group and Daltix to work more closely together.

An absolute win-win situation in which Jonas Deprez (CEO and founder of Daltix) has very much appreciated the fact that we have been doing this exercise together.

Communication & collaboration during Corona

If the year 2020 has made anything clear to the entire labor market, it is the fact that hybrid working will define the future of work. Even within retail, everyone had to organize themselves at a minimum of time to make sure everything kept running. However, such a headlong start does not mean that you have that hybrid working at your fingertips. The craftsmanship involved is not something you can pick up off the shelf. That's where Johan's next assignment within the domain of communication and collaboration started.

They started by drawing up an information model since the business functions and capabilities had not yet been fully defined and did not form an ideal basis. One thing was obvious. How people work and communicate with each other within Colruyt Group is/must remain a differentiating factor compared to other companies. Someone like Koen De Maesschalk provided fantastic advice based on his years of experience within the group. "We strive for a common view of collaboration and communication in which the identity and soul of the organization are an important guiding principle."

A combination between business and IT

What gives Johan the most energy? He had been self-taught for years in the field of business strategy and enterprise architecture and he finally sees that fusion between business and IT flowing together beautifully at Myreas.

In addition, there is another combination that appeals to him. He enjoys working on cross-cutting projects with an impact on 30,000 colleagues and a small, diverse team at Myreas who are screened based on their attitude. "If I can also contribute to that based on my experience, that makes me a happy person. In recent years I was someone who - because of my role - came and went within organizations, giving direction and applying course corrections, but here I see so much short and long term potential for myself and our team."