Cappuccino with Banita Mishra

When did you join REHAU, what are your responsibilities?

I joined REHAU on 1^st May 2021 in the capacity of Market Area Leader, Furniture Solutions South East Asia (FS SEA). My responsibility is to take care of FS business in SEA and drive growth. FS SEA has gone through a rough patch in the last few years. Hence my key focus area is to find out the pain areas, set the value target, restructure, align and drive the team towards achieving the target.

How did you come to REHAU and why did you choose the company?

REHAU is a well-known brand. As I always say, if something REHAU has got right in SEA, it is REHAU’s brand name and its stance for quality. As I was into the laminate industry, I was very familiar with the edging brands in SEA. I had procured some edgings from REHAU in the past too. Honestly, I chose REHAU because I like challenges. I was (still am) very curious about why such a futuristic, quality oriented, global brand like REHAU has not been very successful in SEA. So I saw this as a potential to value add and re-shape REHAU’s FS business in SEA. I chose REHAU because I believe I can bring a significant change to REHAU business in SEA.

Tell me more about your interaction with regional colleagues

My interaction with regional colleagues have been great because I thrive in a multi-cultural and diverse working environment. Apart from my own team, I work very closely with India and China as well. The colleagues there are extremely helpful and their response is very timely. I have also been interacting with our Germany and Italy colleagues.

As I joined during the pandemic, I have not been able to meet most of the regional colleagues face to face. Hence there is a little challenge in terms of coordination, especially with colleagues in Europe with wider time-zone differences. But it is getting better day by day as I get to know and work with them more closely.

With my own regional team, I am trying to build up regular and improved interactions between all team members. Because having great workplace interaction also improves teamwork, which makes an entire team more efficient during times of high stress. When people are happy at work, they tend to do a better job. Errors are reduced, productivity increases and customer service improves.

Working for a global company, what does success mean to you?

“Success to me in a global company like REHAU” – I would describe it in 3 words i.e “Absorb, Implement and Spread”– Learning from global leaders who support talent development; Implementing the right practices to achieve the business goal and sharing the knowledge with the team to shape them into becoming upcoming leaders who can make a difference.