People & Power Moves: The Walter Way

We are growing! Walter has expanded significantly in recent years. Two years ago, we acquired the Portuguese PCD specialist Frezite, which has since become a separate brand as Walter FMT. More recently, Walter acquired PDQ, a leading manufacturer of clamping devices and tools in the USA.

These acquisitions make us an even stronger, more flexible and more effective company worldwide. Above all, however, this internationalisation allows us to remain true to one of our core principles: to always keep our customers at the heart of everything we do. We are committed to serving customers in many different countries, and to do so we need to be present in many different countries. We therefore cannot and do not want to manage everything from our headquarters in Tübingen. We want to be where our customers are and work with them to find solutions.

Not without our values!

It is this ambition that gives rise to the other core values on which we rely and in which our customers place their trust. This means constantly striving to find the right partners for us and to remain at the cutting edge of technology. This applies not only to the long term, but also to our day-to-day work – improving every day is just as important to us as always keeping our sights set on innovative goals in the future. At the same time, however, we believe that this entails always operating according to the principles of fair play in terms of the guiding concepts of health, safety and sustainability. In today's world, it is no longer thinkable to operate successfully as a global company without these principles, and we would not want it any other way – this is the Walter Way.

Find out more about, for example, our Sustainability Committee at Walter 👇

Fair play comes first

But fair play doesn't just mean that we treat the environment sustainably and that safety and health are important to us in and around our company. Andreas Greiner, our Vice President and Head of Human Resources at Walter, explains: “Fair play – that means we treat each other with respect, we communicate at eye level and we cultivate a diverse and inclusive work environment.” After all, the most important building block for achieving all of this and for being successful is our employees around the world. Internationalization has made Walter a more diverse and heterogeneous company, which in turn makes us not only more open and flexible, but also stronger. Teams with people from different backgrounds and cultures are more innovative and flexible than teams with homogeneous structures. Working together in these teams is great not only because you get to meet so many different people, but also because we support this collaborative approach with further training measures and tools.

We want the best

Our main focus is to ensure that everyone can do their job well and efficiently. This means working with our employees to find out what they need to not only do their jobs but to do them with excitement for their work and a passion to win. We want our people to be self-reliant and empowered, which is why we have expanded remote working opportunities and effectively integrated them into our workflows with tools and training. We want the people who work for us to be the best they can be. “We use the results of regular global employee surveys to improve our internal structures and the benefits we offer to our employees, as well as to remain flexible and adapt to changing needs,” illustrates Andreas Greiner. As a result, for example, Walter allows people to take on management responsibilities on a part-time basis if they are the right person for the job but also have care obligations.

In short, we grow not only with the companies we bring into Walter, but also with the tasks and the people who work for us. To do this, we must work as a team, and working as a team means being responsive to each other and creating the conditions for everyone at Walter to perform at their best in a friendly working environment. Because that is the Walter Way.