25 years of Mibcon: Interview with Ondra Dědina

Ondra Dědina has been in charge of MIBCON a.s. since 2016. What does he consider to be the biggest success of the company in the last 5 years and how does he see its future?

Ondro, Mibcon celebrates a quarter of a century of existence this year. Do you still remember when and under what circumstances you joined the Mibcon gang?

Well, it’s been over 16 years. I remember it well though. At that time, I worked at SAP CR, where I was a consultant for SAP Portal. Courtship with Mibcon lasted almost a year. In the end, I was attracted to the transfer by the possibility of significant professional growth. Together with Tonda Cihlář, we started the portal division at Mibcon.

Mibcon at that time was different from what we know today. It originally focused primarily on retail and logistics. Additional knowledge and competences in SAP products gradually began to accumulate around this core. A year before, Honza Holík and I, plus other specialists from BW came to Mibcon with a focus on reporting and related SAP solutions. In 2007, Tonda Cihlář and I joined the company and brought know-how in the field of portals.

In 2000, Mibcon consisted of a handful of consultants. What does the company look like today?

When I started at Mibcon, there were a little over 30 of us. We all fit into one medium-sized villa. We had an open-space in the living room and a meeting room in the garage and in the bedroom. The servers were in the shower stall in the bathroom.

Today’s Mibcon is, of course, no longer that punk. At the moment, we have about 180 people working with us, and soon there will be 200. Our headquarters are now elsewhere, and we meet in beautiful offices and meeting rooms in Prague’s Hodkovičky. We still try to function as a group of friends without playing by corporate rules, but as new faces join, it’s no longer possible to keep everything as it was fifteen or sixteen years ago.

Does it bother you? How do you perceive Mibcon’s growth?

What saddens me the most personally is that I no longer know all the new Mibcon employees as well as I did the original ones. We’re growing at such a pace that if I were to answer whether I know everyone at Mibcon by name, I’d have to admit, no. When there were about 120, maybe 150 of us, I could still manage. But at this point, with so many new faces, it’s difficult. It’s simply the price we pay for growing.

It’s important to mention that Mibcon never had growth as part of its strategy. Despite this, we are growing for two main reasons: The number of customers interested in our services is increasing, and their projects are getting bigger. And then there’s another factor: Mibcon so far doesn’t want to, and in a way, doesn’t really know how to turn down these new customers. That’s what essentially drives our growth.

But to be clear: I have always supported growth. In business, I follow the rule that what doesn’t grow, falls. Growth is also important because it creates new opportunities for new talents, just as technology evolves. You can’t freeze a company and say: How it is now, it will be in 10 years and still remain competitive. Yes, some people may wish for growth to stop, and some may even leave due to changes. But I believe that change is life, both personally and professionally.

Where do you see Mibcon in 5 years?

As I’ve already mentioned, we will be a larger company. We plan to grow by about 20 new positions annually. This means that in the next five years, Mibcon will welcome another 100 new faces. True, we will know each other a little less. On the other hand, we’ll have the opportunity to work on large and interesting projects not only in the Czech Republic but also abroad. Delivering a complex information system for a large company is such a big project that to do it successfully, you need a large company with comprehensive expertise in all key areas.

Looking at it from the perspective of revenue, I would guess that we will move from today’s 600 million CZK per year to just below the one-billion mark.

The importance of our new division for implementing SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition will grow significantly. This new cloud-based version of the S/4 ERP system is SAP’s current flagship product and will attract a wide range of new customers. We are already starting to expand the team of consultants for this area this year.

Personally, I firmly hope that the unique atmosphere and spirit of Mibcon will still be here in 5 years, or that as much of it as possible will remain intact. And that my motto will still hold true: “The greatest benefit of Mibcon is Mibcon.”

The past 5 years have brought nothing but challenges for business, particularly the economic disruption caused by the coronavirus and COVID-19, as well as the war in Ukraine. How did Mibcon manage over this five-year period?

Honestly, I have to say that these external factors didn’t significantly affect us. If I consider our customers, the vast majority didn’t experience any major business downturns. Of course, there were exceptions, where COVID had a strong impact on their business results. But overall, except for these few cases, our customers navigated the pandemic quite well. Thanks to that, we also performed well in business.

It’s important to always keep in mind that the ERP systems Mibcon delivers are crucial for every modern company. This means that while companies cut various non-essential expenses during a crisis, they can’t cut back entirely on ERP and IT. In fact, they invest more. Market changes force them to innovate and adapt to the situation – and this goes hand in hand with adapting resource management systems and the need for investments in new technologies.

That’s the only way to keep up with the competition and move towards greater efficiency. If you were running a business and decided to shut down your ERP system, all that would be left is to ‘turn off the lights and close the shop.’ From this perspective, our industry operates quite counter-cyclically – and that’s one of its advantages.

What do you consider Mibcon’s greatest achievement when you look back at this period?

The first thing that comes to mind is the situation around the coronavirus crisis. I would definitely highlight the speed with which we were able to adapt to online operations. I’m not sure how it went elsewhere, but we managed to fully transition to online functioning within two days. This included setting up MS Teams, introducing online stand-up synchronization meetings for teams and divisions, and switching to virtual events and webinars.

With the war in Ukraine, I associate the enormous solidarity of all Mibcon employees. As soon as we announced an internal company fundraiser, we not only managed to raise a significant amount of money but also quickly gathered the necessary material aid and ensured its delivery to Ukraine.

Has Ondřej Dědina changed in any way compared to the Ondřej who once joined Mibcon?

I’ve learned to let go of more things, so to speak. I used to feel like everything had to be perfect, that everything had to align perfectly and work out. Now, I focus more on important missions with a big impact. I’ve started to rely much more on the team we have at Mibcon. As we grow, more tasks come up, and I’ve had to learn to delegate. In the past, I would have preferred to handle many of them myself, but with the current workload, that’s no longer possible.

Is there anything you’d like to wish for Mibcon in the next five years?

May we continue to be a group of professionals who don’t put on any pretenses, stick together, and do what they enjoy.

Thank you for the interview.