Erik Meijer.
Senior Vice President, Global Customer Specialist & Steering Board Member for ESG Investors
What do you do now?
I work with an exceptional Team and Leadership at MACH49; the leading Growth Incubator for Global 1000 companies, governments and supra-national organisations, helping them to build a pipeline and portfolio of new ventures to drive disruptive growth, by executing ventures, incubators and CVC operations.
Next, I am a steering board member at the global Telecom Management Forum , an alliance of 850+ global companies working together to break down technology and cultural barriers between digital service providers, technology suppliers, consultancies and systems integrators.
Furthermore, I am a board member at Fairphone, representing two leading ESG Investors (Environmental, Social and Governance led investing). Fairphone is a highly successful  social enterprise that is building a movement for fairer electronics. We open up supply chains to understand how things are made and build stronger and more responsible connections between people and their products.
Where did your career start?
My university mentor for my BA in management put me on stage in Kuala Lumpur, Sydney and Amsterdam, as he was a board member for the worldwide federation of travel, airline and hotel management executives and my thesis described first business models for online commerce. From the many great offers made, I decided to join Cambridge Technology Partners (and finish my MSc), a high profile start-up which over 4000 people and 0.5 Bio USD revenues which was then successfully sold to Novell & Eric Schmidt, who then became chairman at Google.
Has there been a stage in your life where you first appreciated what great leadership looked like?
Having been raised in a family business background and having spent time of my youth in Africa and the Middle-East, I got immediate examples from my parents, further family members and their local business partners at a very early age. They displayed true insight, ability to make complex decisions in ever changing circumstances with limited tools at their hands, gave confidence, guidance and never ending support to their teams to achieve their goals, this all while being attentive listeners and taking high personal risks.
Do you have any examples of what you have done to develop yourself as a leader?
For a leader, it is very essential to stay on the forefront of developments, this means ongoing development of your thought leadership, keep taking initiative and managing execution, building collaborative relationships and talent pools for executing results (beyond the boundaries of the organisation) and keep working on personal skills for e.g. situational adaptability (e.g. ESG demands & political landscapes) and resilience (e.g. COVID, personal mind & health).
Working with The Institute’s teams and tools are excellent ways to stay informed and inspired for leading and managing in an ever more complex and volatile world.
How do you think Leadership has benefitted you?
Next to my deep gratitude to August Plak (my BA mentor) and Gajen Kandiah & Alexander Doderlein de Win (at Cambridge Technology Partners) for believing in me at a very early stage of my career, I am very grateful for the leadership of Linda Yates, Paul Holland, the management team and all at MACH49.
Leadership at MACH49 happens at every level, from our youngest designers to our most senior venture fund managers and support teams, as we have committed to carefully listen & belong to each other and help improve the world alongside our clients in very challenging, new to build, environments. Moreover, the major part of our work already executes on ESG targets.
Finally, would like to sincerely thank all people I had- and have the pleasure to work together with, in particular all at the Telecom Management Forum, Fairphone & investors, IMD business school (Lausanne) and the Team at The Institute of Leadership – look forward to establishing our common future!