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Jos Koop - Product Developer PRO bike-gear

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Jos Koop - Product Developer PRO bike-gear

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As a human being on this planet, there's so many opportunities, but with it also comes great responsibilities. As an individual you can't change everything, but even then, everyone has powers to do something, to do the right thing.
Consider this: how can I contribute to leaving this place in a better way for tomorrow than it was in yesterday. And then act!
Everyone can make an impact, but together we can do even more!

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Filip Scholliers - International account manager OEM

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Filip Scholliers - International account manager OEM

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To get an understanding on what is expected from us as employees to contribute towards more sustainability at Shimano.

A realistic, clear and open approach/strategy from the company top management towards the employees.

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Lennart Haas - Team Manager Sales Operations

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Lennart Haas - Team Manager Sales Operations

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Lennart Haas, responsible for the Sales Operations Team within Shimano Europe.

To better understand direction and impact of our ESG approach.

Open approach of ideas and innovation. Dare to try, just do.

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Growing up country side , means growing up in/with nature . being outdoors a lot also showed me many aspects of the modern "consuming" life that are far from sustainable . Today we see a lot of Greenwashing happening around us in order to make us beleive  there is an easy way to continue in the way we did just by using technology and materials.
but reality is far more complicated and needs us all to look beyond technology ,materials and marketing but make real well thought changes together in everyones daily processes.

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Bea van den Hof - Systems Manager B2B E-Business & CRM

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Bea van den Hof - Systems Manager B2B E-Business & CRM

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My name is Bea and I started at Shimano when the building in Eindhoven was opened - on the 1st (OK, 2nd) of January 2017.
Companies can have a large impact on sustainability and the environment. Still, I do believe that every little bit helps and adds up to something big - this starts with awareness. Participating in this course is a good step in the right direction.

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Hi my role for Shimano Europe is to manage all projects with my team of 5 full time project professionals.

Reason for participation is the importance of the subject as such.

Within my space (projects) we recently added 'sustainability' as new criterium for projects to start, this way we really give meaning to this new value within Shimano Europe and create momentum for more/similar projects.

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Marga - Internal Commmunications Specialist

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Marga - Internal Commmunications Specialist

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Hi everyone, I am Marga. Living in Eindhoven (NL) since 2003 and I like enjoying the outdoors - with my family - swimming and MTB.
Proud to be part of team Shimano since September 2022 I take with me over ten years of MarCom and ten years of (Corporate) Communications experience in B2B. Sustainability is a known topic since I used to work for the most original and sustainable recycler in the world and I am excited to put this experience into practice for Shimano.

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My name is Hasan Çevik. I have been responsible for advertising and email marketing (B2C, bike) since I joined Shimano in 2019.

I find myself lucky to be working for a company like Shimano, promoting products that are actually good to people and planet. By participating in this course, I hope to learn more about sustainability. Awareness is the first step in a long process of changing habits and way of working.

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Living almost "in the outdoors" it becomes very clear that we have to secure what we got used to and feel as being the normal. Wildlife around the corner and having close encounters with real easter bunnies we need to make sure it will still exist for the generations that will come after us. Personally, I love to be outdoors with my dogs or on the bike whenever I can.
Linking the above to our daily jobs we all have the responsibility not to only talk about becoming more sustainable however make it happen. We have multiple options to do this, reduce packaging, use sustainable or recycled materials. Make sure that what we love the most will still be available for the ones we love the most.

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Pieter d'Haens - Product Coordinator (bike)

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Pieter d'Haens - Product Coordinator (bike)

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My name is Pieter d'Haens, I am a blue blooded bike nerd, lover of the outdoors, and family man (father of 2). I have been working at Shimano as a Product Coordinator for 7 years now.

Reason I changed my career from automotive to cycling was a combination of following my passion, but also doing what feels right. I do feel we need to be more conscious of our lifestyle in order to make a difference. Every decision we make can have an impact, what we eat, what we wear, how we get to work... where we actually work.

I feel working working at Shimano already makes a difference, as more people on bikes can't be a bad thing :) Still I believe sustainability should become more embedded within #teamshimano, looking at the complete life cycle of the product: from the design, to sourcing the materials, production, serviceability and re-using the materials after the lifetime of a product.

This is going to ask for a culture change within the company, but I am happy to support that change.

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Gerard Bakkenes - Business Planning Manager SEU-FT

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Gerard Bakkenes - Business Planning Manager SEU-FT

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Together with friends and family I love to be outdoors. Hiking and angling enable me to enjoy nature but moreover being away from the hectic daily (work) life. No mobile phones...just the sounds of the birds, cows and the trees.

Being an active user of nature (both Shimano & myself) we have to make a difference. Sometimes this starts with small activities like bank clean-ups but also bigger activies are needed. Reducing product packaging or reducing water used during our production processes are examples of that.

Let's together embrace nature and ensure that our grand children can still enjoy the outdoors in the same way we are doing now

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My name is Jo laes. I take care about the workshop program, in Belgium & Lux. We all know, we have to act asap, to help our beautiful planet, so let's begin by ourselves. As Shimano we can indeed make a great difference just by making the whole subject disputable, inside & at retail level

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Paulina Szala - Administrator Assistant - CSTS department

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Paulina Szala - Administrator Assistant - CSTS department

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My name is Paulina and I work at Shimano Europe as an Administrator Assistant- Custom Service & Technical Support department.

As a child I was always outside, playing, going on bike rides with my parents etc. To this day, I still love long walks in the forest, listening to the birds singing, the fresh air and the smell of the trees. In these moments, I feel like my time flows more slowly....

In my opinion, sustainable business creates business value, helps a company to enter new markets, to succeed by attracting new customers and talent. It motivates employees, investors are more willing to invest in companies with environmentally friendly business processes, it promotes the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and the efficient use of scarce resources. Like Shimano motto: "Closer to nature. Closer to people."

I hope this course will show what important steps we need to take as company to gain more knowledge about sustainability.

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Klaas Salomons - Manager Category Marketing- Shimano Europe Bike

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Klaas Salomons - Manager Category Marketing- Shimano Europe Bike

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As a marketeer I have a duality in my work. Marketing is often about consuming more, while my personal opinion is we should consume less. At Shimano, my mission is to promote people to cycle more. And that is a mission I can support 100%! The bicycle is the solution for many issues in this world. Health, nature, CO2, traffic jams, the bike can be part of the solution. And above all, it fun and brings people together!

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Jürgen Slaats - Service Product Line Owner Technology Services.

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Jürgen Slaats - Service Product Line Owner Technology Services.

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Hi, When I started at Shimano in 2018 I could not foresee how my job developed over the years. Obviously the work is challenging and there are many improvements we can achieve. But the fun and "non-core" activities that are organized I have never experienced with other employers.

Working at Technology Services in the Core Technologies team means that we are continuously searching for options how we can improve the user experience for our 1100 colleagues in Europe. That is a challenge in itself for the entire team.

Within Core Technologies we create, improve, and support a productive environment to make Shimano the brand of choice for everyone. We do this by working smarter, be innovative and simplify our existing technical solutions.

As a team, we work in a service-oriented way which will build confidence and lead to happy users. Together we can achieve great things!

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Chris de Haan - Sr. Product Team Manager Fish

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Chris de Haan - Sr. Product Team Manager Fish

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I love to be outside. Fishing with my friends, hiking with my wife, to play with the kids in the forest or just taking it easy and trying to spot wildlife.

And yes I would hope that my children can do the same when they are my age. So I do know some things have to change, but I'm not ready or able yet to give up a lot of things I like in life.
Of course simple things like taking care of of your trash, having a low consumption of energy and water at home are easy things to do.
But when it comes to food and travelling, I feel I don't want to make any changes. I want to eat what I like, going to places where I want to be and in the most efficient way (time, money) possible. And for sure that's NOT sustainable on the long term.
Who knows after this training.....

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My name is Dennis, marketing director Shimano Europe.

Already as a kid I was always outside and enjoying the forest. Building 'houses' by digging holes and cover with leaves, building houses in threes etc. Building BMX tracks or riding with my mountainbike. And since we are still living next to the forest on one side and the water on the other side we keep enjoying nature. Either by bike, walking or by boat on the water.

Our company company mission is: Closer to Nature, Closer to People. People know the joy of contacting their hearts to the breathing of nature. People know the joy of meeting someone to communicate with each other. That's simply because all people have nature in themselves. And that is what cycling specially in nature is all about.

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My name is Paul Holstege, working as project manager within Shimano Europe.
Reason of my participation.. seems that i was selected :-) but i also feel responsible to commit on this topic

I believe that the topic 'sustainability' becomes more and more important and also for us there is a responsibility to think what we can do. We as Shimano can be ambassador in our (business) area of bike and fishing.

Most important is to learn wat you or i can do to be more sustainable in your daily work and private life.
Looking forward & ready to start the training.

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Kevin van den Besselaar - Digital Marketing Manager

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Kevin van den Besselaar - Digital Marketing Manager

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My name is Kevin van den Besselaar and I’m managing our Shimano Marketing websites.

As ‘closer to nature’ is part of our mission statement, I feel that we as a company are ‘obliged’ to think and act actively around the sustainability topic, to make sure that we become the ‘living proof’ of our own mission statement, so that it becomes more than just a phrase, or ‘random’ individual activities.

I think this course is a good way to gain awareness- and get the conversation around this topic started.

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Evert-Jan Haarhuis - Sr. Product team manager

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Evert-Jan Haarhuis - Sr. Product team manager

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My Name is Evert-Jan, and have been working at Shimano for nearly 15 years. Since I started I have always been involved in softgoods. Mainly apparel and footwear. I also studied textiles in Enschede at De Maere. Since we took over apparel development from our Japanese HQ we made sure that sustainability is embedded in our DNA but also in our products. Everything we develop and bring to market has been brought to life with this mantra. We will always use a sustainable alternative if it is available.

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Giovanna Dominicus Miuccio- Product Development Team Manager

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Giovanna Dominicus Miuccio- Product Development Team Manager

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My name is Giovanna, and I manage the Shimano apparel product development Team.
We develop Shimano apparel for the Global Market, and since SIC gave us this task, we made of Sustainability our driving force.
We moved all our vendors to Europe, where also Fabrics and Trims suppliers are located. And given that, at the beginning of our journey, Europe was responsible for 80% of the total volume, we could consider this as a local for local production.
In the meantime, more markets got interested in our collections, including South America, North America and Australia. This is why we are already considering Factories in other parts of the world, to make this local for local approach more effective.

When we started to develop apparel in EU, we had nothing in place concerning sustainability.
After just 2 years, we can say that 90% of the apparel we produce is made with recycled or upcycled fabrics, trims, and accessories. We source raw materials close to the Factories, sometime the Factories themselves produce the components needed for an item, making it a real 0 km product.
And yet, despite so much has been done, we realize this is just a drop in the ocean. This is why this year, 2023,  we start life cycle assessments on key items in collection, to understand where and how we can improve our sustainable approach. Because just to use recycled or upcycled materials is not enough, and sometimes not even the right choice.
We dream of establishing repairing corners in our EC, and even Service centers. We are implementing repairable zippers in our clothing, to overcome one of the most common reason to dismiss an item. Durability is our motto, together with quality.

I hope this course can give us more knowledge about important steps to be taken to make our Company a sustainable one.
I hope as well that top management will take this as an opportunity to start a real sustainable program, not only for Softgoods. Sustainability is such a wide concept that can loose meaning. We need to set our priorities, chose our battles and go in full force towards a better future.

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Hi, I am Kim. More than happy to participate and contribute. Confirming and strengthening our core values and mission statement which is indeed more than just a phrase.

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Hi, I am Kim. More than happy to participate and contribute. Confirming and strengthening our core values and mission statement which is indeed more than just a phrase.

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Rene de Ruijter - Sr. Controller Corp Functions

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Rene de Ruijter - Sr. Controller Corp Functions

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Hello,
My name is Rene de Ruijter and I am controller at Shimano Europe.

I follow the course to get more background about sustainability and how I can support sustainability in my daily life and work environment.

Sustainability is not only the green earth, but also the quality of life in areas of education, good health and Well-being, and no poverty around us.

Together we can make the difference!

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I'm happy with this initiative and to find that we are teaming-up to create a sustainability strategy as a company combined with individual ownership to accomplish change.

As for every specialism within Team Shimano also our sustainability agenda needs guidance, direction and leadership, which creates transparency on direction, makes clear what activities will make most impact, support the change in culture and measures the impact.

As a company being 'close to nature' I'm convinced that that we will have buy-in from every individual team member and will be able to initiate measurable change as one Team Shimano for ourselves, our planet and the future generations!

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Sharon de Knoop - International Account Manager

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Sharon de Knoop - International Account Manager

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Goodday,
My name is Sharon de Knoop and I am International Account Manager at Shimano.

I like to maximum enjoy outdoors and nature with my friends, family and especially kids and want all next generations also to have this future privilige.

I believe it is needed to keep on stimulating the focus on sustainability to enlarge our impact  and make as most people and organisations aware we all have a role to take care of our environment. And we can all support to this within our own reach of capabilities and opportunities.

By keep on spinning the wheel, support each other and stay in conversations we can create all kind of small and big solutions and innovations to make a difference.

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Martijn Riswick - System owner B2B E-commerce

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Martijn Riswick - System owner B2B E-commerce

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Hello,
My Name is Martijn Riswick, system owner at Shimano Europe in Eindhoven.
I participate in this course, because I am convinced that together with Shimano we can make more impact on reducing our footprint on mother earth. This way I hope we can prepare for next generations to enjoy our beautiful planet the same way we are doing right now.

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Tahnee Didderen - sustainability expert & moderator

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Tahnee Didderen - sustainability expert & moderator

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Hi there!

This is Tahnee, I'll be your moderator for this online course about sustainability. So cool that you're joining us to learn more and take action on urgent issues in today's society, like climate change and social inequality.

I'm a team member at SOW, the awesome company that made this course and will work with your organization to set up a killer sustainability strategy. My colleague Jacklien wrote more about what we do at SOW in her intro.

Besides my work as a sustainability expert, I work as a politician at the local government of Amsterdam, which is also where I live. In my work there, I also focus a lot on both social and environmental sustainability.

I'm a climate activist, because of my love for nature and all that live on this planet. 💚

We're part of a large ecosystem that we're currently destroying. I think it's super important that we rethink our relationship with nature, as human beings. I think we've really lost that connection of what it means to be part of this large ecosystem and I absolutely love that my work is dedicated around bringing that connection back. Whether that's through protecting nature in policy making, or helping organizations like yours become more sustainable.

Looking forward to connecting to you!

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Jacklien Quirijnen - sustainability expert & moderator

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Jacklien Quirijnen - sustainability expert & moderator

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Hi there!

Welcome to our introduction course to sustainability. We hope we can inspire and activate you to contribute to a better world.

1. Who am I
My name is Jacklien Quirijnen, founder and sustainability expert of SOW Sustainability (sow-sustainability.com) and co-creator of this introduction course.

my work:
As a sustainability expert and strategist I help organisations to become (more) sustainable and future proof.

We do this by:
- inspiring and training employees on Sustainability and sustainable leadership
- facilitating organisation to create a sustainability strategy that seamlessly matches the DNA of the organisation
- helping organisation to implement and merge the strategy within the core business (interim sustainability coaching)

2. My participation
I will moderate this course together with Mirjam and Tahnee.

3. Sustainable innovation
What I think is needed for sustainable innovation are intrinsically motivated people who dare to think outside the box and who focus on what is possible.

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Mirjam van Laarhoven - Sustainability expert & moderator

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Mirjam van Laarhoven - Sustainability expert & moderator

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I would like to contribute to 'a brighter future' for everything that lives on this planet. I get energy from doing this together with many others so that everyone can make a difference from their own point of view.
That is why I do this by presenting, facilitating trainings, workshops and working on projects in which employees of companies taking these steps themselves.

Together with Jacklien I founded the label SOW (www.sow-sustainability.com) (read Jacklien's introduction for more info). Part of SOW are courses and so is this introductory course.

For me, to encourage sustainable innovations it boils down to 2 things:
1. DOING ("Yes, and...", instead of "No, because..."), don't wait for someone else or something else but just try it and do it differently.
2. ADAPTION of regulation --> regulation is often still based on 'old' thoughts and 'old', linear business principles (take, make, dispose): we have to get rid of that as soon as possible!