What do making lasagna and leadership have in common?

Lasagne and leadership What's in here?"What do making a lasagne and leadership have in common?" That's a topic I can really discuss with anyone who often changes responsibilities in their career.

And it was especially relevant for me in my final stage before leaving the company.

Making a lasagne means, in a way,that...you're preparing your legacy.

You take all the ingredients — the team, the strategy is sound,the numbers are right, the results are good.

And when someone takes on a new role or, so to say,moves to another country,they leave that lasagne to their successor, so to speak.

And my goal was always to say:"I want to leave something that only needs putting in the oven, like a lasagne,and not have them face a chaos of crises and difficulties right from the start,but rather have some organised things they can deal with.

Then, perhaps, they could also add their spices,change some ingredients,but overall cook smoothly.

And for me, the best test was always when I moved countries,if the results the year after I left were even better than the year before,I knew I'd done a good job with my team beforehand.

And that's how it was, and it gave me great satisfaction.

To create that foundation and be worthy of that possibility,it's essential to bring the team along,empower them, and above all detach them from oneself.

How do you do that?For me, leading......and managing a market or a company was never a matter of power.

I've never been interested in power.I've always seen it as a responsibility,and my role as a leader was that I have a team and must serve it,because we'll only achieve good results if it works properly.

So for me it was clear that the team is the hero.And, of course, it depends on the situation.

And I think above all my responsibility was, of course,to drive a team,improve its performance,foster careers,support talent,but also,in difficult situations, to stand clearly at the head of the team.

And especially in a big company like L'Oréal,when difficult times arrive, the pressure is never far behind.

And then it was a question of: how can I take as much pressure as possible from my team so that they can keep performing well?

That is, standing at the head of the team in those situations.

But when things are going brilliantly and there's something to celebrate,it's the team that should be centre stage.

That has always been fundamental to me.There were also certain awards that were given to us.

And it was clear to me it shouldn't be like in many companies,where the CEO walks on stage and takes all the credit.

Really, the product manager or the marketing director — whoever really led the project — they must be on the stage.

So he has to shine.And for me, the greatest satisfaction was to be in the background and delight in seeing them up there.

And to me, leadership has always been something I view as constant building.

You could compare it to building a house.I've always focused on the foundations,because I thought the stronger I built the base,the taller the building could be.

That is, the better the foundation,the greater our growth and success.

Those were some fundamental convictions.