Michael Fritz holds a PhD in media sciences and a degree in business administration and has specialized in marketing. He worked for several associations, e.g. as head of an institute for lifelong learning. Since 1996 he is managing director of tekom. Since 2001 he is also managing director of TC and more GmbH, a company providing services for tekom.
“Technical communication is a quite stable area”
Dr. Michael Fritz is manging director at tekom. tcworld spoke with him about the effects of the global financial crisis on the organization and the technical communication sector as well as about tekom’s increased efforts to collaborate with organizations internationally.
The year of 2009 was a difficult time for many companies. As a professional association for many members of the industry, was tekom spared from the crisis? How is the association recovering in 2010?
Professional organizations like ours are usually an indicator for the state of the profession which they represent. Fortunately, tekom was not very much affected by the economic crisis. Even at the end of the year 2009 – which was probably the worst year for the worldwide economy over the past 50 years – we saw an increase in the number of members, which was not too much below the usual figures. The conferences showed, however, that companies had cut costs rigorously: The number of attendees decreased by 15 percent and the exhibitors reported more sluggish contracting activities compared to the years before. But looking at the big picture, it was proven again, that technical communication is a quite stable area.
What are tekom’s future plans with regard to international activities?
Recent developments have shown that co-operation with other professional TC organizations has become more difficult as globalization has created more international competition even between professional organizations like ours. And, we have learned that there are different ways in which other professional TC associations run their business. Therefore, we are re-assessing our international activities this year. Some of our most important criteria are the reliability of the potential partners, the business models which these organizations follow and, of course, specific business opportunities. As the so-called emerging markets become more and more important to our members, we are evaluating these markets with top priority, especially South and East Asia. But we also try to re-define our relationship with organizations in traditional markets like Europe and the US.
Over the past couple of years, tekom has strengthened its co-operation with Asian organizations like the Japan Technical Communicators Association (JTCA). Will there be more co-operations following?
For professional TC organizations like ours the markets in emerging countries and even in some emerging European countries are not mature yet. Nevertheless, many international companies that operate in these countries face the usual challenges regarding technical communication: a lack of qualified technical authors, a lack of consciousness within the companies’ managements, and a lack of qualified service vendors. These are some of the reasons why it is not easy to find professional associations in these countries with which we could co-operate in our usual manner. Therefore, we are currently talking with different kinds of organizations worldwide that see the potential of technical communication and consider investing in this market in the future.
Where do you see the benefits of these kinds of co-operations for tekom members and visitors to the tcworld conference?
For several years, conference delegates have seen more and more international presentations and exhibitors at our conference in Wiesbaden. In the last years one third of our participants came from countries outside of Germany. This offers a great opportunity for learning and increasing business opportunities for all parties involved. Many participants representing industrial companies have established contacts with new service vendors. International co-operations between vendors started right there. Overall, tekom as a “learning organization” has acquired a lot of new knowledge about international markets and competencies in international technical communication.
How is this international orientation and corporate philosophy reflected in the tcworld conference?
Starting last year we have established the “Associations’ World” on the second floor of the conference venue in Wiesbaden. Here, we invite organizations from all over the world to showcase what they are offering and what they are looking for. This year we will feature additional “pavilions” with new service vendors from Japan, Korea and China on one side of the staircase and from India on the other side. These vendors are supported by their respective professional associations, so that their countries gain more visibility. Also, we will see more international organizations represented with their own booths, like the European Language Industry Association (ELIA) and the Globalization and Localization Association (GALA). In addition, we are open to welcome even more associations from technical communication and related areas in the years to come.
How does the economic crisis impact international business relationships?
Many experts say that the emerging countries are the obvious winners of the crisis because their banks were neither involved in the US real estate crisis nor in the European debts crisis (as we know so far). This creates two main effects for the worldwide economy: First, established companies will try to strengthen their relations with these emerging markets (because their domestic markets do not grow enough) and, second, the emerging countries themselves will concentrate more and more on developing their own domestic markets (because they grow much faster than the others). These two effects will also apply to the world of technical communication and related services.
In times of economic downturn, how important is effective communication that has been adapted to the linguistic and cultural requirements of the target market?
Today we see a steadily and rapidly growing number of consumers (and industry customers) in the emerging countries. As they become more and more self-conscious, they will buy more high profile products and services, thus demanding more and more high quality communication that facilitates the use of these products and services throughout their whole lifecycle. These people will no longer accept insufficient communication and they will require all necessary information in their mother language. For vendors this means that they have to adjust to these communication requirements if they wish to remain or become international players.
Are there strategies that might help companies emerge from the crisis with invigorated energy?
Many companies are re-adjusting their strategies these days. This should also apply to their communication strategies. Technical communication managers should be prepared to manage distributed, multi-cultural teams. They should design the appropriate processes, software infrastructure and support. People who have been working in content creation for years should be prepared to adjust themselves to changing roles within these new structures and acquire the necessary competencies.
Where and what will tekom be in five years from today?
As I already mentioned at the beginning of this interview we are re-aligning our international activities at the moment. Of course, I cannot predict the future – but I imagine that we will see a tekom, which is even more focused on its strengths and competencies, with clearly defined multilateral partnerships worldwide, with an even more international conference and with global activities in the field of education and training for international technical communication.