The future of technology: Thomas Rudin joined the management team at schalku0026amp;friends in August 2021. The 43-year-old platform expert comes from the network agency diva-e and will be primarily responsible for technological development and the expansion of the service portfolio.
The technology of the future: As the new Managing Director of Technology, Thomas already knows exactly which services, platforms and packages will soon help schalk&friends customers move forward even more efficiently. We spoke to him about his change, his plans and the potential of Pimcore.
What immediately excited you about schalku0026amp;friends?
I was particularly impressed by the agency’s broad service portfolio. We are not a classic consulting agency or a pure implementation agency, but can do both. In other words, we can advise, develop and stay until all set goals have been measurably achieved. My new colleagues in particular make this possible. Incidentally, I have come to know them not only as highly professional, but also as very human. I’m delighted to be part of the team from now on!
How would you describe your role?
Probably the biggest area that I have taken on is the further development of our technical and digital solutions – together with my colleagues from the management team, but also the respective teams themselves. I am also gradually getting to know the customers I will be looking after. However, my tasks also include traditional management topics such as processes and contracts.
Which skills would you like to develop further? And why?
This year, we became a successful silver partner of Pimcore, an extremely powerful best-of-suite digital platform. In other words, Pimcore offers a customer experience/web CMS solution, a shop solution and various customer and product data components (keywords: PIM, MDM, DAM, CDP) bundled on a central platform. With other experts in the field and our successful Pimcore projects, our next goal is to become a gold partner. However, this is not intended to be a specialisation in just one platform – rather, we want to grow in all areas and further expand our entire portfolio in the long term.
What concrete added value does this have from the customer’s point of view?
We are currently developing a technical toolbox for our SME customers. This will enable us to offer customised digital solutions in the future. Pimcore already plays an important role in this toolbox, as many components are already covered by this platform. In addition, we can use and add all services from our schalk&friends portfolio, for example from hosting, security or as an online marketing agency.
Where do you see the most potential for development?
At schalk&friends, it’s all about the “WE” and we hear time and again from clients that this is where the greatest added value lies compared to other agencies. Despite all our technical excellence, we naturally want to retain our most important core values and continue to develop as people and a team. That’s why we invest in our employees – because that’s where I see our greatest potential.
