Before Jannik ventured into the business world he was a high-level youth football player at AGF based in Aarhus. He went on to attend the “Team Danmark” program at high school, making it easier to combine school with elite level sports.
After high-school he went across the country to pursue a bachelor’s degree with Denmark’s highest GPA requirements – International Business at Copenhagen Business School. While studying he worked part time at Nordea in their Asset Management team and continued at CBS to finalise his MSc in Finance and Strategic Management. During the Bsc and MSc he got to study in London, Singapore, Beijing and Cape Town.
Today he is a Senior Consultant at Maersk Management Consulting (MMC) – the in-house consulting team of the Maersk Group solving the most important issues for the world’s largest shipping and logistics company. They were recently ranked as the second best in-house consulting firm in Denmark.
➔ Hiring! MMC are looking to hire graduates for their consultant roles. Click here for more detail.
Education
Experience
How did you find the position at MMC?
I was part of an CBS International Case Competition Teams, and at the MMC case training I ended up talking to a consultant from MMC. The consultant had a lot of interesting experiences to share and I remember that he explained about some of the many international opportunities he had experienced from working in Senegal to Chile to New York . That excited me a lot and I applied for a role as Business Analyst (part time student role). The rest of the process was very similar to consulting with case and fit interviews.
What are you working on at the moment?
As a consultant it’s very varied in general, but right now I’m working on growth strategies for our Global Logistics and Services Product Heads. My role is to help them crystalize their strategic choices and priorities their growth initiatives. In today’s Shipping and Logistics industry, it is critical that we are very clear on our core competences and what markets/products we want to compete in, hence we only compete to win and accomplish our strategy of becoming the global integrator of container logistics.
Global Shipping & Logistics is under disruption and you see many startups emerging such as Flexport and Freightos but also BigTechs such as Uber and Amazon venturing into logistics and overall a lot of capital is being allocated to these companies and their logistics ambitions. However, we have some obvious advantages being the largest shipping and logistics provider in the world with operational control, asset ownership, proprietary data generated from the assets and in-depth understanding of a very complicated industry. In addition, we also have an internal venture development team, Maersk Growth, that invests in industry related startups.
The universe of venture capital-backed shipping and logistics tech startups has matured since 2015, when it was still in its infancy. In 2019, average late-stage valuations reached $158 million, 430 deals were closed and $11.8 billion was invested in logistic tech startups.
What does a typical work day look like for you?
It’s very similar to an external consultant’s work day. Today I have three calls with three different global product heads. A few week ago I gave them a strategy framework to populate and today we will review that and discuss the next steps.
Later I have a call with our Finance Business Partners to do a finance deep dive on some of the Products and then I will wrap up the day with a call with our M&A team to discuss inorganic growth.
In-between meetings I spend a lot of time preparing for meetings, doing various pieces of analysis and creating some slides (yes, there is no way to get around that).
What’s the most difficult project you have worked on?
It was probably a project I was part of this spring during corona together with an external global consulting partner. The objective was to determine how we could move towards an organizational structure (a Platform Operating Model) similar to Amazon or Google and move our business closer to our technology teams. This was a complex project due to being a large scale digital transformation conducted during a global pandemic which put our ability to collaborate in completely new ways at test.
It was a very complex project as it had a significant impact on the business, technology organization and how they co-operate. On projects like this we usually also partner with external consultancies to ensure we get external input on best practice.
How many places have you travelled the past two years?
The opportunity to be able to travel and visit other offices and cultures were a big part of my reasoning for joining MMC. I have personally been on projects in the New York, Singapore, Australia, The Netherlands, Austria, Spain, Italy and England during my last two years at MMC.
It’s up to the individual to decide how much they want to venture out. Some consultants with family might priorities to stay in Denmark whilst others, like myself, get to travel a lot. We also have an office in Singapore where it’s possible to make a transfer and work there for a period of time.
Roughly 20% of the world’s container trade is moved by Maersk Ocean
What’s the best experience you have had with MMC?
I really enjoyed our initial induction week. For all new joiners we have an annual trip to Kitzbuehel in Austria where the training is facilitated by McKinsey partners and then we went skiing in the weekend with the team. They teach a thorough introduction to the classical consulting toolbox to ensure we learn the classic capabilities of the essential consulting tools.
I also ran a digital product development project in Perth for three weeks where I went surfing on the weekend. I guess many of the best experiences have been with an aspect of a great social experience as well.
What are the 3 most important learnings you have gotten so far?
What kind of training does MMC provide to new consultants?
As I mentioned in the above, we have an induction training week where we are taught by McKinsey partners.
On top of that, we have internal training where we go more in-depth with various consulting skills, finance training and analytics tools.
Finally, we have a lot of industry training. Maersk is a very complex business and it takes a while to understand how the different parts of the company work together. Personally, I can say that it has helped me a lot to spend time really understanding the business in detail. I also think that’s one of the strengths of having an internal team of consultants, that we understand the business really well and don’t need time to get up to speed.
Who would you recommend to apply for the Consultant role at MMC?
First of all, we accept applicants from all degrees and backgrounds. So regardless of your background I encourage you to apply as long as you have a passion for the role and being part of one of Europe’s largest corporate transformations.
I do think it’s important that you find consulting work interesting, as a lot of the work you will do is the classical skills such as analysis, presentations, meetings etc.
Given that we are in internal consultancy for Maersk and the fact that all projects evolve around the business, you should probably have an interest in the industry and Maersk as a company.
Right now Maersk is going through the largest transformation in the company’s history and if you join you will be part of an inflection point that will define Maersk and our industry in many years to come. I find that super motivating and exciting to be part of – this is make it or break it, either we transform our industry or die.
If anyone is afraid that Maersk is too corporate for you then I can say that we lost the “suit & tie” dress code two years ago and you will occasionally find people walking around in flip flops.
Who will your colleagues be?
We have a diverse group of consultants in the team. Some are very classical CBS types such as myself whilst others are engineers (all types). Being a global company, we have a lot of international people in the team and the majority are either from a consulting background or from the Maersk Group.
I think the average age is below or close to 30, so in general it’s a young vibe with a lot of energy.
What do I get from joining MMC that I wouldn’t get at a top tier external consulting firm?
It’s important to say that the below is just my personal view and what I have gathered from speaking with friends and colleagues in the industry.
What company benefits do you have at MMC?
What are the exit opportunities after having worked at MMC?
One of our KPI’s is to deliver top talent back into the Maersk Group. Around 65% of former consultants take on roles in the Maersk Group, both in Denmark and internationally, and the rest join other external consulting firms or internal strategy teams.
What is Maersk doing to reduce its carbon emission levels?
It’s something that the business is spending a lot of resources on and it is on the agenda of the senior management. We are trying to become as efficient as we can be when it comes to carbon emission and reduce our footprint. Our leadership team has created a plan that is industry leading and committed to solely have a fleet of carbon-neutral vessels by 2050 and the first viable CO2 neutral which is commercially viable in 2030. You can read more about it here.
Maersk has also recently funded the Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Center for Zero Carbon Shipping. The center is a non-profit embarking on an ambitious journey driven by real action to steer the shipping sector on the course to zero carbon emissions.
➔ Hiring! MMC are looking to hire graduates for their consultant roles. Click here for more detail.
1. How much do you sleep?
6-7 hours
2. Favourite Book?
The algebra of happiness by Scott Galloway
3. Do you believe in god?
No
4. Do you feel lucky?
Yes and very privileged
5. Best piece of advice for talents?
Be curious
6. Do you meditate?
Yes, 10 minutes every morning
7. Who are people you admire?
People that admire impact for others
8. What is your super power?
I’m a hard worker and have a lot of persistence
9. What is your best and worst habit
Best: I do some kind of sports activity everyday
Worst: I’m a very logical thinker. Sometimes I can lack a bit of nuance (my PL would say a lot)
10. Something you believe to be true that others don’t?
Right now is the make it or break it with the climate crisis. Not in 5 years.
