14. Pierre-Alain Vielvoye, Président du Conseil d’Administration de Groupe ADEO - Quand la créati...

With pleasure. I am Pierre-Alain, 55 years old, father of six and grandfather of two. Sharing in the family is a broad subject that goes beyond the company. I fell into the family association Mulliez through marriage. I have a northern industrial background on my father's side and a teaching/public service background on my mother's side. After a few years in industry, I was attracted by the FM project and joined Leroy Merlin 25 years ago, starting in a store in Dunkirk. I held various regional roles, then went to Poland as CFO of Leroy Merlin Polska. I joined the group's executive committee in 2009 to oversee IT and Eastern European developments. Eleven years ago, the shareholder asked me to take the role of Chairman of the Board, and I have since supported our leaders and teams. In parallel, I served eight years on the FM's management board, which gave me insight into family business. I continue to apply that experience.

Absolutely. The CEO is the one who daily carries the business, proximity, incarnation of the project and strategy, and bears the positive responsibility. I am his accompanier. That's the role of a chairman: I have two roles. The first, taking about 50 to 60 percent of my time, is to accompany the teams, not to tell them what to do but to listen, go to the field, and iterate with them. This is what we call duality. The second part is governance: as one of the three circles (shareholders, leaders, governance), the first job of governance is to verify coherence between the wishes and constraints of shareholders and what leaders want to implement. My job is to guarantee this coherence between these two key blocks. That's what allows the company to function long-term. So I call myself a number zero, there to make things feasible.

I am surrounded by a board of six people with great experience. We meet every two months, usually for full days to go to the field. We love to hold four to five board meetings a year in stores to link strategy to what people experience. That gives the most useful feedback to encourage leaders or warn them of discrepancies.

This is a key subject. We must first respect that each territory is different. The utility of Leroy Merlin in France differs from South Africa or Brazil. So company projects must be tied to the utility for inhabitants. Then, unity comes from principles, values, a governance framework, and cultural elements like a leadership model, customer centricity, and sharing. Since we all work in housing, we can share products, resources, and tools. Careers evolve as people move across countries and concepts. For us, a company is a brand on a territory: Leroy Merlin France is one company, Bricoman France another. There is no Leroy Merlin world concept. About twenty entities are directly linked to the group. The group level implements a compass that distinguishes cultural elements, strategy, organization, and a development engine.

More than twenty. The group board doesn't determine the relevance of each enterprise; that's the CEO Thomas, who delegates to what we call president-coaches. A president-coach is both president in duality and a coach for development. Each president-coach has their own board, replicating governance down to the business units. The group board appoints the president-coaches, distinguishing upstream governance toward the shareholder and downstream governance at the service of the business.

This is at the heart of our culture, coming from our shareholder FM (Mulliez family association). It was theorized at Auchan and replicated at Leroy Merlin. We have four structured levels. The first is sharing the will: a shared vision process mobilizing all teams to build what they want for their brand on their territory. This is done every 5 to 10 years. For example, in the mid-90s, Leroy Merlin France set a vision of global leadership in customer satisfaction through a process where entire teams were trained and contributed.

Yes, in these vision processes, which are usually every 5 or 10 years. We replicate it in all territories. The goal is that each person can contribute to writing a strategy. The second level is sharing knowledge. This goes beyond training; it's about spending time sharing experiences and convictions. We made 100% of our tools accessible via company smartphones for all 110,000 employees. There is also personal training. For example, I participate five to six times a year in a training called 'Roots and Wings' where I share half a day on our origins and meaning.

Yes, sharing power is about subsidiarity: giving people capacity and responsibility to implement what is necessary. It starts small, like one meter of shelving, and grows to a store, a country. This allows people to grow and feel like actors. It's because of these three levels that sharing wealth has meaning. That creates efficiency. The fourth level is sharing wealth, which we have in three stages: a progress bonus (quarterly, local, based on progress in sales, margin, client satisfaction), profit-sharing (annual, legally regulated but we go further, applied in all our countries), and then the free choice to place profit-sharing into company shares, making employees shareholders. Today our employees hold about 13% of the capital, around 2 billion euros. This is valued annually by independent experts, not by stock market speculation.

Some store employees have left with assets exceeding a million euros. That's the fruit of savings, loyalty, and company performance. It gives meaning. People often use this money for retirement, children's education, or a home. Our compensation is market-level, but the difference is this ability to create savings through profit-sharing in a well-run company.

It's very demanding. If you destroy part of your employees' savings, it creates difficult discussions. But it's virtuous: it forces transparency and mobilization. We have annual general assemblies in each store where leaders report to employee shareholders. When things are hard, it can stir tension, but it helps with reality checks and rebound.

You're right, that's a risk. We need simple formulas to link daily job to bonus. We must also train employees in business economics. We create meaningful profit accounts that reflect strategy, not just accounting. Another tool is 'sharing ambassadors'—two elected employee shareholders per store who explain results and value changes at assemblies. This peer-to-peer approach avoids overcomplexity. It can initially clutter with unions, but it's distinct.

Sometimes there is friction because it's another channel, but it's distinct. Shareholder return is separate from remuneration. It reinforces our need to train and explain. It takes time to embed the culture. I experienced this when launching employee shareholding in Poland; it seemed strange at first. But when performance is good, it brings people together. I believe sharing is at the root of our performance and resilience.

Indirectly, yes: it creates proximity and meeting points that engage responsibility and patrimony. It's one element of social dialogue. Formal instances handle other subjects like safety.

I don't think they oppose. It's about social justice and efficiency. Philanthropy is giving for the general interest; we are at the service of our company's performance. It reconciles efficiency and social justice.

It's a beautiful alliance between history keepers and corporate culture. People often ask if sharing still works in current generations. I think these topics remain very modern but must be constantly translated into new tools, like profit accounts that fit our omnichannel platform business. I wish to continue connecting to the meaning and the founding spirit while renewing how it expresses itself.

Thank you, goodbye.