Given his skill on the football pitch, (67) might never have joined Cactus--except his athletic career was .
But the business world offered him another path. Schonckert sidestepped the readymade future in banking or consultancy that his university degree had promised him and went for the operational side of things instead, where he rapidly proved himself. Not shy of challenges, energised by the fickle nature of retail, he has found Cactus the perfect grounds for his leadership skills. Next year it will be a quarter-century since Schonckert took over as director and CEO of the beloved Luxembourgish supermarket chain.
Paperjam: What was your very first contact with the professional world?
Laurent Schonckert: I started with a student job. It was in Kirchberg, in 1974. I was 16. Why do I remember it so clearly? Because, with the money I earned in those two months, I bought my first motorbike! It wasn’t the Kirchberg we know today, it was under construction. I was working in a construction company myself, checking the lorries that brought the stones in and out. After that, I worked during my studies, in particular for the tobacco wholesaler Fixmer. It was a pretty tough job because you had to man the tills and make the delivery rounds, but it was rewarding. Then I worked for a bank, which led me to decide that banking wasn’t for me. And one to highlight: I once worked for a forest ranger.
Oh? Doing what?
I planted oak trees in Mamer, where I come from. Forty years later, the trees are a good size and I can see them when I cycle past. I feel like I’ve done something useful. I always say to myself: “Those oaks will still be there when I'm gone.”
Football was a big part of your youth. But did you already know what you were going to do, professionally speaking?
As I’ve just said, I quickly realised that banking wasn’t what I wanted. There was also an opportunity in insurance. My father had a portfolio, like many others. I had the licence, I started out in that field, and then I said to myself that, no, that wasn’t for me either. Perhaps it was my maternal grandparents who gave me a taste for business. They ran a hotel-restaurant on the banks of the Sûre. The family spent every weekend there, and I liked to wait tables to earn a bit of pocket money. After studying economics and law, football brought me to Cactus, which sponsored the club. I did a work placement there. Later, I called the head of personnel. I’d got to know the company, and the company me. That’s how I got in.
If you put yourself in the context of the time, what attracted you to the world of mass retailing?
There are lots of facets, lots of different jobs. People often only see the tip of the iceberg, i.e. the supermarket. But apart from that, the structure of Cactus means that there are lots of possibilities: marketing, purchasing, IT, accounting, finance, logistics, you name it. It suited my temperament better than working in a bank with a suit and tie.
In your 41-year career, have you been tempted to radically change fields or paths?
No, frankly. Never. These 41 years have gone by so quickly. When you think about it, it seems like yesterday. I’ve never been bored. And I’ve never said to myself: “I could have done or I’d like to do something else.” It was in me. Maybe I was made for this company, and this company was made for me. We found each other, as they say.
It was local people who had built Cactus, and I came into it thinking I knew everything, when in fact I knew nothing.
Is there a rookie mistake you’d like to erase?
I’d just come out of university, so it was very academic, very theoretical studies, also very intellectual. It was local people who had built Cactus, and I came into it thinking I knew everything, when in fact I knew nothing. I found myself working with men and women who had been there for 20 or 30 years, who had done a lot of work, and I sometimes had the pretention of wanting to reinvent certain things. I quickly realised that I had to get to grips with reality.
Was there a turning point that got you where you are today?
It’s a bit like a long river. I wouldn’t say a calm one, but a long river, a process. Of course you have to have the desire to make a journey, but desire alone is not enough. You also need a certain character to succeed. Being a footballer has taught me a lot of things, like the fact that you have to accept things that are less pleasant--like defeat. You also have to be lucky sometimes in life, both in your private life and in your career, to be at the right place, at the right time. I’m also lucky that the Leesch family has always supported me, always trusted me. In sport, as in private life, if you don’t have ambition… but then ambition isn’t enough. A lot of people would like to be the pope, for example, but not everyone can become one. There are many circumstances that have helped me, but you also have to help yourself.
What do you rely on to get through the difficult times?
I’ll be honest with you: I haven’t experienced any real personal failures. A few disappointments, maybe. Sometimes projects didn’t get off the ground, for exogenous or endogenous reasons, it doesn’t really matter. And sometimes human disappointments with managers. It’s the human failures that stand out the most. To overcome them, I have two passions: cycling and fishing. These are moments to step back. You hurt yourself a bit on a bike too.
And what have these more difficult moments taught you about yourself? I’m thinking of the covid period, for example, probably the worst of all…
A certain resilience. My ability to believe in men and women. Covid was all about people. I discovered a lot of support for the Cactus model from a lot of people.
I’m knocking on wood: we’ve never had any real mishaps in terms of commercial success.
What are you most proud of in your career?
Being able to contribute to the good health of the company. In 41 years, we’ve never had a real crisis, such as redundancies or shop closures. I have the satisfaction of having been able to support new supermarket projects fairly quickly, at a fairly young age. Finding a plot of land, talking to politicians and government departments… back then, things were highly politicised. It’s not like now, where, if you find a plot of land, you can do whatever you want. Then came the time for building sites and opening up. Each time was a highly rewarding and motivating adventure. Opening a shop is one thing, but making it a success is quite another. Here too I’m knocking on wood: we’ve never had any real mishaps in terms of commercial success.
Was there ever a moment when you said to yourself: “I’ve succeeded”?
No. Because it’s never over. I saw Auchan come in, I saw Aldi and Lidl come in, and now I see Leclerc coming in. These are always moments of questioning. Nothing can ever be taken for granted. That’s also what I always like about the job: there’s no absolute truth, it’s a daily challenge.
Is there a person or mentor who has proved decisive?
Obviously Mr Paul Leesch, the founder. I learned a lot from him, because he was very straightforward, very correct. He had an eye for detail that always amazed me. When he took me to the shops, he would see things that I didn’t, and I’d wonder: “How could he have spotted that?” He had a very charismatic side and he listened to people. He believed in me, as did the whole family.
What’s the best advice you ever got from Paul Leesch?
I was lucky enough, when I was quite young, to be in meetings he called with Cactus staff from different backgrounds. I used to listen a lot to how he was going to solve the subject or problem at hand. He always had the intelligence to find a solution. With tact, without rushing anything.
Would your career have been the same without him?
If he hadn’t been there… would anyone else have had as much confidence in me? Paul Leesch knew me as a footballer, he knew how I behaved on the pitch. I had character. Maybe he thought I’d be the same in my professional life. I could never ask him, nor did I want to of course. But there you go…
I’m a very sociable person and I’ve never understood why some people have labelled me as aloof.
What was the hardest criticism to hear? Or the one that challenged you the most?
Before I started my professional career, people described me as haughty. Because I have a certain way of looking at things, it was said that I had no heart. I’m not going to name the people who said that, but I don’t see myself in that at all. I’m not the guy who’s going to say “let’s have a drink together,” I’m not the local boyfriend, I admit that. But I’m a very sociable person and I’ve never understood why some people have labelled me as aloof.
To what extent do the people around you influence your career choices?
I don’t have any children, but I’ve been married since 1987. My wife has always supported me, she’s always helped me. Sometimes it was a bit more difficult, but I never wanted to bother her too much with work. I try to close the door. If I have a problem, I know how to cut from one moment to the next.
In your daily life, what are the major principles and values that serve as your compass?
My ambition, my commitment. As we said earlier, every day is another day. You wake up and you don’t know what’s going to happen, so you always have to be prepared. You also have to talk to the people you work with. They are people from all walks of life, from all intellectual backgrounds. My strength has been being able to talk to everyone. That again comes from football: I’ve played with lazy players, good players, very good players, a striker who didn’t run but scored goal after goal… you have to get the best out of the men and women you work with. I’ve always been ambitious; otherwise I wouldn’t have gone into football. I wasn’t the best, nor the worst either, but I did what I could do, and even a little more because I wanted to. At work, it’s the same.
And what about temperament? Are you a man who takes decisions on the spur of the moment?
No, not on the spur of the moment. On the other hand, I’m not going to beat around the bush for months and months. I’m quite a Cartesian. For me, one and one always equals two.
What’s the most important thing your career has taught you about yourself?
Listen. Just because you’ve studied doesn’t mean you’ve got the best degree or that you [can] think you’re the most intelligent… especially in our professions. Everyone has a role to play.
If you could give one piece of advice to your 20-25 year old self, what would you say?
“Stay humble and correct, always. Don’t make promises you can’t keep. Have a certain authenticity.” I think that, especially now, young people understand quite quickly who they’re dealing with. When I started out, there was an unwritten hierarchy. The “old hands,” as we used to call them, would say: “We do this because we’ve always done it this way.” That’s no longer acceptable today. We have to explain to the young and not so young who come to Cactus why we do this or that. This is something that has changed a lot. People are much more demanding, they want to understand why we do this and not that.
As a boss, what would you like your staff to think of you?
You have an image of yourself. Is it the one that others have of you? Have I disappointed them? I don’t think so. I believe, but that’s just me, that my colleagues see me as a fundamentally decent person. Now, not everyone must like me, because sometimes decisions have to be made. But I think they know who I am. I also think they know they can come to me. My door has always been open. They know I’m there, I have a face, a body, they can see me. I’m not an anonymous person, locked away in an ivory tower. But you’d have to ask the others. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m not.
If there were one moment you could relive over and over again, what would it be?
My appointment in 2001, as director, with Mr Max Leesch. When Paul Leesch handed over the reins of the company to us, it was a very important moment for me. I started at one point, and I had the ambition to reach another point. So getting there… a lot of people travel a path, but do they ever get there? I did. I’m serene about what I’ve done and what I could have done. I was lucky. I was at the right place, at the right time.
Last question: if your career were a film title or a song?
A song from my youth, in the mid-1980s: “Never Gonna Give You Up” by Rick Astley. It’s a bit like my credo too: there are always harder times, but no real catastrophe.
This article was originally published in French.