Management and management system

CEO and Executive Group Management

The President of Vattenfall AB, who is also CEO of the Vattenfall Group, is responsible for the day-to-day administration in accordance with the Swedish Companies Act. The President has appointed decision-making bodies for the Group and makes decisions independently or with the support of these decision-making bodies.

Lars G. Josefsson was President and CEO through 11 April 2010. The Board decided on 11 March to appoint Øystein Løseth as President and CEO effective 12 April.

The Executive Group Management (EGM) focuses on the Group’s overall direction and decides – within the mandate provided by the Board - on matters of importance for the Group, such as certain acquisitions, investments and divestments.
(See also the section ”The Board’s Work”) .
Information on the members of the Executive Group Management

Governing Business Ethics

The Executive Group Management decided on 12 August 2010 that Vattenfall’s core values shall be Safety, Performance and Cooperation.  

Vattenfall’s vision is to develop a sustainable, diversified European energy portfolio with long-term increased profits and significant growth opportunities. At the same time, Vattenfall aspires to be among the leaders in developing environmentally sustainable energy generation.  

Vattenfall’s Group-wide Code of Conduct and company philosophy stipulate that all employees shall adhere to and work in accordance with Vattenfall’s core values, policies and instructions. The stipulations of the Code of Conduct are concretised in other parts of the management system. Work is currently in progress on drawing up a new Code of Conduct. In 2010 Vattenfall also completed the introduction of a Group-wide whistleblowing function with locally appointed external ombudsmen (attorneys) to whom employees, consultants and contractors can turn to report suspected, serious improprieties that the whistleblower for some reason does not want to report internally via the normal reporting channels.

Further information on guiding business ethics is provided in
Vattenfall’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report.  

The Vattenfall Management System (VMS)

To ensure that Vattenfall develops in the intended direction and lives up to ethical and legal requirements, the CEO has established the Vattenfall Management System (VMS). Integrated with the VMS is an Environmental Management System. The VMS is available to all employees on the Group’s intranet. The VMS is documented in binding governing documents. All units within Vattenfall are obligated to comply with the management system’s governing documents.

Special routines are in place to ensure that the VMS is also applied by subsidiaries. With respect to the German subsidiaries, since June 2008 a special agreement (Beherrschungsvertrag) has been in place between Vattenfall AB and the German holding company, Vattenfall Europe AG. Under this agreement, the board (Vorstand) of the holding company is subordinate to Vattenfall AB, and Vattenfall AB has the right to issue directives regarding governance.

New Organisational Structure

On 24 August and 20 September 2010, the Board decided on a new strategic direction, organisation and business model for the Vattenfall Group. As part of this, a new, business-led organisational structure is also being introduced for the Vattenfall Group. The new organisational structure took effect on 1 January 2011 and entails primarily the following:

• Replacing the existing organisation, structured mainly according to the value chain in the respective geographic regions, by a functionally led organisation structured in cross-border Business Divisions and Business Units;
• A number of functional areas have been identified. Responsibility for these is delegated to cross-border Staff Functions, which take over for the former functions at the Group level as well as on the Business Group and Business Unit levels;
• Establishment of a Group-wide Shared Service unit.

In autumn 2010 an extensive project was carried out to prepare for implementation of the new organisational structure. Part of this project also involved increased process orientation and updating the Vattenfall Management System, and reshaping it into a more effective tool for governance. This project continued until the second quarter of 2011 and will continue throughout 2011 for the VMS.