"No man is an island."
The following is an excerpt from the PayEx brand book
While thirteen year old Max Hansson spent his summer holidays shut away in his father's dark office writing invoices as if his life depended on it, his peers were focused on the female guests sunbathing upon the Gotlandic beaches. Max was envious of his friends and longed to get out of the dark office where his father ran his auctioning firm. What does a boy, who wishes to go out but has work to do, do first? He makes his work more effective without jeopardizing the quality of the end result, of course.
Therefore, Max obtained carbon paper from the Swedish mainland so he wouldn't have to write the invoice twice. He ordered envelopes with windows so he wouldn't have to write the addressee's name and address twice. These ideas may seem obvious today. But not back then. This was, of course, just the beginning.
Max assumed responsibility for the auctioning firm after his father, just as his father had done after Max's grandfather. Eventually there were no more farms to consolidate on the island. This made it difficult to have auctions. It also made it difficult to do what Max Hansson liked to do most of all. To invoice.
It was no whim that made Max start Faktab, which is now PayEx. It was experience which he received from his childhood.
Max started Faktab in 1972 and began taking over the monotonous and mechanical paperwork from his customers at the time. 35 years later, Max changed the name of his company to PayEx - a company that in those 35 years has become so effective and highly technological, professional and specialized, that the customers could hardly carry out the processes themselves. But why would they want to?!
- No man is an island, wrote Ernest Hemingway.
- No company either, countered Max.
Hemingway meant that most people need other people to succeed in life. That is about how Max reasoned as well.
No man is an island.
Sometimes people need help to realize it. If they finally reach that insight, they may become historic. Max Hansson certainly will. At least in business history. In the same way, PayEx will become historic. Thanks to Max and the other approximately five hundred of our staff members.
In the centre of a world heritage site
Our headquarters is on Gotland, in the centre of Visby.
A site on UNESCO's world heritage list. We have created unique workplaces in stone houses from the middle ages in order to promote the creativity, commitment, concentration, collaboration – quite simply the job satisfaction of our staff.
Other offices supplement our headquarters with key expertise, customer relations, language, culture etc. In addition to this we spread the risk by having certain functions in a variety of geographical locations.
All in all this provides very good continuity and quality at a reasonable cost at the same time as we are close to our customers and the market.
PayEx has five key themes
We keep our feet on the ground and work hard every day to contribute what we can – on our own or as a group. We formulate this in five "key themes"
- Do things right
- Do something new
- Care
- Act
- We are PayEx
Do things right – We are good. But good can always be better. To become even better we need to pull ourselves up by the bootstraps a bit. We need the courage to take risks, but at the same time remember to do things right. Only then will we be effective. Do things right.
Do something new – We develop together with the customer. We need to know our customer and our customer's customers in order to carry out work for them properly. We need to be sensitive to our customer's wishes, and to be able to help them see needs and constantly develop the services on offer. At PayEx all staff are responsible for ensuring that their duties are carried out in the best possible way. They must always question the appropriateness and structure of their work, there is always a way of achieving better quality at a lower cost. We must help each other to continuously look for new solutions and better ways to get our work done. This is when PayEx develops and can benefit its customers, this is how we can move forward. There is always a better way. Do something new.
Care – Wellbeing is essential, how otherwise can we manage to do things right and do something new. We must all safeguard everybody's wellbeing. Showing consideration and respecting each other may seem the obvious thing to do, but at PayEx we think that it is worth emphasizing.
We look after other companies' money. Naturally they want us to keep them in good order. The order imposed on our work must also be reflected in our business premises by keeping our workplaces in good order. All components of our work must be of the highest quality, even our attitudes to each other. Me must care, not just about our customers and our work, but about each other as well. Care.
Act – It is not enough to share these attitudes intellectually by just nodding and agreeing. How we act from day to day, in reality and in difficult situations, between departments and each other, is something completely different. We strive towards an open climate of criticism in which everybody dares have their own opinion. Take responsibility for your wellbeing at work! Together we can create a good working environment.
When we act in a PayEx sort of way the PayEx concept is created and lives on. Acting is not just doing something new – we also need to help, fix, correct, question, praise, show drive. Let us keep the PayEx concept alive. Act.
We are PayEx – A company is nothing without its staff. Each individual component makes up the whole, and each member of staff contributes to making PayEx what it is. We are all different, and that is the point – we complement each other and are stronger together. We are PayEx.