Fränzi Kühne (Torben, Lucie und die gelbe Gefahr) enjoys the comfort tech provides and is ready to give up some privacy in return. Germany’s youngest member of a supervisory board sees the gender quota as a necessary tool, even if it’s not an elegant one. Fränzi appeals to all established corporations that want to live diversity to voice their support as loudly as possible.
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#ada18 interview with Fränzi Kühne
Fränzi, you say you have a lot of respect for tech and its possibilities. Does it sometimes creep you out as well?
Fränzi Kühne: No. I am a thoroughly optimistic person. I tend to enjoy the comfort tech provides and I am ready to give up some privacy in return. More often than not, “creepy tech” equals “uninformed user”. And that is indeed a problem that worries me: A lot of people take on certain new technologies as a given, without asking questions, and then feel duped when certain facts come to light. I hope that the Cambridge Analytica story will change things a bit – but it will take more than one sensational story to instill a lasting awareness.
You call yourself a late adopter of Instagram Stories. Which digital trend fascinated you from the beginning on, so that you became an Early Adopter?
Fränzi Kühne: Well, Instagram’s core product itself. For many years, digital tools were primarily photo tools to me – my laptop was my photo album first and foremost. So Instagram was instantly appealing!
You recently joined the Allbright Foundation, which dedicates itself to create more diversity within the economy. What are first simple steps that every company could take to ensure more diversity?
Fränzi Kühne: For startups, it is pretty easy: try to make your initial team as diverse as possible. Both diversity and homogeneity tend to replicate themselves – which is why the gender quota is a necessary tool, even if it’s not an elegant one. For established corporations, it all starts with the will and the conviction: say that you support it and know why you support it. Without these, all practical steps will be useless.
With Torben, Lucie und die gelbe Gefahr (TLGG) you ve got versatile insights into the German economy. Are there aspects in which companies from all sectors need the most digital support?
Fränzi Kühne: At TLGG, we have always thought it best to avoid golden rules and generalizations. German sectors, branches and companies are in a lot of different stages of adopting, implementing and developing digital tools, processes, methods. Change management is surely an issue for most of them, but even that comes in so many guises. I’m sorry, but there is no simple answer here.
We`re looking forward to having you at #ada18. What are you looking forward to?
Fränzi Kühne: I am of course looking forward to meeting and speaking to many smart and knowing women. But I know I’ll really enjoy spending time with Verena Pausder. Oh, she’s wonderful.
Fränzi Kühne is one of the three founders and CEOs of the German digital business agency Torben, Lucie und die gelbe Gefahr. Founded in 2008, TLGG grew into a 170-strong agency sought after by international brands and corporations. The German Award for Online Communication named TLGG “Agency of The Year” twice. In January 2015 TLGG, as a partner of the CRM-specialist RAPP, became a part of the second largest international communication network Omnicom.
Berlin-born Kühne helms projects that demonstrate clearly the potential of technological and cultural change for brands and corporations. As Head of Operations, Fränzi shapes the structures and processes within the agency, takes care of company culture and is responsible for the internal and external style of communication.
Fränzi Kühne shaped her digital profile as a project manager at Frogster Interactive Pictures AG, as an editor and as a freelance writer on gadgetry and technology. In November 2014, Edition F named her one of “25 women for the digital future” – among candidates like Gesche Joost and Constanze Kurz. In June 2017, Fränzi was appointed to the supervisory board of freenet AG, making her the youngest member of a supervisory board in a publicly owned company in Germany.