Kurt Zech awarded ULI Leadership Award for 2012

Kurt Zech, CEO of German conglomerate Zech Group, has been awarded ULI’s Leadership Award for private business 2012 for his ability to foster and promote young talent.

In keeping with ULI tradition, his ‘Tree Ceremony’ will take place in Bremen on 12 June.

The award is a personal award recognizing sustainable, future-oriented leadership and recipients are chosen for being pioneers in their field and for their ability to think ‘outside the box’.

He was chosen by the jury on several accounts, according to Claudia Gotz, executive director of ULI in Germany,
Switzerland and Austria. Firstly, because he has successfully turned a family-run construction business into a global concern but also because of his ‘unique’ management style, said Gotz:

‘His management style is completely different to that of many mangers. He has built a network with young players to whom he gives a lot of creative freedom - that’s very rare,’ said Gotz. ‘He enables them to start their own businesses within the framework of the Zech Group. He is supporting the next generation of talent and helping them to get started, which is really commendable. He is also very engaged when it comes to sustainability; it’s not about a quick win for him,’ she added.

For Gerhard Dunstheimer, head of the 12-person jury and deputy CEO and managing director of development at Hamburg-based developer ECE, the prize is given to someone with ‘exceptional leadership skills’. ‘It’s not always easy to distinguish between what an individual has achieved and what the company as a whole has achieved. We awarded this prize to Kurt Zech because he’s a businessman who can spot opportunities and analyse them to gauge the risk potential,’ he said. In addition, Zech’s business model of investing in the ideas of young entrepreneurs also found favor with the jury, he added.

Zech, 56, is a shareholder in the group, who took over the family business from his father in 1978, turning it into the conglomerate is it today. The management holding company has six main divisions: construction, real estate, hotels, technology, industry and an international arm, which also includes operations in Brazil.

He is also a board member of DFH Deutsche Fonds Holding in Stuttgart and of communications agency Joke Event in Bremen. Zech declined to be interviewed.