Own It Spotlight Session: The Leadership Principle That’s Fueling Our Future

We officially kicked off our Leadership Principles Spotlight Series (and the bar was definitely set high!) We had an energizing session that was dedicated to our first principle, ‘Own It’, where we saw Heroes come together to unpack what ownership really means at Delivery Hero.

From bold decisions and brave actions, to bias for action over waiting - we heard it all! In this article we dive into the highlights and takeaways from the session.

What does ‘Own It’ mean to you? 

Olena Bachynska, Director, Software Engineering was the host of the session, and she opened up the discussion by asking employees what ‘Own It’ really means to them?

Submissions were fed into a word cloud, which grew fast on the presentation screen: Action, Drive, Accountability… This icebreaker exercise proved that these aren’t just buzzwords, and truly showed what we are aiming for with this principle.

C Level Wisdom: Owning It at the Top

Marie-Anne Popp, Chief Financial Officer, and PJ Vandepitte, Chief Operating Officer, were on the panel and shared honest, often personal reflections about what it means to ‘Own It’ at the highest levels of Delivery Hero.

PJ recounted a fast-moving situation around rider branding. Instead of letting colleagues hit a road block, he got the ball moving. After a recent discussion with the CEO of Woowa Bros in South Korea, he reached out to the team at Talabat, UAE and connected them to get the right people involved. Within days, teams from different countries aligned and owned the issue. His message? “Don’t be shy. Don’t wait for the next monthly meeting, pick up the phone and send the message.” 

Marie-Anne added “Everyone should be asking themselves, how can I think long term? How can I think ‘big picture’?” She emphasized that ownership isn’t just an attitude, it’s a performance lever. When we ‘own the result’, we ‘own the outcome’.

Accountability was a hot topic. The panel stressed that ownership must live beyond motivational words. It should be woven into how we define OKRs, assess success, and hold ourselves (and each other) accountable.

PJ added, “It’s not about rolling something out. It’s about adoption, improving performance, driving savings, delivering real impact.”

Hero Spotlight: Everyday Ownership in Action

Koen Dubelaar, Director of Product Operations, was our Hero speaker for the session and he brought the leadership principle to life with some inspiring real life stories.

He spoke about examples of team members and how they had grown professionally and owned it in different situations. 

‘J’ was an intern who joined in 2021, who eventually took over from an experienced individual contributor to support key business priorities. J leaned into the challenge and focused on getting stuck in, staying positive, and most of all - worked out how to become ‘data driven’, even when he didn’t know how. 

Koen then discussed how ‘N’ from Product Ops, joined as an IC1 in 2021. She quickly took on project management responsibilities with zero fuss, and brought deep focus, solid comms, and a strong bias for action, which brought solid results.

Koen’s biggest takeaway? Be the one who instigates the action. Whether you're new or a seasoned professional, there’s power in simply getting started. 

Final Words

To close, Olena brought the energy full circle; “There is no excuse for not owning it. If everyone in the company owns it, success will happen.”

This is just the beginning! We’ve got five more spotlight sessions coming your way, each one essential, and each one designed to help us grow together. 

But for now? Let’s Own It!