Duco Sickinghe: ‘I’m Consciously Super-Incompetent’

Diner with FD - By Daan Ballegeer

Few Dutch nationals are as respected in the Belgian business world as Duco Sickinghe. He transformed telecom company Telenet into a tech gem and became an expert in cultural experiences along the way. “A Dutch person will tell you what they know, but with a Belgian, you have to figure out what they know.”

“Your turbot steak wasn’t fully cooked, was it? I noticed it didn’t come off the bone easily.” Duco Sickinghe (66) addresses the waiter kindly but firmly: “Ce n’était pas tout à fait cuit. Ça c’est dommage.” Startled, she promises to check with the kitchen what went wrong. Upon her return, she apologizes and informs him that the coffee will be on the house.

“I think they’re really stressed out now,” says Sickinghe with a playful smile. Two days earlier, he had visited Lola, a brasserie in the upscale Sablon district of Brussels, to make a reservation, mentioning that the restaurant would be featured in an interview. The staff is on edge, and then something like this happens. By the end of the evening, not only was the coffee on the house, but so was the aperitif.

Cultural Differences

Sickinghe is best known in his home country as the chairman of KPN, a position he held from 2014 to 2022, thanks to the reputation he had built in Belgium as CEO of telecom company Telenet. He has lived for more than twenty years in the Brussels suburb of Kraainem.

Belgium has softened him, he says, and made him less direct. “The Dutch have an unshakable belief that if they explain something to you thoroughly, you will surely agree with them. But they forget that people don’t always agree or disagree based on arguments but often on context. Do you understand someone’s position? That’s where Belgians excel.”

At his investment firm, Fortino Capital, Sickinghe often encounters these cultural differences. For example, during presentations by CEOs. “A Dutch person will tell you what they know, but you don’t know if they actually know it. The Belgian says nothing, so you have to figure out what they know. Usually, it’s four times more than what they let on, while a Dutch person will offer you all their knowledge unsolicited.”

Sickinghe himself can talk with great energy and conviction. “My father had two near-death experiences due to tuberculosis, which made him realize that time was not on his side. I think he passed on his sense of urgency to his children. As a child, we were never allowed to just sit and read at home. There were always projects to do, like mowing the lawn or helping repair a boat.”

His father, F.O.J. Sickinghe, was a captain of industry, CEO of the Dutch conglomerate Stork, and a descendant of a noble regent family from the north. His mother, Marguerite, came from the well-known Van Eeghen entrepreneurial family and was involved in various social organizations. How much pressure was there to succeed in life with such parents? “You don’t want to fall behind, let’s put it that way. I quickly understood that I had to forge my own path.”

Steve Jobs

The starter has been cleared away: an appropriate combination of Belgian shrimp croquette and Dutch cheese croquette. The tataki and the slightly undercooked turbot steak are served.

Although Sickinghe would have liked to study economics after high school, he was deterred by the math. He opted for law instead, but he didn’t see himself as a corporate lawyer. Instead, he ventured into tech, working at Hewlett-Packard in Switzerland and at NeXT, the computer company Steve Jobs founded after being ousted from Apple, in France.

Sickinghe frequently experienced Steve Jobs’ notorious high expectations. “He could bluntly tell me that something made no sense at all. People like Steve are incredibly articulate with their ideas, but they lack social intelligence. They are so convinced of their vision and mission that they act as if they think you’re stupid if you say something that doesn’t align with them.”

Sickinghe, who describes himself as 'consciously super-incompetent', operates differently. “There are many things I know I’m not good at. A good CEO must realize that many people know more than he does. That’s also why Telenet became so successful.”

This success is the foundation of Sickinghe’s stellar reputation in Flanders. When he took over as CEO of the telecom company in 2001, it was on the brink of collapse. Why was he interested in the role? “One Saturday evening at home in Hilversum, I was looking at the business plan, and I didn’t understand much of it because I was unfamiliar with the complex cable business. So, I took a virtual tour of Telenet’s office in Mechelen online, and the building looked so nice that I thought: I’m just going to do it.”

Never the Same Dog Twice

A second non-alcoholic beer keeps the conversation flowing. He is “a bit low on alcohol,” he says cheerfully. Only on weekends does he deviate from the 0.0, and this dinner is midweek.

At Telenet, Sickinghe laid off one in eight employees. He built it into a profitable company that was technologically and commercially among the world’s top. In 2012, the American cable group Liberty Global, which by then owned 51% of Telenet, made a takeover bid that had not been discussed with Sickinghe. He learned the news in a hotel room in New York. “Unfortunately, I had just taken a sleeping pill, so I fell asleep halfway through that phone call.”

Like the Belgian directors of Telenet, Sickinghe found Liberty’s bid unfair to the minority shareholders. The price of €35 per share was also below the fairness opinion of investment bank Lazard, which came out at a minimum of €39. It didn’t help Liberty that Telenet kept delivering better-than-expected results, causing the share price to rise further. “At that point, the people at Liberty probably couldn’t stand me.”

When the takeover bid failed, Sickinghe knew his days as CEO were numbered. He resigned on his own. Everyone assumed he would quickly become CEO elsewhere, but Sickinghe thought of his father’s advice: never get the same dog twice in a row. “His point was that you start comparing, while it’s better to go for a unique experience. That became my own investment firm.” Fortino (Italian for “little fort”) focuses on companies that provide business-to-business software. Nearly €800 million has been invested in about thirty companies.

“Being able to look at a different company every week is the best thing for me,” says Sickinghe as a selection of cheeses is served. Is there a moment when it doesn’t have to be anymore? “I’m already doing much less than before. But I’m afraid that if I start taking it easy now, I’ll miss exciting developments like artificial intelligence. There will come a time when I can’t keep up with it all, but until then, I’ll keep playing outside.”

Love

After the non-alcoholic beer, Sickinghe orders a decaf coffee. Why did he mention his difficult divorce in his farewell interview as chairman of KPN a few years ago? “The people who knew me were aware that there was something very dark and difficult in my life, and it felt uncomfortable for me to leave that unmentioned. Duco might do many things well in his life, but there are also things where he has met his Waterloo. I felt that was part of the image of me.”

His final wish was to find peace and harmony again. Has that happened? His face brightens. “I have found a new partner, and we are very happy together. She became a widow a few years ago after the sudden death of her husband. We find it important to talk a lot about him because there is still a lot of mourning. But at the same time, there can also be love in the present.”

His partner, who lives on an estate in Beesd with a restaurant and shop selling local products, thought Sickinghe would quickly return to the Netherlands, “but it turns out that Duco is somehow attached to Belgium. I really like Belgium. She sometimes looks at what happens in this country with wide eyes, but then I tell her it takes years to understand.”

Read the FD article here (Dutch).