Bettina Rotermund with Siemens
On this week's Industrial Talk we're onsite at IoT Solutions World Congress and talking to Bettina Rotermund, Head of Strategic Marketing – IoT with Siemens about “Mentoring, Supporting, Advocating and Encouraging more Women in Industry”. Get the answers to your “Women in Industry” questions along with Bettina's unique insight on the “How” on this Industrial Talk interview!
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BETTINA ROTERMUND'S CONTACT INFORMATION:
Personal LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bettinarotermund/
Company LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/siemens/
Company Website: https://www.siemens.com/global/en.html
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SUMMARY KEYWORDS
patina, siemens, industrial, bettina, technology, people, iot, female, male, diversity, tx, problem, digital transformation, speak, step, find, working, customers, order, listeners
Industrial Talk is brought to you by TxOne now you know cybersecurity is important if you're on this digital transformation journey, TXOne networks has the solutions for you. And you're saying to yourself, Scott, they're going to be complex, they're going to be difficult. No TXOne's taken that into consideration. And they provide a suite of solutions that truly meet your cybersecurity needs go out to TXOne dash networks.com and find out more, you're not going to be disappointed. Also industry IoT Consortium. At industrial talk, we always talk about education, we always talk about collaboration, we are always talking about innovation. And if you're a business that has any desire to be resilient to the future, you need to be able to educate, collaborate, as well as innovate with other industry professionals. That's a must. Industry IoT consortium brings that all together, you need to be a part of this community. You need to be connected with these leaders that are all apart the industry IoT consortium, go out to ai consortium.org. Find out more again, you will not be disappointed. You're just going to be happy. All right. Once again, thank you very much for joining industrial talk. We were on site at IoT solutions World Congress, Barcelona, Spain was the location absolutely excellent event. And that's where I connected with Bettina Rotman and she isn't, you need to connect with her you need to go out to LinkedIn, you need to find Bettina, you need to just be a part of her network because she is an absolute digital Rockstar that must, you must connect with because you're about to change the world and she's changing the world. Also. Siemens just launched this accelerator. I'm right on the website right there. Right on the website. And it's the open digital business platform for accelerating your digital transformation. Yeah, right there. You need to find out more you need to learn more, there's a button that says learn more, go out to siemens.com Find out more reach out to patina because this conversation is absolutely wonderful and it is Women in Technology is the subject so enjoy the conversation with Bettina.
She's, uh, You're a legend. Again, I'm gonna go back and I'm gonna, I'm gonna put this on in our conversation just because you are a legend. I met listeners I met patina. Virtually, she blew my socks off. She's got massive digital skills. And and I don't know how she does it. And she's able to communicate it in a way that even I understand. And that's quite a challenge. How you doing Bettina?
And now I'm blushing
out here. Shut. I'm doing well. Thanks, man. Check it out. Yeah, I'm having a great time. I mean, the hacky. I'm like the guy that brings the six pack of beer, I don't really have like, Hey, he's a fun guy.
I can help you to digitalize the kitchen
digitalize the six, then let's just make it a case. That was just leveraged. Yeah, we didn't get we didn't get a chance to go out for your leaving tomorrow. I'm going to say you live in a day. That's right. We didn't get a chance to have a bourbon or anything from that is a problem. Because you're a busy person because everybody wants to talk.
Because I'm busy to talking to other great people and getting inspiration and exchange and finding similarities and working on new projects.
To Ben, you're just you're just an awesome person. All right. For the listeners, let's do it. Again. If you have not caught her original conversation on industrial talk, go out to industrial talk.com type in patina, you'll find her because she's the only patina out there. Going forward, if she's the only I'm not going to have any other patina something just to push them away. I've said no. But Tina's will give us a little background real quick, but you know who you are and about women in tech. Exactly.
So I'm a Bettina Ottomans. I worked for Siemens now for four years, which is two years longer than my average tenure with companies who speaks for Siemens, and pretty well. I'm responsible at Siemens for the strategic marketing in the sector of IoT digital transformation and business transformation.
mouthful. It's a mouthful. Yeah. You're the one that can do it. That's
actually I have a great team. I have great leaders around us. We have bright minds. We work super close together with our customers and partners. That's a it's a real it's like the biggest playground I could have hoped for. So I'm very happy. I'm a happy camper. Where
would you what is cool about the whole thing is that there's a lot of buzz around what's happening with digital transformation and in all the technology and the innovation that's going on, you know, everybody's saying, hey, I can do this and do this. And the use cases are getting developed. And they're everything is just all wonderful and exciting. You know what the problem is? The average guy like me, who doesn't have the, the intellectual horsepower, like you is hard, I have a hard time keeping up with all of the changes and all of the things that can happen. It's just there's a velocity that I just I really do.
The change is unprecedented. And that's for sure. And that's not only the change, it's the complexity that yes, so um, we did a lot of surveys, and we talked to customers and did a lot of deep dive workshops with customers to figure out what is it that they truly need. And usually, when you talk to customers of your usual visits, they report on the symptoms that they see in that they experienced, but sometimes it's not, most of the times, it's not the root cause. So it really takes time. And this is to make approach to go deep. And to figure out what are the underlying patterns that hinder people who do IoT or to be successful or to change their operations for the better. And so this is where we help. And this is where we come in to say, here is a place where you can see this is the art of the possible, other people have done it before, which make it more easy to adapt to what is already existing and what is proven and to move on from there and not starting from scratch. Yeah,
I think the market is screaming for that. I think we've got to venture beyond the hypothetical, yeah, I can do this. But where, and have the real, something that's touchable smelled like, there it is right there. And it's doing this, and this is the value proposition and recognize that I see customers, they're all dealing with their own set of challenges. So you got to start there to figure out what the problem is, what they're looking for, and how to solve it. But then, you know, be able to use some use case. But that's not what we're going to talk about. We can we can definitely riff on that for a long time. But I don't want to talk about that. I want to talk about women and technology. You're here you were at this conference, you were on a panel talking about women and technology. Can you explain to the listeners what that what that was? First of
all, it was great fun, because I had bright, super intelligent, powerful woman or like just an A Polina and Alicia seen a Paris and an instance of kowski around me, and Jessica, and Lisa being CEOs of relayer, and a rebellion. And the fun fact is, we all showed up for the, let's say, pre read to this thing in bright red colors, and everybody, you know, by design, but individually. And we just said, Yeah, we're here to make a statement on why we need more diversity in the sector, and how we can help and that we are up for leveraging our personal platforms in order to do this. So
I think it's a no brainer, don't get me wrong. I I I'm just looking for the right person, the right insights, the intelligence, the smarts. So is there still a reluctance to? or is there an encouragement to direct women to technology? What's What, what, what's the beef?
The problem is multi fold that makes it so difficult to tackle because you have systemic issues, you have individual issues, you have geopolitical issues. I mean, the easiest is to say, let's install a quota and then it will be cured in a couple of years, which probably is not the case. Because if you installed the borders, but then you do not have then female leaders that feel belonging to the culture and feel happy where they are. It's never never going to work. So you can look at is there a diversity, and I mean, for us also, at Siemens diversity is so much more than just gender diversity, we talk about diversity, inclusion and belonging. And that means everybody is welcome to the party. Everybody is not only allowed to dance on the party, but we want everybody to dance in order to enrich our culture. Because we not only believe we see proven by a lot of studies, the more diversity means the more resilient the more sustainable, the more successful solutions. So but I mean, for society, it's the easiest to look into gender diversity first, and maybe we'll stick to that. The problem is, if you look at a typical pyrometer, and you want to have more leaders on top, you need to grow them from the bottom and just falling from the sky. So actually, it starts in school. It starts in how kids are taught mathematics. Then it starts on what is the perception on the technology sector. So I dropped math in 12th grade because it just simply wasn't a good at it. I couldn't find any meaning is
okay, whatever exactly what
people perceive or what females perceive if you want to go in technology, you need to be an engineer and you need to be good in mathematics. This is the the chain that basically, this is what we what we present to the outside world. So there is so much more needed in technology, you need UX UI designer, you need customer succession managers, you need to have people that understands the buyer journey in order to present them the right portfolio to match their their needs. And there's so much more needed. You need management skills, yeah, you need to have social skills like hell, because in order to be able to reduce this complexity, and to maneuver through ever getting more volatile times, you need different skill sets. But this is not what we talk about technology to the outside world. And thus, also with a lack of role models, young females look at the thing says, there's nothing in the form. And this is why we are lacking people, we are lacking young female talents moving into technology, and then then comes to the systemic issue. And then they need to move all through the hierarchies of the super companies that we see and need to stay there and not being you know, completely disappointed by, I cannot work flexible. I want to become a mom who's taking care of the kids, etc, up. So there's a lot of issues that we have to tackle. And also when it comes to the systemic issue of the bias that we all have. It is a young female talent would say something and then somebody else will he phrase it 30 minutes later, and then it's got to be his idea. There's less protection in the way. Okay, thanks
for just repeating what, Jessica Nina, Joe,
whoever said in the first place, this is something that is also very hard to tackle. And this is just only one thing. I can report on incidents I had years ago when I entered the boardroom, in one of my employers. And then somebody said, Oh, the decoration is entering room. And so this is something I say okay. That he does. And that is either your, your prep for that, yes. Okay, I take it with a good portion of humor. And let's, let's see, this is laughing in the end. Or you just, you know, you're hurt by it, because it's like, it's like sandpaper on your skin?
Yes, I just, I think it's fine. To try to unravel what you were saying. I think one of the things that I gravitate to is is the the education component, instilling that passion in the beginning, having the institutions that have the education institutions that, that encourage that I think that that's a that's so important. And to your point. I mean, to, you know, you don't have to be a whiz at at math, I wasn't. But then you know, you have other skills and other abilities. But I think that encouraging from a from a young youth on up, I think that's incorrect. Let me ask you this about Siemens. With that said, you've got a culture you've got certain passions about, about that diversity, inclusion, all of that good stuff. That's all fantastic. So how does Siemens an organization, be able to take take the women, the woman the workforce, and then begin to work them up? There's a program associated for
that. We have several programs, because they are not always working on a global scale. Yeah, you need to take the local circumstances into consideration. It might be something working in the US, but it's not working in India. Yeah, because the social setting and context is completely different. So there are a lot of local elements and activities, there is a global equity program that we that we launched, and that has a lot of sub segments and sub activities, in order to really dig into all the different areas that are just mentioned, there you have a bias, you have the opportunity to source the talents in and make them grow, so to speak. And that is it has completely different facets. And that also is very nice, because then the young talents can look into where do they feel belonging? What does what speak to them in terms of the activity that they then also can choose and are maybe also eligible for. And for us, it's very important also to put the role models in place and the role models is not just somebody like me, who's fighting for the ones that are stepping into my footsteps, but it is something about male advocacy. And that is what Jessica Polina yesterday brought up it's not about male allies because male allies is just like, Yeah, I would jump in if need be, and but it's more a passive role that that is behind it. If you're talking about male advocates that are male making an effort in order to help young females rise and thrive, and this is what we also look for, what are the male advocates that make an effort that make room and space and share their knowledge and I happy in order to to make young females thrive in the organization?
Is there a mentor type of outside Get the mail, I get that, yes, they've got to step up, they've got to not whatever, they've got to be supportive and all of that good stuff and help. Is there a mentor program that lets say, hey, Bettina, mentored her or whatever it might be?
Yeah, that's, um, we have this. And we have that in literally every business unit because this also designed around what are the needs in that business unit that help female rise to the top now. So you need work skills, you need soft skills and personal skills and that all needs to work together. So I personally am involved in two programs, the one is the sponsor her program, yeah, where you find the senior exec where you find senior leadership people, male and female, and you figure out who chemistry wise and knowledge wise or the best to each other. And then you have the sessions, you have counseling, you have coaching and mentoring sessions with these young talents. And that proves to be super successful because you come from the same area, you know, what's working, what's not working, you can share your knowledge tool, you understand what is the specific situation that person is in, and it's easier. So that's the one thing that's working in a lot of areas and a lot of flags, which I'm heavily involved in, I love this working, because also I get so much back from this young talents, and learn from them the same as they might learn from me.
I'm a big fan of the youth insight.
Yeah, and it's not only us, um, sometimes the gap in age, it's not even that big, but it's the gap in the hierarchy. And that comes with totally different shapes and sizes. Yeah. And the second thing that I'm doing, I'm active in our grow to blow network. And that is a women for women, no female for female network, where we find also sponsors and coaches and leaders that help other other people find. And I mean, we look at it and says, yeah, that coaching is a nice thing. But it's really does make a difference to the lives of so many people. And I'm just giving you an example, in one of my sessions that I had speaking in front of a bigger group of these coaches, a young female stepped on set with Tina, I needed advice, do you recommend adapting to more male behavior in order to be more successful in the company? And I was just like, yeah, there was, No, I have to digest it. And I said, Give me a second to think about it. And I in my, in my mind, there was this swirl of what does that mean? Does that mean she needs to speak and low voice? Does that mean that she needs to show up only in decent, black, gray, white dresses that she needs to make? A you know, whatever? cut her hair? I don't know. So there were a lot of things in at the same time in my mind? And the answer was, Don't you dare.
Beautiful. I was getting ready. I was so I was holding my breath. I was gonna say You better not say yes. Because I was.
Yes. So for me it was that everybody was looking at me. And I said this is this will be two steps back. Don't do this. Whatever you need in order to thrive and to excel and to feel strong and having somebody your back call me in any way anytime. 24/7 I'm here. But we need more diverse thinking behavior. We know, we know, we know that diversity is success criteria for the future. So what happens if you copy male behavior, this is making it even worse. So this is not what we want. But we are living in this in this friction time. Yeah, we're seeing declining the one leading culture and making room for other cultures that move in and in this X in the middle of this is the friction phase. And this is where everybody has it. And that's why you cannot step back if you need to step up. And my job is to make sure that the young females have a problem solving pool that they can tap into and say if this situation occurs, I'm proud because I have spoken that group with patina and I'm stronger I feel much more practical this one and it can stand the storm if it arises. So this is what we all need to do stepping up and making an effort in order to work against the bias and making these young teammates
your rockstar. I do I think you're I love that kind of guy. Yeah, you do you're you're pretty spectacular. Because I think you're you're you're hitting on all cylinders on on all of these topics. I was just when you when that young lady walked up to you and said Do I need to be more I would say no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I don't want to I don't want that. Never ever. So somebody's out there saying gosh, I want to know more about patina. How do they get a hold here?
I'm easily to find on LinkedIn. It's a Tina. or testimonials from Siemens Sue.
And do I have to say it like, because I won't because I can spell it. It's gonna be out on industrial talk. Exactly. See what I tell you listeners. Again, she does not disappoint at all. All right, again. Thank you. Thank you. Excellent. All right listeners we are once again day three IoT solutions World Congress, we are broadcasting live great venue, great people, great professionals like Bettina, all around here. So put that on your bucket list. We are going to wrap it up on the other side. So do not go away. We're going to have all the contact information for patina and then some at industrial talk. So stay tuned, we will be right back. You're listening to the industrial talk Podcast Network.
Again, thank you very much but Tina for being on industrial talk. You are a rock star at Digital rock star. Thank you very much. Thank you for what you're doing. Thank you for speaking about women in technology, important conversation. Excellent job. Also listeners go out to siemens.com Siemens accelerators out there right on the homepage right there with the Learn More button. This is the to accelerate your digital transformation. Yeah, you need to be in the digital transformation game you do and you need trusted individuals to help you with that journey. That's right patina team Siemens. absolutely a must wonderful industrial talk is creating a platform a platform dedicated to industrial education. Please support us in every way possible. All right. Be bold. Be brave. Yeah. dare greatly you guys are are just absolute incredible individuals you in industry. So hang out with people who are bold, brave and daring greatly in you're gonna change the world. Thank you very much for what you're doing. We're gonna have another great conversation shortly.
Transcript
Industrial Talk is brought to you by TxOne now you know cybersecurity is important if you're on this digital transformation journey, TXOne networks has the solutions for you. And you're saying to yourself, Scott, they're going to be complex, they're going to be difficult. No TXOne's taken that into consideration. And they provide a suite of solutions that truly meet your cybersecurity needs go out to TXOne dash networks.com and find out more, you're not going to be disappointed. Also industry IoT Consortium. At industrial talk, we always talk about education, we always talk about collaboration, we are always talking about innovation. And if you're a business that has any desire to be resilient to the future, you need to be able to educate, collaborate, as well as innovate with other industry professionals. That's a must. Industry IoT consortium brings that all together, you need to be a part of this community. You need to be connected with these leaders that are all apart the industry IoT consortium, go out to ai consortium.org. Find out more again, you will not be disappointed. You're just going to be happy. All right. Once again, thank you very much for joining industrial talk. We were on site at IoT solutions World Congress, Barcelona, Spain was the location absolutely excellent event. And that's where I connected with Bettina Rotman and she isn't, you need to connect with her you need to go out to LinkedIn, you need to find Bettina, you need to just be a part of her network because she is an absolute digital Rockstar that must, you must connect with because you're about to change the world and she's changing the world. Also. Siemens just launched this accelerator. I'm right on the website right there. Right on the website. And it's the open digital business platform for accelerating your digital transformation. Yeah, right there. You need to find out more you need to learn more, there's a button that says learn more, go out to siemens.com Find out more reach out to patina because this conversation is absolutely wonderful and it is Women in Technology is the subject so enjoy the conversation with Bettina.
She's, uh, You're a legend. Again, I'm gonna go back and I'm gonna, I'm gonna put this on in our conversation just because you are a legend. I met listeners I met patina. Virtually, she blew my socks off. She's got massive digital skills. And and I don't know how she does it. And she's able to communicate it in a way that even I understand. And that's quite a challenge. How you doing Bettina?
And now I'm blushing
out here. Shut. I'm doing well. Thanks, man. Check it out. Yeah, I'm having a great time. I mean, the hacky. I'm like the guy that brings the six pack of beer, I don't really have like, Hey, he's a fun guy.
I can help you to digitalize the kitchen
digitalize the six, then let's just make it a case. That was just leveraged. Yeah, we didn't get we didn't get a chance to go out for your leaving tomorrow. I'm going to say you live in a day. That's right. We didn't get a chance to have a bourbon or anything from that is a problem. Because you're a busy person because everybody wants to talk.
Because I'm busy to talking to other great people and getting inspiration and exchange and finding similarities and working on new projects.
To Ben, you're just you're just an awesome person. All right. For the listeners, let's do it. Again. If you have not caught her original conversation on industrial talk, go out to industrial talk.com type in patina, you'll find her because she's the only patina out there. Going forward, if she's the only I'm not going to have any other patina something just to push them away. I've said no. But Tina's will give us a little background real quick, but you know who you are and about women in tech. Exactly.
So I'm a Bettina Ottomans. I worked for Siemens now for four years, which is two years longer than my average tenure with companies who speaks for Siemens, and pretty well. I'm responsible at Siemens for the strategic marketing in the sector of IoT digital transformation and business transformation.
mouthful. It's a mouthful. Yeah. You're the one that can do it. That's
actually I have a great team. I have great leaders around us. We have bright minds. We work super close together with our customers and partners. That's a it's a real it's like the biggest playground I could have hoped for. So I'm very happy. I'm a happy camper. Where
would you what is cool about the whole thing is that there's a lot of buzz around what's happening with digital transformation and in all the technology and the innovation that's going on, you know, everybody's saying, hey, I can do this and do this. And the use cases are getting developed. And they're everything is just all wonderful and exciting. You know what the problem is? The average guy like me, who doesn't have the, the intellectual horsepower, like you is hard, I have a hard time keeping up with all of the changes and all of the things that can happen. It's just there's a velocity that I just I really do.
The change is unprecedented. And that's for sure. And that's not only the change, it's the complexity that yes, so um, we did a lot of surveys, and we talked to customers and did a lot of deep dive workshops with customers to figure out what is it that they truly need. And usually, when you talk to customers of your usual visits, they report on the symptoms that they see in that they experienced, but sometimes it's not, most of the times, it's not the root cause. So it really takes time. And this is to make approach to go deep. And to figure out what are the underlying patterns that hinder people who do IoT or to be successful or to change their operations for the better. And so this is where we help. And this is where we come in to say, here is a place where you can see this is the art of the possible, other people have done it before, which make it more easy to adapt to what is already existing and what is proven and to move on from there and not starting from scratch. Yeah,
I think the market is screaming for that. I think we've got to venture beyond the hypothetical, yeah, I can do this. But where, and have the real, something that's touchable smelled like, there it is right there. And it's doing this, and this is the value proposition and recognize that I see customers, they're all dealing with their own set of challenges. So you got to start there to figure out what the problem is, what they're looking for, and how to solve it. But then, you know, be able to use some use case. But that's not what we're going to talk about. We can we can definitely riff on that for a long time. But I don't want to talk about that. I want to talk about women and technology. You're here you were at this conference, you were on a panel talking about women and technology. Can you explain to the listeners what that what that was? First of
all, it was great fun, because I had bright, super intelligent, powerful woman or like just an A Polina and Alicia seen a Paris and an instance of kowski around me, and Jessica, and Lisa being CEOs of relayer, and a rebellion. And the fun fact is, we all showed up for the, let's say, pre read to this thing in bright red colors, and everybody, you know, by design, but individually. And we just said, Yeah, we're here to make a statement on why we need more diversity in the sector, and how we can help and that we are up for leveraging our personal platforms in order to do this. So
I think it's a no brainer, don't get me wrong. I I I'm just looking for the right person, the right insights, the intelligence, the smarts. So is there still a reluctance to? or is there an encouragement to direct women to technology? What's What, what, what's the beef?
The problem is multi fold that makes it so difficult to tackle because you have systemic issues, you have individual issues, you have geopolitical issues. I mean, the easiest is to say, let's install a quota and then it will be cured in a couple of years, which probably is not the case. Because if you installed the borders, but then you do not have then female leaders that feel belonging to the culture and feel happy where they are. It's never never going to work. So you can look at is there a diversity, and I mean, for us also, at Siemens diversity is so much more than just gender diversity, we talk about diversity, inclusion and belonging. And that means everybody is welcome to the party. Everybody is not only allowed to dance on the party, but we want everybody to dance in order to enrich our culture. Because we not only believe we see proven by a lot of studies, the more diversity means the more resilient the more sustainable, the more successful solutions. So but I mean, for society, it's the easiest to look into gender diversity first, and maybe we'll stick to that. The problem is, if you look at a typical pyrometer, and you want to have more leaders on top, you need to grow them from the bottom and just falling from the sky. So actually, it starts in school. It starts in how kids are taught mathematics. Then it starts on what is the perception on the technology sector. So I dropped math in 12th grade because it just simply wasn't a good at it. I couldn't find any meaning is
okay, whatever exactly what
people perceive or what females perceive if you want to go in technology, you need to be an engineer and you need to be good in mathematics. This is the the chain that basically, this is what we what we present to the outside world. So there is so much more needed in technology, you need UX UI designer, you need customer succession managers, you need to have people that understands the buyer journey in order to present them the right portfolio to match their their needs. And there's so much more needed. You need management skills, yeah, you need to have social skills like hell, because in order to be able to reduce this complexity, and to maneuver through ever getting more volatile times, you need different skill sets. But this is not what we talk about technology to the outside world. And thus, also with a lack of role models, young females look at the thing says, there's nothing in the form. And this is why we are lacking people, we are lacking young female talents moving into technology, and then then comes to the systemic issue. And then they need to move all through the hierarchies of the super companies that we see and need to stay there and not being you know, completely disappointed by, I cannot work flexible. I want to become a mom who's taking care of the kids, etc, up. So there's a lot of issues that we have to tackle. And also when it comes to the systemic issue of the bias that we all have. It is a young female talent would say something and then somebody else will he phrase it 30 minutes later, and then it's got to be his idea. There's less protection in the way. Okay, thanks
for just repeating what, Jessica Nina, Joe,
whoever said in the first place, this is something that is also very hard to tackle. And this is just only one thing. I can report on incidents I had years ago when I entered the boardroom, in one of my employers. And then somebody said, Oh, the decoration is entering room. And so this is something I say okay. That he does. And that is either your, your prep for that, yes. Okay, I take it with a good portion of humor. And let's, let's see, this is laughing in the end. Or you just, you know, you're hurt by it, because it's like, it's like sandpaper on your skin?
Yes, I just, I think it's fine. To try to unravel what you were saying. I think one of the things that I gravitate to is is the the education component, instilling that passion in the beginning, having the institutions that have the education institutions that, that encourage that I think that that's a that's so important. And to your point. I mean, to, you know, you don't have to be a whiz at at math, I wasn't. But then you know, you have other skills and other abilities. But I think that encouraging from a from a young youth on up, I think that's incorrect. Let me ask you this about Siemens. With that said, you've got a culture you've got certain passions about, about that diversity, inclusion, all of that good stuff. That's all fantastic. So how does Siemens an organization, be able to take take the women, the woman the workforce, and then begin to work them up? There's a program associated for
that. We have several programs, because they are not always working on a global scale. Yeah, you need to take the local circumstances into consideration. It might be something working in the US, but it's not working in India. Yeah, because the social setting and context is completely different. So there are a lot of local elements and activities, there is a global equity program that we that we launched, and that has a lot of sub segments and sub activities, in order to really dig into all the different areas that are just mentioned, there you have a bias, you have the opportunity to source the talents in and make them grow, so to speak. And that is it has completely different facets. And that also is very nice, because then the young talents can look into where do they feel belonging? What does what speak to them in terms of the activity that they then also can choose and are maybe also eligible for. And for us, it's very important also to put the role models in place and the role models is not just somebody like me, who's fighting for the ones that are stepping into my footsteps, but it is something about male advocacy. And that is what Jessica Polina yesterday brought up it's not about male allies because male allies is just like, Yeah, I would jump in if need be, and but it's more a passive role that that is behind it. If you're talking about male advocates that are male making an effort in order to help young females rise and thrive, and this is what we also look for, what are the male advocates that make an effort that make room and space and share their knowledge and I happy in order to to make young females thrive in the organization?
Is there a mentor type of outside Get the mail, I get that, yes, they've got to step up, they've got to not whatever, they've got to be supportive and all of that good stuff and help. Is there a mentor program that lets say, hey, Bettina, mentored her or whatever it might be?
Yeah, that's, um, we have this. And we have that in literally every business unit because this also designed around what are the needs in that business unit that help female rise to the top now. So you need work skills, you need soft skills and personal skills and that all needs to work together. So I personally am involved in two programs, the one is the sponsor her program, yeah, where you find the senior exec where you find senior leadership people, male and female, and you figure out who chemistry wise and knowledge wise or the best to each other. And then you have the sessions, you have counseling, you have coaching and mentoring sessions with these young talents. And that proves to be super successful because you come from the same area, you know, what's working, what's not working, you can share your knowledge tool, you understand what is the specific situation that person is in, and it's easier. So that's the one thing that's working in a lot of areas and a lot of flags, which I'm heavily involved in, I love this working, because also I get so much back from this young talents, and learn from them the same as they might learn from me.
I'm a big fan of the youth insight.
Yeah, and it's not only us, um, sometimes the gap in age, it's not even that big, but it's the gap in the hierarchy. And that comes with totally different shapes and sizes. Yeah. And the second thing that I'm doing, I'm active in our grow to blow network. And that is a women for women, no female for female network, where we find also sponsors and coaches and leaders that help other other people find. And I mean, we look at it and says, yeah, that coaching is a nice thing. But it's really does make a difference to the lives of so many people. And I'm just giving you an example, in one of my sessions that I had speaking in front of a bigger group of these coaches, a young female stepped on set with Tina, I needed advice, do you recommend adapting to more male behavior in order to be more successful in the company? And I was just like, yeah, there was, No, I have to digest it. And I said, Give me a second to think about it. And I in my, in my mind, there was this swirl of what does that mean? Does that mean she needs to speak and low voice? Does that mean that she needs to show up only in decent, black, gray, white dresses that she needs to make? A you know, whatever? cut her hair? I don't know. So there were a lot of things in at the same time in my mind? And the answer was, Don't you dare.
Beautiful. I was getting ready. I was so I was holding my breath. I was gonna say You better not say yes. Because I was.
Yes. So for me it was that everybody was looking at me. And I said this is this will be two steps back. Don't do this. Whatever you need in order to thrive and to excel and to feel strong and having somebody your back call me in any way anytime. 24/7 I'm here. But we need more diverse thinking behavior. We know, we know, we know that diversity is success criteria for the future. So what happens if you copy male behavior, this is making it even worse. So this is not what we want. But we are living in this in this friction time. Yeah, we're seeing declining the one leading culture and making room for other cultures that move in and in this X in the middle of this is the friction phase. And this is where everybody has it. And that's why you cannot step back if you need to step up. And my job is to make sure that the young females have a problem solving pool that they can tap into and say if this situation occurs, I'm proud because I have spoken that group with patina and I'm stronger I feel much more practical this one and it can stand the storm if it arises. So this is what we all need to do stepping up and making an effort in order to work against the bias and making these young teammates
your rockstar. I do I think you're I love that kind of guy. Yeah, you do you're you're pretty spectacular. Because I think you're you're you're hitting on all cylinders on on all of these topics. I was just when you when that young lady walked up to you and said Do I need to be more I would say no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I don't want to I don't want that. Never ever. So somebody's out there saying gosh, I want to know more about patina. How do they get a hold here?
I'm easily to find on LinkedIn. It's a Tina. or testimonials from Siemens Sue.
And do I have to say it like, because I won't because I can spell it. It's gonna be out on industrial talk. Exactly. See what I tell you listeners. Again, she does not disappoint at all. All right, again. Thank you. Thank you. Excellent. All right listeners we are once again day three IoT solutions World Congress, we are broadcasting live great venue, great people, great professionals like Bettina, all around here. So put that on your bucket list. We are going to wrap it up on the other side. So do not go away. We're going to have all the contact information for patina and then some at industrial talk. So stay tuned, we will be right back. You're listening to the industrial talk Podcast Network.
Again, thank you very much but Tina for being on industrial talk. You are a rock star at Digital rock star. Thank you very much. Thank you for what you're doing. Thank you for speaking about women in technology, important conversation. Excellent job. Also listeners go out to siemens.com Siemens accelerators out there right on the homepage right there with the Learn More button. This is the to accelerate your digital transformation. Yeah, you need to be in the digital transformation game you do and you need trusted individuals to help you with that journey. That's right patina team Siemens. absolutely a must wonderful industrial talk is creating a platform a platform dedicated to industrial education. Please support us in every way possible. All right. Be bold. Be brave. Yeah. dare greatly you guys are are just absolute incredible individuals you in industry. So hang out with people who are bold, brave and daring greatly in you're gonna change the world. Thank you very much for what you're doing. We're gonna have another great conversation shortly.
About the author, Scott
I am Scott MacKenzie, husband, father, and passionate industry educator. From humble beginnings as a lathing contractor and certified journeyman/lineman to an Undergraduate and Master’s Degree in Business Administration, I have applied every aspect of my education and training to lead and influence. I believe in serving and adding value wherever I am called.
