We are Lien Kemper and Priska Göbel-Ralph – two Siemens colleagues, with different development paths, who crossed road at our current station: The Supply Chain Management DigiNetwork, short the “DigiNetwork”. It may sound cheesy, like a love letter, it is our dream job!

Priska Göbel-Ralph (left) and Lien Kemper (right), Founders of the DigiNetwork, both located in Germany

We are founders, thought leaders and mindsetters of the DigiNetwork. We have passionately created our environment to innovate from the inside.

First things first: What is the DigiNetwork about?

Some of the 300+ DigiNetwork members. Learn more about the DigiNetwork here.

The DigiNetwork consists of more than 300 digital enthusiasts who are spread across the Siemens world in different functions inside and outside SCM (Supply Chain Management). Our purpose? To drive the digital transformation in SCM and Siemens.

The DigiNetwork is, however, more than a simple “network”. More so, it is an ever-growing ecosystem that focuses on experience sharing and realizing concrete innovation projects. An ecosystem which connects the countless dots, such as people and partners, ideas and solutions, knowledge and experience on the way to digital transformation.

How does the DigiNetwork make all of that happen? By collaborating across all forms of boundaries – be it organizational, functional, or hierarchical. By simply trying out things, acting bottom-up, learning from failures, and enabling each other. All of that requires a certain kind of mindset, a growth mindset: open, curious, adaptive.

Get to know two of the network’s founders.

Let us introduce ourselves. Starting with Lien.

I am Vietnamese looking with a German accent when speaking English. Born in Vietnam, I moved to Germany at the age of 12, I have lived in quite a few countries in the world. My studies and work brought me to the U.S., Mexico, France, China and Australia.

I started my career at a multinational FMCG where I became a highly skilled purchaser and successful leader. I was climbing the traditional career ladder. A headhunter call changed my path 7 years ago: I joined Siemens because it intrigued me to work in Management Consultancy. I have not done it before. Also, I thought the boss who hired me was greatly minded.

Having great role-model as leaders and the freedom to shape are of great importance to me.

In my career, I had a station where I felt not empowered. The business was successful. ‘Don`t do things differently ‘ was the common mindset.

I was in that job for six months and changed it. Siemens offered me to join Supply Chain Management after leading a digitalization program within the company. Here, I realized that digitalization is more than tools and technology. It starts in the head and deeper, in the mind. Teaming up with passionate colleagues, I founded the DigiNetwork to drive transformation from the bottom up and the middle out. The DigiNetwork has brought to life many powerful projects (visit the DigiNetwork Page for more).

My next endeavor is a 6-month sabbatical with my young family. Siemens is also amazing in this aspect. It took one single call to my boss to get the sabbatical thing rolling. Initially, we wanted to travel from South to North America. With the pandemic, we’ll just go with the flow and see where life leads us. Go with the flow – I can`t wait!

Over to Priska.

When I was in my final stage at high school, as for many young people at the time, the big questions arose: Where do I want to go in my professional life? What am I passionate about?

These are tricky questions, especially if you enjoy a broad variety of subjects. Equally inspired by natural sciences on the one end of the spectrum, economy, and law, as well as languages and communication on the other end – the choice was not an easy one. I finally decided to go for European Business Administration, thereby being able to combine many (though not all ) of my interests. At that time, I would never have thought that – more than 16 years later – working in the digital arena within Siemens Procurement would allow myself to live these passions, and even discover new ones.

After graduating university, I started my career in the Procurement organization of a big supplier to the automotive industry. Since then, I was able to discover the extremely diversified possibilities that Procurement has to offer. I gathered broad experiences in various Procurement jobs outside and inside Siemens, working both as a team lead as well as an individual contributor, including the operational and strategic range, from Business Unit via Division to Corporate.

Despite this varied spectrum from the past, working for the DigiNetwork now offers me a whole new ‘bunch of flowers’ and gives me the possibility to grow in whole new areas. This includes communication as I am taking care of marketing activities for the DigiNetwork – not the first topic you would think about in Procurement. Another huge passion of mine has become Change Management – in a very practical manner: As digital transformation foremost starts in the mind, developing and implementing hands-on programs is crucial to take all SCM colleagues on the journey. And it`s so much fun, too!

Every day, I literally have the chance to learn something new. What an exciting growth journey the DigiNetwork has to offer – for me and everyone!

Two different paths. A perfect joint.

Two different paths are combined via the DigiNetwork. A perfect joint. Founded on compassion, collaboration with others while serving the greater good. Siemens is much more than the known, traditional company. The example of the two of us greatly shows the vast engagement opportunity in Supply Chain Management and Siemens in general. Calling a spade, a spade: we have passionately created our own environment to innovate from the inside.

Are you also keen on creating your own innovation environment? Check out our career opportunities on www.siemens.com/careers/digitalminds

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