Word: germanize
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Inside Siemens, the habits of Germany Inc. have been dying for a long time. In fact, the company has changed so much that it's fair to ask whether Siemens is really a German company anymore. Siemens has businesses in the U.S. ranging from water technologies to medical equipment that employ 104,100 people and generate $31 billion in sales, some 26% of revenue. Asia, where Siemens is building low-emission coal-fired power plants in Shanghai, accounts for 15% of the company's sales. In Europe, excluding Germany, Siemens has 127,400 employees and nearly a third...
...visit to the company's industrial-steam-turbine business in Görlitz, a provincial city on the Neisse River, which divides Germany and Poland. Kleinfeld walked into a meeting with about 200 of the division's staff, shook a few hands and launched into a pep talk in German. As he started to hit his stride, many of the division's top executives looked on dumbfounded. Then Rene Umlauft, the division CEO, intervened, waving his hand at Kleinfeld and forcing him to stop midsentence. "Excuse me, Mr. Kleinfeld," said Umlauft. "But you can't speak German here. They...
...growing number of non-German engineers is a result of economics and education. Countries like India, China and the Czech Republic are producing highly qualified engineers who are less expensive than their German counterparts. And it's not just engineers who are caught in the global squeeze. In 2004 Siemens extracted an agreement from its workforce at two mobile-phone-handset plants in Bocholt and Kamp-Lintfort to work longer hours and accept a cut in holiday pay. Frustrated union leaders say they were blackmailed into eating what amounted to a 20% wage cut. "We had to accept these terms...
...pressure from global competition inside and outside Siemens has a huge impact on careers. While there are still very few non-Germans in high executive positions, they are becoming more common. For example, a year ago, Umlauft needed a director for global sales. "Everyone expected me to appoint a German," he says. "But I hired a guy out of India. He's now in Görlitz, and he's a great sales...
...Erlangen, Germany, to run Siemens' global image- and knowledge-management business. "I have never come across any ceiling--visible or invisible," Singh says. "If you look at a 10-year span for somebody born in India, working in the U.S. and responsible for a global business at a German-based company, I would view that as best in class...