Interview
Digital Transformation Manager
Sabrina Schubert

As the “Digital Transformation Manager,” Sabrina Schubert and her team from the “Digital Transformation Office” (DTO) have been driving digitization at WAGO forward since August.

Sabrina Schubert, 24, originally comes from Velbert, a small town in the heart of the Ruhr district situated between Essen and Wuppertal. After realizing that the law studies program in Bielefeld was not the right thing for her, she decided to study business administration, focusing on controlling, finance, and accounting. In addition to her studies, Sabrina also trained as a key interdisciplinary competency tutor with a focus on communication and presentation. In addition, she gave tutorials on soft skills, as well as on mathematics and statistics. After getting her degree, she joined WAGO directly – she explains in an interview how she "ended up" in the Digital Transformation Office.

You studied business administration with a focus on controlling. What ultimately motivated you to become a Digital Transformation Manager?

The story of how I became the Digital Transformation Manager is a bit complicated - but I'd still like to tell it. While studying, I became aware of the topic of digitization – originally in the area of finance. Arising from my interest in disruptive FinTechs and cryptocurrencies, I then took part in digital conferences, completed an internship at a bank and wrote a conceptual bachelor's thesis in the field of FinTechs – but with a focus on behavioral economics (part of which is also online here). I learned that digitization entails an all-encompassing change, and I asked myself how I could become a “digital controller and financier” – or, in other words, what comes next? My answer: Data Scientist. So I applied at WAGO as a controller, with the goal of doing my master's and then learning data science from there. I was invited for an interview, and I also talked about digitization, which led me to Mareen Vaßholz. It turned out that being a Digital Transformation Manager serves exactly the fields that I enjoy: digitization, figures and data, communication and psychology, concepts. It combines my human and my analytical knowledge.

What motivates you most about your job?

Two aspects motivate me primarily in my job: First, I do not want to pursue my work as an end in itself, but rather help others with it. After all, only together can we make a difference. As a Digital Transformation Manager, I can use my analyses, concepts and knowledge to help others in the company advance – this is of great value to me personally. And secondly, I want to be in the front row when the world changes. And that change is called digitization, because that's where the exciting things happen that don't take place in a textbook. I have already tried augmented and virtual reality myself, steered a drone (into a tree unfortunately), experimented with artificial intelligence and simulated the course of a share purchase with algorithms. As a Digital Transformation Manager, I’m now working in a professional environment that extends beyond data science, articles and gadgets with these topics and those still to come.

As a Digital Transformation Manager, I can use my analyses, concepts and knowledge to help others in the company advance – this is of great value to me personally.

In the DTO, you promote digitization and support a large number of projects. Do you have an especially interesting/exciting project at the moment and can you give us an insight into other topics?

At the moment I'm working out a lot conceptually on the one hand, and on the other hand, I provide a great deal of support, such as by analyzing work results or making recommendations for action. Two projects are particularly interesting to me at the moment. I've also been able in the last few weeks to help answer the question of how we deal with partnerships at WAGO in the future. A decision-making basis should be established for this. The team provided precise feedback, so that we made good progress with the concept.

Secondly, we are currently working on laying the foundations for data-driven business models. We can begin as soon as the preparations have been completed. As a “freshman,” I am particularly happy about any support I receive. I would therefore like to take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks to everyone who has supported my work so far.

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