Margriet Hooghiemstra is the Strategy Program Director at Covestro (formerly DSM) Additive Manufacturing team, working from the Netherlands.
Before joining the AM team, she worked at McKinsey & Co as a strategy consultant. She is our Women in 3D Printing Guest #284!
Nora Touré: Margriet, Could you let us know briefly about your background and your journey into Additive Manufacturing?
Margriet Hooghiemstra: I started my career as a strategy consultant with McKinsey & Company, working across many different industries and on a wide variety of topics.
On my very first engagement, for a large logistics company, 3D printing was introduced as a far-out innovation that one day could rock the logistics industry.
In the second half of my time with McKinsey, I specialized in energy and sustainability, mainly working with industrial and manufacturing players on their journey in the energy transition. Also there, 3D printing was often a promising innovation, but not yet part of their core operating model.
A bit over a year ago I started my role with the DSM Additive Manufacturing team. Our goal is to accelerate the adoption of 3D printing for manufacturing by providing fit-for-purpose materials.
We recently transitioned to Covestro, where we aim to continue that journey to enable a more sustainable way of producing.
Nora Touré: Can you tell us more about your role: Strategy Program Director at Covestro?
Margriet Hooghiemstra: The additive manufacturing industry is incredibly dynamic and fragmented: many different technologies and applications exist today, with new ones continuously popping up.
Developing materials, on the other hand, takes time.
My role as Strategy Program Director is to set and keep the direction in that dynamic industry by putting in place the right plans for our organization and making sure we execute those plans.
This means understanding the market and creating a strategic road map based on that, while also helping to push forward some of our larger strategic initiatives.
Examples of the latter are our medical & dental and construction & infrastructure segments, our efforts in digital and sustainability, but also our internal reporting, communications, and quality management.
I need to give the full team a big shout-out here by the way: my background lies in strategy, not in additive manufacturing. So, to make all the plans and strategies I mentioned, I have leaned heavily on the knowledge and experience of my colleagues.
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