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InspireME: How I gained the Trust of the Brand Owners
The world of Tech has always been a tight-knit community and breaking into their inner circle requires talent, skill, education, and perseverance. Here’s a great story from Alaa Abdel Baky on how he managed to do all this in a high-tech environment.
It was in 2001, I joined Siemens mobile as an Assistant manager in the customer care department. I was in Dubai for less than a year working for a local company and had a dream to join a big multinational organization and start building my career.
The first thing my manager did when I joined was to send me to Germany to spend 3 weeks with the technical team in Düsseldorf and in the factory in the small town called Kamp-Lintfort.
The team at the factory were the tech masters and top-notch technical experts who knew the function of each component on the PCB. A bit of apprehension from both sides ensued with the language and cultural differences, I had to take the responsibility of managing the technical aspects in the region after all. Initially, it had been a bit challenging as I had to build their trust in my capabilities so they could share the knowledge openly.
I recalled my German colleagues to be initially well-guarded and seemed introverted, not…
