Staffing Up

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Electronics and engineering conglomerate Siemens AG (NYSE: SI) already has 421,000 employees in 1,640 locations around the globe. Yet with a new worldwide focus on infrastructure, health care and energy solutions such as wind power, the company is creating more jobs. President and CEO Peter Löscher says it’s a case of identifying opportunities — even in tough economic times for some of Siemens’ key markets — and directing the company’s resources accordingly. “We laid the foundation for economic growth quite a while ago by addressing the megatrends of demographic change, urbanization, climate change and globalization,” says Löscher, 54. “The current economic crisis didn’t catch us unawares. We never let up during the recession, which has helped us come out of it relatively unscathed.”

Courtesy Siemens

Siemens CEO Peter Löscher

As a result, Löscher says, today the company is a “pioneer in energy efficiency, industrial productivity, affordable and personalized health care, and intelligent infrastructure solutions.” Being a leader in those fields, he says, contributes to a reputation that draws a dedicated workforce from around the world.

In fact, Siemens created more than 16,000 jobs worldwide in the first nine months of fiscal 2011 as Löscher pushed the company in new directions and into new markets. A native of Austria and a former pharmaceutical industry executive whom Siemens recruited in 2007 as the first outsider to head the company in its 164-year history, he has taken a far more global perspective than some of his predecessors, perhaps owing to stints in locales as diverse as Japan, Spain and the U.S. (He also studied at The Chinese University of Hong Kong.)

Löscher believes that adding diversity to Siemens’ workforce is crucial to its ability to grow in new geographic and sector markets. “We need to create great, diverse teams made up of people who believe in the company’s totality and have the right passion,” he explains. “At the end of the day, there must be chemistry.”

A U.S. Push

Siemens is particularly interested in growth in the U.S., where it already employs more than 60,000 in some 100 manufacturing facilities. The company reports “significant orders,” such as a contract to supply Amtrak with 70 energy-efficient electric locomotives, which will create 250 green manufacturing jobs at three plants. Siemens also is expanding an Illinois facility that makes wind turbines and an Iowa wind blade manufacturing plant, together generating some 1,100 jobs.

In explaining why Siemens is spending nearly $200 million to build a gas turbine factory in Charlotte, N.C., Löscher notes: “By manufacturing here, we get proximity to our largest market, highly skilled workers educated at some of the world’s best universities — with access to the best research facilities — and cutting-edge innovation that we can link directly to our manufacturing sites.” That plant, which expects to employ 1,000 people and spur 2,000 indirect jobs, is slated to export gas turbines to markets across the world.

JUST THE FACTS

Headquarters
Munich, Germany

Revenue
$103.4 billion (fiscal 2010)

Market cap*
$87.9 billion

Employees
421,000

Listed since
March 12, 2001

*As of 10/17/2011

Siemens added around 1,000 new U.S. jobs last fiscal year, taking advantage of a small resurgence in manufacturing and tax incentives. For example, the company, which is investing $2.9 million to expand a smart-grid project in Wendell, N.C., is set to receive up to $2.6 million in state tax incentives if it meets its goals of creating 139 new jobs.

Yet Siemens frequently finds itself unable to hire enough qualified workers — despite U.S. unemployment rates topping 9 percent. Currently the company is looking to fill more than 12,000 positions worldwide, including more than 3,000 in the U.S. Many of these jobs are for workers that vocational schools used to train when manufacturing employed a higher percentage of the U.S. workforce.

To help qualify would-be employees, Siemens launched an apprenticeship program modeled on its long-standing practice in Germany. The company pays high school seniors an hourly wage to learn a skill, then puts them through a two-year community college. When finished, they have an inside track to be hired by Siemens. Currently the company provides this training to nearly 10,000 young people in Germany, Saudi Arabia, Russia and the U.S.

A Powerful Advantage

Beyond the U.S., Siemens has doubled its emerging-markets revenues since 2005, Löscher says, and continues to expand aggressively in markets such as China — although he admits that market is becoming more challenging as local engineering firms mature. “For many years, we had no serious trouble finding talent,” the CEO says, “but now we compete with Chinese companies seeking graduates as well.”

Yet he says Siemens’ reputation as a global powerhouse gives it an edge when it comes to hiring. “We build the world’s biggest gas turbine, the fastest CAT scan and some of the fastest passenger trains,” remarks Löscher. “That’s how the hearts of young engineers get opened.”