Ups & Downs On the 8th of November, Caitlin Riesewijk and Iris Borst visited the Dow Master Thesis Award 2021 of the Operations Management Logistics (OML) master’s program. After this ceremony, Caitlin interviewed Nancy Guiterrez and Jens Witlox, who are both employed at Dow. They talked extensively and enthusiastic about the ambition and values of the company and their new way of working. TEXT & DESIGN Caitlin Riesewijk
Dow’s ambition & values: Innovative, customer-centric, inclusive, sustainable Dow, an American company, is one of the three largest chemical producers in the world. Dow’s business portfolio of plastics, industrial intermediates and coatings and silicones provides a broad range of differentiated, science-based products and solutions to its customers in high-growth market segments, such as packaging, infrastructure, mobility and consumer care. Dow has 106 production sites in 31 countries and employs approximately 35,700 people globally. Dow’s ambition is to become the most innovative, customer-centric, inclusive, and sustainable materials science company in the world. The beating heart of Dow Benelux is in
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Terneuzen, which include 16 factories and approximately four thousand employees. As the largest employer in Zeelandic Flanders, Dow contributes to the region’s economic and societal success by supporting many initiatives and events. Jens Witlox and Nancy Gutierrez are both employed at Dow Benelux. Nancy Gutierrez is the Customer Service Director for Europe, Middle East, Africa, and India. In her role, she provides different level of operational and strategic support to the business and function. Jens Witlox is Supply Chain Manager at the business unit ‘Consumer Solutions’, which is mainly focused on the production of silicones. When people think about artificial intelligence, the main focus
is towards B2C organizations. Think about the automated chat robot that answers your basic banking questions or the Nexflix AI that provided you with your favorite movie yesterday evening. However, the B2B field has much to gain from AI as well and is increasingly using it. Sustainability
Nancy Gutierrez is enthusiastic about Dow’s ambitions on Sustainability: As part of our action plan to put us on path to Net Zero by 2050, we are committed to implementing and advancing technologies to manufacture our products using less resources, besides increasing energy efficiency of our operations, processes and
