Ilse Henne loves to laugh. You might think that the Chairwoman of the Supervisory Board of Thyssenkrupp Steel doesn't have much to laugh about. But the 52-year-old, who took up her position on the Supervisory Board in September, following the exodus from the Executive Board and Supervisory Board, seems to have settled into her new role. The Belgian has been working for Thyssenkrupp for 25 years, and follows the long tradition in Essen of taking on responsibility.

„Knut Giesler, my deputy on the Supervisory Board, and I looked each other in the eye and decided to work together in a spirit of trust,“ says Henne. She does not want to talk about internal Supervisory Board matters. This is understandable after the impression was gained in the summer that the future plan for the steel division was being negotiated in public, and not in the responsible committees. This should now come to an end.

The linguist and literature graduate skilfully dodges the burning question of the appearance and behaviour of Czech billionaire Daniel Křetínský, who has acquired a 20% stake in the steel division, and gained a seat on the Supervisory Board. She says she knows nothing beyond what is already publicly known. And before you know it, the conversation turns to George Clooney. Years ago, Henne stayed in the same hotel in Paris as George Clooney and Brad Pitt, who were filming in the French capital. As luck would have it, she even rode in the lift with the VIPs. However, it is not known whether it was a lift from Thyssenkrupp Elevator. Thyssenkrupp sold its lift division to private equity in 2020.

Henne has been a member of the Executive Board of the company since January of this year, and would have enough to do even without the Supervisory Board job at the weakening steel division. Especially since she also became CEO of materials trading, i.e. the Material Services (MX) division, in June. Henne began her professional career there as a sales manager, and gradually climbed the career ladder. In 2019, she made the leap to the MX Management Board, first as COO and later as Chief Transformation Officer.

There is no way around the transformation in materials trading either. „I'm looking forward to it,“ says the manager, who completed a postgraduate degree including post-master's courses in business management. However, the transformation also involves job cuts at MX, especially in Germany, where a redundancy programme was recently concluded to cut 450 full-time positions.

According to Henne, the weakness of the domestic market is the biggest challenge for the company, which is represented in 30 countries. Nevertheless, she is confident that she can also find success with customers in this country via the intelligent and sustainable management of materials and supply chains.

There is no doubt that Henne's heart beats for materials trading. That's why she thinks it's a shame that Thyssenkrupp is primarily perceived by the public as a steel group. „Thyssenkrupp has much more to offer,“ she says. At the same time, she appreciates the company's long tradition, which now needs to be carried into the future. This translates into her management style. „I try to take people along with me, but I also always have a North Star firmly anchored,“ says Henne. In other words, there is a clear target, but she lets people talk to her about how to get there.

Henne experienced first-hand that managers at Thyssenkrupp need a thick skin when it came to her appointment to the Thyssenkrupp AG Executive Board, beginning in January. The employee representatives on the Supervisory Board railed against the planned increase in the Executive Board –Volkmar Dinstuhl was also promoted alongside Henne.

In the end, Supervisory Board Chairman Siegfried Russwurm had to use his double voting rights to expand the management body, poisoning the atmosphere on Thyssenkrupp's Supervisory Board. But Henne does not take the fact that the employee side voted unanimously against her personally. „I always got on well with the employee representatives, both before and after,“ she says. Perhaps this is why the steel division has become comparatively quiet in the public eye.