Vanwege het internationale karakter van ons bedrijf en onze medewerkers hebben we hun verhalen en ervaringen in het Engels weergegeven.

"Performing at the highest level and just making it happen"

Marjel is the kind of person for whom a question is never too much to ask, and going the extra mile is in her DNA. Her job description contains maybe only half of all the activities she is performing in a day, and with over 30 years of service – and counting – she has tons of stories to tell.

Marjel about her position at Medtronic

At this moment, I am the Management Assistant for the Human Resources (HR) team for the functions & Employee and Labor Relations in EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa). Next to that, I am supporting the Dutch Leadership Team as well as the Heerlen
Works Counsel. Furthermore, I am also organizing events for all of the Netherlands, such as our annual Patient Event, the annual employee summer BBQ in Heerlen and the reception parties for our employees who are celebrating work anniversaries, etc.

Marjel’s education and career path

Over 30 years ago, I started as an administrative support in the engineering department. Back then, the pacemaker production facility was still located in Kerkrade. Over the years,
I grew a lot in my career. Since 1999, I am supporting HR. The HR Director back then asked me for this position and also here, my role evolved tremendously and it became very diverse and challenging.

Most challenging in my current role

The most challenging aspect in my role is to ‘juggle all the plates’ every day. All the different responsibilities, the different people whom I am working with, and the people who rely on my support, are keeping my work extremely diverse. But they also require that I perform at the highest level. How do I make the difference here? I have this ‘just make it happen’ attitude!

What I like most in my current job

What I like most in my current job are the standard things: I learn a lot in this role and I get an overview of the entire organization, not just HR alone. Organizing the events is also very energizing! It is so rewarding to receive the responses or recognitions from employees, but also from people outside of Medtronic.

A while back, I brought a relative into contact with someone from our Diabetes business. That person – having diabetes for 40 years – decided to switch to the pump and he was so grateful. It made me feel very proud.

In 30 years, you get so much in return from colleagues, even the smallest things can be most rewarding. Maybe the best way to summarize it: it is the personal touch which this company has, despite our growth over the past years.

What I like about working for Medtronic

Our Mission is very powerful and resonates fully with my own values. It is great to see the pride of our employees with respect to our mission. Next to that, I like that, as an employee, you really are rewarded and recognized for your efforts.

Medtronic is my first employer and some things are very normal for me, but when speaking to friends, I realize that this is not normal at all. The opportunities you get here, the flexibility in how you fill in your job, the freedom, etc.

Also, what I like about Medtronic is that you are being heard. You can give your opinion and your advice is being followed up. By talking to people outside of Medtronic, I realized that this is quite extraordinary!

What ‘Further, Together’ means to me

‘Further, Together’ for me means bringing the products, patients and employees together at our annual Patient Event. Having employees listen to patients, to their personal and emotional stories, is very impressive. But also, the patients who meet the people behind the product or therapy, is very impactful. We hear it back from both employees and patients every year.

If you experience such an event, you realize that we are doing it together, all of us. We all need to be on the same page to make our company successful, and to help our patients.
I strongly believe the Patient Event highly contributes to this.

My most memorable experiences at Medtronic

This is not an easy question, since so much has happened in my 30 years at Medtronic.
One memorable experience, which I mentioned already before, is the annual Patient Event. Patients who dare to share their private medical stories with an audience of 1,500 Medtronic employees, remains impressive. We are organizing this event already for years in a row, but every year again, you end up with goosebump-encovered arms!