 Frank Ulbricht - Yale EMEA's managing director |
Yale's Frank Ulbricht is a man focused on a future where his company is at all points on the globe - selling not just a product, but solutions.
Ulbricht, a business administration graduate, has seen many changes throughout his years in the industry. "You see many trends, companies consolidate and new competitors joining the markets, especially from Asia," he says. "We're moving more and more from selling products to selling solutions.
"The key is to have a full product offering and a well-educated sales staff. However, at the end of the day, it is about offering the highest level of products and services. This will never change.
"Our vision is to fill all our white spots on the distribution map as quickly as we can to become a major player in the EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) region," he says.
Ulbricht's professional life has revolved around building and developing international distribution networks for technical and investment products. "During the '90s, I worked for Wap Cleaning Systems as a regional manager for Europe and the Americas where I developed the dealer network for cleaning machines.
"Building and developing distribution structures is the underlying theme of my professional life. They all were hard work and very rewarding to share in the success.
"I also worked as the managing director for a UK sales company before I joined L.E.K. Consulting where I developed its industrial practice in Germany," he says. "In my most recent position, as head of sales overseas at Jungheinrich AG, I was responsible for all sales activities in Asia, the Americas and parts of Eastern Europe."
Ulbricht was appointed managing director for Yale EMEA in September '08 (
Forkliftaction.com News#378).
He is focused on developing Yale's existing dealer network and bringing new strong dealers on board. "The team is multinational and entrepreneurial, which spices up your day and makes life very enjoyable," he says.
He says he was attracted to his current role because of Yale EMEA's strong investment in products, production facilities, support functions and distribution networks. "These products now suit the European applications perfectly and I believe Yale is on target to become one of the few real global players in our industry," he explains. "I would like to contribute as much as possible to achieve this success."
Ulbricht says success in management is about listening. "You have to be a good listener - to customers, distributors and your own staff," he explains. "Things are not always black or white; often they are somewhere in between.
"But when you have made a decision, you should follow it through strongly and give clear guidance to everybody involved."