Manuela Wild is a Telekom ambassador with a passion. With her initiatives, she impressively demonstrates that our corporate influencers stand for more than just the color magenta. For example, she has created the #Wildgehege: a social exchange platform which takes part every Thursday evening to promote the exchange of ideas across company boundaries. This creates more discourse at eye level.
What effects do you have in your role as Telekom ambassador?
“We TELEKOM AMBASSADORs are proud of our work, our employer and the performance of our colleagues in the entire Telekom Group. We demonstrate our pride internally and externally giving Telekom a face. We are present, approachable and draw attention to issues which are important to us. To me these are primarily technical topics and news from the industry like #5G.
We are not trained communicators who do this full-time, however. We do provide an insight into our everyday working and also into our private life. We are independent of any "instructions" - e.g. from a communications department but we are in close contact with each other. Our work is voluntary as well as self-motivated and -organized. My personal environment reacts real positive. Many people think it's great that I have so much passion for my job and I see it that way as well. We don’t spend more time awake anywhere as we do at work. So it’s best that we really enjoy what we do...
My neighbors know where I work as well. This enables me to advise them on a new product or answer a question across the garden fence.
How useful is your appearance in social networks?
Personally, my #ProudToBeT-activities bring me a lot. I find it enriching to exchange ideas with others. Through the social media you meet people you would never have met otherwise. This sometimes brings completely new perspectives into play. It is also a good opportunity to network with people outside our company. Whether it's online or through events that you wouldn't have heard about without social media.
This also applies, of course, to discussions with critics. A new point of view can be helpful to look at a topic differently. An open dialogue as well. This discourse at eye level is good for both sides.
And what’s the “Wildgehege”?
From a Twitter dialogue with a colleague from Daimler, we came up with the idea of initiating a casual exchange outside working hours, so that we could simply exchange ideas without an agenda or concrete goals. The #Wildgehege was born . Since the middle of March, about 30 people have been meeting in a video conference each Thursday evening, the participants are widely spread across company boundaries - there are also some external Telekom ambassadors present. For me, this is a simple implementation of our Corona claim #WirSindFürEuchDa ( We are here for you ), but we are primarily here for each other, to conduct conversations at eye level".
Further information about the TELEKOM BOTSCHAFTER program
Manuela did not only answer some questions for us: In a long interview with communications and strategy consultant Kerstin Hoffmann, she explains in detail how she works as an ambassador. These insights have been published in the current book "Markenbotschafter - Erfolg mit Corporate Influencern" by Haufe Verlag. A short overview of the programme is provided by 10 questions to the TELEKOM BOTSCHAFTER.
