Since 2014 Ingrid Deltenre has been engaged at her Alma Mater – first as Vice President and since one year as President of the Executive Committee of the Executive MBA of the UZH.

After many years as Director of large companies, Ingrid Deltenre has returned to the UZH at least in part – as President of the Executive Committee of the Executive MBA of the UZH. The election as “Executive Board Member of the Year” is the icing on the cake of her remarkable career.

Brigitte Blöchlinger

The subjects Ingrid Deltenre took at the UZH did not look like promoting a steep career as an Executive: Pedagogy, Journalism and Biological Anthropology. “The combination was purely interest-driven,” says Ingrid Deltenre. “I was particularly interested in biological anthropology and journalism – I really put my heart and soul into them.

The main subject, pedagogy, finally fell by the wayside when choosing a career. She became general secretary of the Swiss Press Association, then moved to the Ringier publishing house, where she took up her first management position: Publishing Director of the business paper “Cash”. For six years she was the Director of Swiss Television and then Head of the Directorate General of the European Broadcasting Union in Geneva.

On the “soft carpet level”

Deltenre’s Board of Directors mandates are as varied as her fields of study: at the age of 45, she started as President of the Board of Directors of TV Productioncenter Zurich, followed by the Board of Directors of the Cantonal Bank of Vaud, Givaudan, Agence France Press, Sunrise Communications and Deutsche Post DHL Group.

A proud performance – especially considering that the proportion of women on boards of directors in Switzerland is only about 32 percent. And it’s not a typical career for a woman who chooses to study the subjects she did. The question then arises: why didn’t Ingrid Deltenre come across the infamous glass ceiling – why didn’t she, like many other women in the course of her career, reach a point where things simply couldn’t get any better, no matter how hard she tried? In the video above she talks about her recipe for success.

Exemplary Leadership Principles

Last June, she was the first person in Switzerland to receive the Women’s Board Award. The six-member jury, made up of board members from various industries, justified its election as Board Member of the Year not only with the mandates and qualifications Deltenre has to offer. The decisive factor was the “responsible Leitkultur (leadership principles) that she demands and exemplifies”. Ingrid Deltenre herself is convinced that diversity changes the corporate culture. More women on management committees should primarily be the responisbility of the respective management and human resources departments. Because the role model function is important – “to see that there are women who have made it,” she told the magazine “Finanz und Wirtschaft” at the award ceremony.

President Executive MBA of the UZH

Since 2014 Ingrid Deltenre has also been engaged again at her Alma Mater – first as Vice President and since one year as President of the Executive Committee of the Executive MBA of the UZH (EMBA). The EMBA programs are designed to be extra-occupational and provide prospective executives with the management basics and practical tools for a management position at home and abroad. As EMBA President, Ingrid Deltenre can contribute her broad management experience to the continuing education program at the UZH’s Faculty of Economics and Business Administration – and occasionally even some of her pedagogical insights.

In her spare time, the Holland-Swiss woman is drawn to the mountains. Her latest role is to on Board of Trustees of the Swiss Mountain Aid Foundation. But it doesn’t always have to be Switzerland, Ingrid Deltenre is a cosmopolitan person. At the moment, the Far East is tempting: “I don’t know Mongolia at all, that’s where I’d like to go. I would also like to travel to China and Japan.

Whatch the video in German produced by Brigitte Blöchlinger, Video Editor UZH.