WE MOVE. YOU WIN.
People
A life in motion
In this inspiring story, we meet Dr. Himanshu Trivedi. As a ten year old boy living in India, he dreamt of becoming an engineer. Now, he’s Vice President, Head of Quality Management and Health, Safety and Environment (HSE) at Bosch Rexroth. Discover the fascinating story of his rich and varied career, which crosses continents and spans more than 25 years – and find out why he’s motivated to keep you moving.
I was born in India and grew up in Ahmedabad, Gujarat – the state where Mahatma Gandhi was born. I went to a school that taught me, not only academic subjects, but also important principles, such as discipline, respect for humanity and curiosity for knowledge. From the age of ten, I dreamt of becoming an engineer, so after I finished school, I went on to study Production Engineering at a college in Bhavnagar. This gave me a taste of subjects such as quality and industrial engineering – topics that are still very much of interest to me and relevant to my career now. This interest was further strengthened during my master’s studies from Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS-Pilani), a well-known college in India.
In 1994, I got a one-year apprentice engineer job at what was then G.L. Rexroth, working in the production shop in Ahmedabad. I didn’t know it at the time, but that was to be the beginning of a long and varied career at Bosch Rexroth, working not just in India, but also in Germany and South East Asia. I’ve been a team member, functional leader, group leader, regional leader, plant manager and central department leader, before becoming a global leader in my current role.
Himanshu Trivedi in 1994, when he joined Bosch Rexroth.
A day in a life
Since 2019, I’ve been working for Bosch Rexroth in Germany. I’ve recently stepped into my current role as Head of Quality Management and HSE, leading a global team of Quality Managers who are responsible for quality across our business.
I start my day early, get organized and prioritize my agenda based on business and stakeholder requirements. I’m a strong believer that learning is a lifelong process, so I like to spend time on reading and self-development.
Fortunately, personal development and education are very important to the company, so we’re all given the opportunity to learn and receive training.
Bosch Rexroth also has effective processes for leadership development, which helped me to progress. Being part of such a large organization enabled me to gain experience in other departments and seeing life outside of the quality department helped reinforce my belief that quality is everyone’s responsibility.
After my business meetings during the day, I spend time in the evening working on business related topics. I also like to take time to reflect on the day, and I make notes, focusing on what went well and what needs to be improved. At Bosch Rexroth, open feedback is encouraged, as it helps us all to expand, but I also like to give myself regular feedback as part of my own development.
A journey towards excellence
I’ve worked for Bosch Rexroth for 20 years and there are many reasons why I’ve chosen to stay with the company for so long.
Being part of an international company with colleagues and customers all around the world, I’m inspired on a daily basis by different cultural influences, different ideas and different ways of doing things.
I believe that quality topics are always culture and context dependent. So, in a global organization like ours, it’s important to have mutual trust, and an open dialogue about quality between ourselves and with our customers, to establish a unique and customer-facing direction for our company.
As well as diversity of people, there’s also diversity of product and technology. Working at the forefront of technological development, our business is fast-paced and we have a strong focus on innovation in our products and services. Training in the latest topics – such as IoT, digitalization and artificial intelligence – is provided, to make sure we’re developing solutions that are cutting-edge and deliver optimal benefit to our customers. Simplicity is another interesting topic that we explore – taking complex technologies and working out how we can make them easy-to-use.
There are two major aspects to my role. The first is to address the basics and create a strong foundation for quality upon which we can build our future. The second is to delve into new areas, such as Quality 4.0 and digitalization, to provide future-facing solutions for our customers. These projects involve cross-functional teams across multiple locations. It’s a real privilege to be able to draw on the knowledge and experience of so many talented people.
I strongly believe that no one is perfect alone, but together we can be the best team in the world.
Many of Bosch Rexroth’s values mirror my own: a belief in empowering people with trust; working together as a team to better our customers’ worlds; proactivity; caring for the environment. I guess you could say we’re a good fit! I think of my time at Bosch Rexroth as a journey towards excellence.
Driven by vision
For me, having a strong vision and a systematic approach has been helpful throughout my career. My father worked in the Government of Gujarat and he was also a writer – he wrote books for children and research articles. He was my role model and instilled in me a love of learning and reading, which has helped me to refine my vision, remain humble and not become complacent.
There have been many proud moments throughout my time at Bosch Rexroth. When I worked in India as Quality Manager and then Plant Manager, I worked with a team of technicians and engineers, developing the right mindset to work proactively and systematically. Imagine our delight when our plant won the Global Bosch Rexroth Quality Award for the first time. After a few years, our team was selected for a Global Bosch HSE award because of our efforts on a resource conservation project. I was so pleased that our team had been recognized globally.
Looking to the future, I’m very excited about the work I’m currently doing with my team, preparing the business for future quality requirements. We need to constantly work on being faster, leaner and more effective, in order to meet our customers’ requirements.
About Dr. Himanshu Trivedi
Himanshu Trivedi is a Master of Engineering and a Doctor of Philosophy. He has been awarded Fellow of the National Center for Quality Management (in India) and Fellow of the American Society for Quality (in the USA). He was named in the “40 New Voices of Quality” list and has co-edited six books on quality and operations management. He also participates in the Quality Council of universities in India as a member of their Board of Studies. His career spans 25 years, 20 years of which have been at Bosch Rexroth, and he is currently working in Germany as Vice President, Global Head of Quality Management and HSE.