From Turkey to Poland, International Career Story of Derya Coban

Tuesday, September 10, 2024

What is your current role and what makes it exciting?

As part of global R&D BGCM (Beverages, Gum, Candy, Meals) organization, I currently lead R&D Gum & Candy Innovation agenda and the team with Mondelēz Europe, Middle East and Africa markets in scope. My role provides wide opportunity to create value and positive impact for our consumers, company, stakeholders and our planet that makes it very exciting.

How has your career developed at Mondelez?

In 2013, I joined Mondelēz as part of local R&D Gum Development team based in Gebze, Turkey plant where I had the privilege to work with many great people and learnt a lot from them. Among the years I have moved to regional R&D role with gradually increased responsibilities starting from Eastern Europe and finally reached Mondelēz Europe, Middle East and Africa region. During my tenure, I worked in various R&D roles with accountability on Innovation, Product Development/Process Development, Productivity and Portfolio Management.

What made decide to move to Wroclaw?

International move brings a lot of new dynamics and things to learn that enables career and personal development. Wroclaw Technical Center (WTC) is one of our cross-category R&D centers in Mondelez network. I find this aspect quite attractive as it increases synergies within our diverse R&D community.

Within the last years, many of us learnt how to work more efficiently under remote working conditions. In the meantime, face to face interactions is still very powerful and important. Therefore, relocation to Wroclaw Technical Center enabled me to work with grand majority of our team at the same office, boosting the interactions and engagement positively.

How did you manage to transfer from Turkey to Poland?

For sure, permanent move is a big decision that requires good search and deep analysis in advance-working rules and conditions, day to day life, schooling, etc. In my case, travelling for business to Poland frequently within the last years provided good preliminary perspective about the conditions of working and living here. I leveraged the experience of my colleagues who live in Poland as well. Here I would like to thank very much the relocation team and local HR team for their consult and support. I am grateful to my previous and current managers for their empowerment to make this step change in my career. I also had to mention my team and colleagues in WTC who has welcomed we very warmly and onboarded easily to the new location.

It is true that there are a lot of things to miss in the home country. Our way with my family is to embrace the relocation as an exciting journey to know new people, culture, build new skills and that way to get the best from the experience.

What was the most surprising at your first day in Wrocław Technical Center?

As a good practice, in the WTC Atrium we have big screens where newcomers of the month are part of a slide show. The week I joined, there was a breakdown that has been keeping my face on the screens a bit longer than planned. Thanks to that I was able to meet with many colleagues quite fast as they’ve used to see me for a while, thanks to the screen surprise. 😊

And finally, what are your plans for the next steps in your career at MDLZ?

Mondelēz vision and values match quite well with my professional and personal values. I think it is a great place to work that promotes diversity, offers many functional and shaping experiences and fosters us as employees to be at our best. As an R&D professional, I like to continue elevating my leadership skills in Mondelēz to steer the growth of my team, self and our company further.