Alumna starts new engineering position as she leads the way for women in STEM

Sarah Black-Smith

Sarah Black-Smith (Manufacturing Engineering and Management, 2004) has recently been promoted to the role of General Manager at Siemens.

Sarah will now be leading Motion Control business in the Digital Industries division as part of her new position. Alongside her work, she is also studying for her MBA at the Alliance Manchester Business School. 

Her career at Siemens began during her year in industry when she completed a placement at Siemens Energy in Lincoln. After graduating, Sarah returned to Siemens in a graduate role and has taken up many positions across the company since.  

Her latest appointment underlines Siemens' commitment to strengthening gender equality across the organisation and its drive to increase the number of women in engineering. In 2021 half of graduates and 42% of intern recruits were women. 

We asked Sarah what impact Loughborough has had on her career. She said: 

Loughborough was a fantastic place to study; I learned a huge amount during my time there. Not only the technical expertise from the degree I studied, but the soft skills that the University encouraged us to practice – such as presentation skills and working in teams.  

 “Loughborough has a good reputation and an Engineering degree from this university has kudos when applying for roles. The University’s close relationship with industry enabled me to get my placement easily with Siemens in the first instance, so thank you Loughborough! I also met my best friends at university, and they will be my support and friends for the rest of my life.” 

Sarah also spoke about how the STEM environment changed for women during her time at Siemens:  

“STEM is definitely promoted a great deal more to females than it was when I was at university.Companies such as Siemens do a lot to promote Engineering and STEM within schools and they engage in events such as Women in Engineering Day to encourage females.  

“I want to inspire other women to enter the Engineering and Manufacturing profession and I work within Siemens to encourage more women and girls to become Engineers. “  

Check out some of the things Sarah has done within Siemens.