About Jens Voigt

Jens Voigt, talking from eBay’s offices in Berlin, says the first part of his career was shaped by momentous events in Europe. In 1989 the Berlin Wall came down and the Eastern bloc effectively dis-integrated. Voigt was a witness to it all, as he lived in East Germany, then known as the German Democratic Republic, or GDR. He was brought up in a small town west of Berlin and was 16 when the wall was dramatically pulled down and East and West Germany eventually united.

He says he had a good experience and upbringing in East Germany, but there was little doubt that once the wall was gone, he wanted to taste freedom and more particularly travel.

“It was a really exciting time, particularly those two years between 1989 and 1991, because there was the sense in East Germany at the time that, we could do anything.”

He says there was a sense at the time of something really unique. “The newfound sense of freedom was quite astonishing even for me as a teenager back, then,” he explains. Voigt did his primary degree in Germany (business administration) in the year after the wall came down, but as soon as he could he wanted to strike out somewhere new, and Dublin was his choice. Unemployment was very high in the 1990s in Germany, so getting a new experience and steady employment was crucial for him. He did not know a huge amount about Ireland at the time, but found the labour market in Ireland had opportunities, as the so-called Celtic Tiger was fully underway. He also had a more mundane ambition- to improve his English!

He started with his first job in a call centre and eventually worked his way through a number of roles and landed employment with a company called Lexmark (who manufactured printers and were once part of IBM) which he describes as a great period for him. Lexmark gave him opportunities for growth and several promotions and greater responsibility came along. He is still in contact with many colleagues from the company and listening to him, he sounds very grateful for the opportunity the company gave him at the time.

But by 2007 he was starting to take stock and doing some more long term thinking, beyond just the daily grind. “I'd been doing this job for a while. I would love to, you know, to further develop I was thinking, and I was talking to my boss at the time, and she had just finished an MBA, an executive MBA. And she said ‘think about it’. It would be a great next step for you as part of your career and that Lexmark would even sponsor,” he recalls.

Asked why he felt it was necessary to do the programme, he says: “I needed to do something else. I think I needed to broaden my horizons and my education levels a little bit,’’ is how he explains it all these years later. “I felt a number of things were missing at the time. I think I was very specialized in what I was doing. So I wanted to broaden my view, even though I had obviously the background of business administration studies. When it came to things in terms of finance, marketing,  operational management, I felt a bit weak in terms of my educational levels,’’ he recalls. The solution was the part-time executive MBA with Smurfit Business School.

Voigt hugely enjoyed the lectures on the MBA particularly the teachers themselves as many had worked previously in business or industry and were now able to pass on practical insights, not purely academic theory. “That really made it for me, this combination between the real life experience, plus the theoretical part, the expertise,” he says. While he says the assignments were intense, the great benefit of them was the group work structure.

“Those group assignments, you know, they made us collaborate, made us compromise, made us, appreciate different ideas and opinions, and because the group was so diverse too. There  were people from all sorts of backgrounds,” he recalls.

After this fruitful sojourn doing the MBA, Voigt took up a new position at Yahoo!, where he was an operations manager for Europe.r He remembers Yahoo! very much as having a start-up mindset, although he tended to prefer more structure. But it was a great experience nevertheless.

“So Yahoo!, was really different, you know. As I mentioned, Lexmark used to be a former IBM company. And the one thing I can tell you about IBM is they're very, very structured.”  He says Yahoo! had a different type of culture and he struggled initially. “But you know I figured things out. I restructured a team, I brought more processes into place and they finally started to appreciate that. People there were saying maybe there's something good about a structured process. Maybe it's good to have some documentation. Maybe it's good not to rely on people's wits all the time.”

While tough at times, he sounds like he learnt a great deal from this period and a year and half later he got an offer from eBay, but this came with a twist- it would involve going back to Germany and Berlin. Asked how he viewed this change, he replies:  “Excited, excited, because it had been a long time in Ireland, and I kind of started to feel a little homesick frankly. I had been thinking about it for at least a year, moving back to Germany. I felt a little homesick, and my parents health wasn't great at the time. So I want to be a little bit closer to my parents,” he recalls.

He has been with eBay ever since and while he has left Ireland, he returns regularly as part of his eBay role which has a European dimension. That role these days is in procurement which encompasses things like contract management, contract design and negotiation and partner management. He says the eBay approach is a positive one with contracted parties, and the company seeks to grow as much value as possible from its partnerships, which often last many years. He says the best partnerships need ‘co-dependency’ and that takes time.

He says his time at eBay has been great, with many role changes and such changes are part of the company culture. “Yes its very much ‘lets take a risk on our people, we believe in them’ right, and that's the great thing about eBay,” he explains. He sees further growth at the company, but is also expanding his own personal horizons, and recently joined the advisory board of a German start-up.

 There is something different about Voigt, in the way he has such a relaxed air about life and careers. Maybe its down to his younger years, in East Germany, but also maybe down to a time spent in a punk rock band, which he describes very comically. “The good thing with punk was, you know, you don't have to be singer as such, and I was actually the singer of the band. I didn't play guitar. You just kind of scream your head off,” he laughs.

Panel

Reflecting on your time at UCD, what experience stands out as particularly impactful or memorable?

There are a couple of things that stand out. First, the level of relevant experience a lot of our lecturers had. Spicing up theory with real live examples enhanced the learning process and kept even some drier topics like accounting interesting.

Second, the people, my fellow students. I really enjoyed going through the MBA process with them. I loved the diverse background, experiences and the competition with them. It was hard work but worth it.

Is there a particular book or song you have carried with you for much of your life?

Songs, I used to be a singer in a punk band in Germany and always had a love for 80's new wave bands. So, 99 red balloons by Nena would be a song that I still love back from my childhood. it's simple, catchy and has great lyrics that still speak to me today.

What's the best piece of advice you've ever received, funny or serious?

..."football is a game that lasts 90 minutes" ...a former coach used to say that to us all the time, and it has served me to this day. The work is only done when it's done. Put in full effort until the end...

What's a hobby or activity you've always wanted to try but haven't gotten around to yet?

...my wife would say learning to play guitar even though I have been playing the guitar for 30 years now, haha. I would love to have learned to race cars. Pushing cars to the maximum and still staying in control is a skill that I would like to have

If you could have a conversation with any historical figure, who would it be and what would you ask that person?

This one is really hard, there are so many... If I had to pick only one historical figure, it would be Einstein. I am fascinated by his mind experiments and how he used them to develop and test his theories. I would love to ask him how he developed them and what inspired him to develop these mind experiments.

March 2025