17. SZ-Wirtschaftsgipfel

Olaf Scholz, born in 1958, was elected as only the 9th Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany on December 8, 2021. This needs to be remembered occasionally when general criticism of the Social Democrat once again gets out of hand: Whether he communicates enough and moderates coalition sufficiently energetically or not: the man can win elections. And he must govern in the face of a turning point in Europe unprecedented since World War II.

born in 1980, became the first woman to be Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs in December 2021. The Green politician ran as a candidate for chancellor in the 2021 federal election. Baerbock studied political science with a minor in public law, and her hobbies include trampolining. She was recently Germany's most popular politician for a time.

born in 1969, has been under fire since the first day of the traffic light coalition. The former Green Party leader actually wanted to drive forward the climate-friendly transformation of the economy. Instead, he is now the federal government's top troubleshooter - in the fight against the energy crisis.

Multiple world heavyweight boxing champion, long-time No. 1 according to all independent rankings, celebrity on all channels: that's how Wladimir Klitschko (born 1976) is known, along with his older brother Vitali, who later entered Ukrainian politics and is now mayor of Kiev. Wladimir Klitschko became an entrepreneur. Even before the Russian invasion, he joined the reserve army of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Today he is an influential face of Ukraine's defense struggle against Putin

Karl Lauterbach, born in 1963, undoubtedly has one of the most important jobs in the country. As Germany's health minister, he's tasked with bringing down the pandemic - and also defending his impressive talk show ratings. Where would Markus Lanz and Anne Will be without him? Lauterbach owes his appointment as federal minister in part to the popularity his public appearances brought him at the start of the pandemic. However, the medical graduate has not only enthusiastic fans, but also enthusiastic critics.

He got the office he really wanted: Christian Lindner, born in 1979, has been Federal Finance Minister for almost a year. Since then, he's been practicing the discipline of all treasurers: saying "no. In 2023, he wants to comply with the debt brake again, and taxes are not to rise either. It's not easy being finance minister, Lindner likes to say. But he probably wouldn't want to change jobs.

Sir Tim Clark, born in 1949, was part of the founding team of Emirates and has been instrumental in its expansion into the largest international airline. Clark has been President of Emirates Airline since 2003. The hub in Dubai, which is unparalleled anywhere in the world, is his creation. Emirates offers long-haul connections there to all parts of the world. After the deep cut of the Corona pandemic, Clark and his team are busy restoring the Dubai hub to its former greatness as quickly as possible.

Michael Diederich, born in 1965, has been CEO of Hypo-Vereinsbank, a subsidiary of the Italian UniCredit Group, since January 2018. Prior to that, he was responsible for the credit institution's investment banking division. His conviction is that investment banking must primarily serve corporate customers.

Anja-Isabel Dotzenrath has been a member of the BP Group's Global Executive Board since March 2022. Prior to that, she was head of RWE Renewables, one of the world's leading renewable energy companies. Dotzenrath studied electrical engineering and business administration in Aachen and then initially worked in management consultancies, after which she worked for the energy group E.ON before moving to RWE.

Martin Eisenhut has been working in the consulting industry for around 25 years. He has been working for the international consulting firm Kearney since 2015 and has been responsible for the business in Germany, Austria and Switzerland since 2016. Eisenhut studied at the Technical University of Munich and still lives in the Bavarian capital. Prior to his studies, he earned a journeyman's certificate as a machinist.

born in 1972, began his career after studying law in 1998 as a legal and regulatory officer at Telefónica in Germany - then Viag Interkom. Since 2017, Haas has been Chairman of the Management Board of Telefónica Deutschland Holding AG in his hometown of Munich. For internal digitization, the amateur chef relies on ideas from the team.

Ingrid Hengster, born in 1961, is one of the best-known female bankers in Germany. She has been the head of Germany at the British investment bank Barclays since the beginning of 2022. Before that, she was a member of the board of the state development bank KfW for almost eight years. Born in Austria, she studied law in Salzburg, followed by professional positions at Commerzbank, UBS, Credit Suisse, ABN Amro and Royal Bank of Scotland.

After two and a half years of the pandemic, at the latest, it has long since become normal to pay even for bread rolls at the bakery by card - and that also has to do with people like Albrecht Kiel. For the past seven years, he has headed the Central European business of Visa, a leading global payment network that most people associate with credit and debit cards. With his team and many industry partners, he works every day to further develop secure digital payments and make them more accessible. Prior to 2015, Kiel led Allianz's European direct insurance business, among others.

Christian Klein, born in Heidelberg in 1980, started working as a student trainee at the global software company SAP in 1999. He quickly made a career for himself and was promoted to the Group Executive Board in 2018. When American Bill McDermott surprisingly left in 2019, Klein took over the leadership of Europe's largest software provider together with U.S. manager Jennifer Morgan. He has been sole CEO since April 2020.

Fränzi Kühne, born in 1983, was once Germany's youngest female supervisory board member. After leaving the social media agency TLGG, which she founded with two friends when she was 25, she wrote a book - about men and the questions you never ask them - and is now Chief Digital Officer at pen manufacturer Edding.

Harald Schmidt, born in 1957 in Neu-Ulm, is the - so far - unbeaten grandmaster of ambiguity. Sometimes he's on the Traumschiff, then he hosts a venerable classical music program on WDR, himself an organist with a C certificate. His shield? Multiple irony.

Born in 1962, he joined CRM market leader and cloud provider Salesforce in 2007 after working at Boole and Babbage, Veritas Software and Symantec. There he is now responsible for strategic management and development as well as key account business in Germany and Austria. Schreiner also supports various projects in the areas of education and integration, and is specifically committed to improving education in STEM subjects.

Christian Sewing, born in 1970 in East Westphalia, actually wanted to become a sports journalist. After graduating from high school, however, he did an apprenticeship as a banker at the Bielefeld branch of Deutsche Bank, then studied part-time at the Bank Academy in Bielefeld and in Hamburg. In 2015, he rose to the Management Board, and in 2018 he was appointed Chairman of the Management Board of Deutsche Bank. With the exception of two years at the real estate bank DG Hyp, Sewing has always worked for Germany's largest financial institution.

Margret Suckale, born in Hamburg in 1956, studied law and initially worked for the U.S. Mobil Oil group. She then moved to Deutsche Bahn, where she made a career for herself and ended up as a member of the Board of Management. She then went to the chemical group BASF, where she was a member of the Board of Executive Directors until 2017. Since then, she has sat on supervisory boards, for example at the Dax companies Infineon and Deutsche Telekom.