Blog

Thoughts on technology and working together.

No fixed rhythm, no posts by schedule. I write when a thought is ready: about modular automation, mediation and honest insights into self-employment.

30 October 2026 · #FounderJourneyFriday

How’s it going?

“How’s it going?” I’ve heard that question a lot over the past few months. Today, for #FounderJourneyFriday, I finally want to answer it.

I haven’t written anything here for a long time. Partly because of a bereavement I had to come to terms with right at the start of my self-employment. And then, once I had made my way out of that valley, a lot of work was waiting for me. That made writing hard too, but this time for a lovely reason: my business is slowly getting off the ground.

Behind me lie many weeks of building, tearing down and building again. I tried out what fits me, the market and my values. October was my first month with contracts and revenue. I look back on working and talking with many wonderful people who are with me on my way: with assignments, with exchange, with perspectives.

Being self-employed also means missing your colleagues from the coffee machine or from Teams. It means often sitting alone in the “office”. But it also means opening up new room to act and moving things forward together with many people in other contexts. Business friendships take on a whole new weight.

So today, simply a thank you to everyone who has supported me, still supports me, is on this road with me and asks every now and then: “How’s it going?”

My answer: thanks to you, better than expected. Thank you so much, from the bottom of my heart!

Many animals stand in a circle around a small person

Illustration: © Andrea Fischer

6 July 2026 · #MediationAmMontag

“Mediation isn't conflict resolution, it's safeguarding the future.” Is that true?

Mediation takes time, and you don't know what will come out of it in the end. I hear that a lot, and hey: it's actually true! But this is true as well: unresolved conflicts shift into sick leave, into quiet or loud resignations, or into projects that stall.

Clearing up conflicts early costs resources, yes.
But the problems that follow cost far more.

And mediation isn't only more economical from a TCO perspective. It also strengthens a team's ability to resolve conflicts on its own in the long term. And with that, mutual understanding and teamwork grow too.

So mediation really is far more than “just” conflict resolution: it's proactively safeguarding the future.

Nadine Greck, Chair of the Board of the Deutsche Stiftung Mediation (German Mediation Foundation), puts it in a nutshell in the recently published annual report: “Mediation is far more than a method.”

Illustration: © Andrea Fischer

3 July 2026 · #FounderJourneyFriday

Why?

At 16 I started my vocational training as an IT business specialist. Back then I sat in the EDP department and spent my first year formatting floppy disks. EDP became IT, metal boxes became VMs, and after a few years I moved from IT into the world of OT, of automation. Then I became a Senior Technical Consultant and most recently a Sales Manager.

And now: self-employed.

The foundation for this decision has been building over the last few years. While I watched technology in IT and OT make ever greater progress, I also saw how much potential was lost along the way. And that wasn't down to a lack of technological progress. Sometimes IT and OT didn't understand each other, often systems were simply developed past the people and their requirements, and so on.

With my own business I want to make the world a tiny bit better and help reduce the “sand in the gears”. And it's at the interface between technology and people, I'm convinced, that I can make the biggest difference.

My start with MTP

When I was handed a lab pump in 2019 and asked to make it MTP-capable, I knew next to nothing. I wasn't really sure what MTP was, I hadn't programmed in years, and even back when I did, it certainly wasn't PLCs. (Cycle time: what's that?) The first few days cost me a lot of nerves. But in the end there was a working PoC, and the pump was successfully orchestrated in a POL. That cleared the way for a big project.

That was many years ago, and I still don't know everything, but a great deal more than I did then. I didn't become a PLC programmer, but I have built up extensive expertise in modular automation and MTP. A fair amount of theory and even more practice. Above all, but not only, in the pharma environment.

This story is the reason I'm posting here from today. After many years in the world of IT, automation and modular plants, for different employers in different roles, I have now arrived.

As of today, I advise as an independent freelancer on modular automation, IT/OT strategy and OT security.

Every Wednesday I'll talk about what modular automation in the pharma and process industry really means. Today it was about my own start.

What does your start look like? Where do you stand with modular automation? Just about to begin, or already in the middle of it? I look forward to the exchange, ideally over a coffee at your site.

Get in touch, I'm really looking forward to hearing from you!

Warm regards,

Christof

A hand places a ball on a spiral marble run