1. Name: Nicoleta Thomka
Place of birth: Sibiu, Romania
Education: Studies of Foreign Languages (English, German) in Romania, Studies
of Business Administration in Germany
Current Profession: Undergraduate Business Administration
Your function in the ICV: Person in charge of the English homepage, member of
the PR-Committee
For how long have you been a member/an operative member? I have been
supporting the ICV since November 2006, so for 3 years.
Your ICV-team consists of:
Brigitte Dienstl-Arnegger: Web-editor
Herwig R. Friedag: Head of the PR-Committee
Silke Neunzig: Internet Service
Jens Obermöller: ControllingWiki
Hans-Peter Sander: Press officer
Michael Spina: representing Austria
Rainer Stelzer: representing Switzerland
From the l. to the r.: Adrianna Lewandowska (Member of the ICV-Board), Maika
Lewandowska (ICV-support, Poland), H.-P. Sander, Brigitte Friedag, H. R. Friedag,
N. Thomka, M. Spina, R. Stelzer, S. Neunzig, B. Dienstl-Arnegger, A. Lörgen
(former member of the PR-Committee)
How many hours do you spend working for the ICV?
It depends on how much there is to do and on how much free time I have. I
would say about 150 hours a year.
What are your main duties and responsibilities in the ICV?
To my main duties there belong providing new content for the English homepage
and keeping it up to date, the translation of the contents for the English E-News,

2. the support of the work groups in Central Europe on different questions and on
technical problems regarding their own homepages.
What do you like about your work for the ICV, what could you easily leave
behind?
The thing I like most is to give a helping hand when somebody asks for it. The
things that I could easily live without are the quarterly reports and the minutes of
the PR-committee or more exactly reading and completing them.
What is your motivation to work for the ICV?
It is the wish to do something else besides studying, to look beyond my own nose.
How does the ICV benefit from you – and how do you benefit from the ICV?
I offer the ICV my support in terms of English and Romanian knowledge,
commitment, social skills and cross-cultural experience. I think that my benefit
from the ICV is much greater than vice-versa. Thanks to the activity in the ICV I
improved my hard and soft skills; I had the chance to take over responsibility and
decision making and thus to collect experience which will certainly be of help in
my future profession. Moreover I got acquainted with great people, from whom I
learned a lot; I joined a network of controlling experts.
In the Eastern European ICV work groups there are more women in positions with
responsibility as compared to the Western European ones. Why do you think it is
like that?
Oh, this is a difficult question. I suppose the fall of the communist regime and the
opening towards the West made the woman’s emancipation very dynamic. Taking
over more responsibility was a way of experiencing freedom and of doing
something else besides working and taking care of the family. But I think this
difference between West and Central European ICV groups will decrease in time.
What could men in the ICV learn from women in the ICV, what could a man in any
organisation learn from YOU?
Maybe men should do a bit more! They are just working, women however are
NETworking ;-)).
If you think of the ICV: just tell us one word or one sentence or one thing you do
immediately think of!
Work. There is always something to be done.
If the ICV could fulfill you a wish right away, no matter what – what should it be?
I wish I found a job right after my final degree, which means starting with January
2010.
Are there any other organisations related to your profession that you support?
No, it is only the ICV.
In Germany there is a dictum saying that a working woman always has to be
twice as good to achieve the same level of appreciation that a man receives. What
do you think about it – would you agree with it?
Maybe a woman does not need to be twice as good as a man, but she definitely
needs to be a little bit better than a man in order to work in the same position.
Alternatively, see also the answer to question 8.