Bart Hammer, head of project management at ROSEN Europe:

This article is part of a series called “Twente Leeft!” (Twente Lives!). You can read personal stories here about living and working in Twente. Twente is a nice place to be, according to the talents we meet. The beautiful nature, space, the down-to-earth mentality; they all characterise Twente. There are also plenty of career opportunities! Twente has many innovative, international and future-proof companies that are desperate for staff. Want to know what Twente has to offer? You can find Bart Hammers story below.

One guided tour at KLM was reason enough for Bart Hammer to attend the Anthony Fokker School in The Hague. “I lived in Scheveningen at the time”, he says. “Far away from my parents and family, so I grew up quickly. The first year was full of parties, but I became more serious and finished school. I loved it because aeroplanes have all the technology from air conditioning to engines; precisely my interests.”

His first job was at KLM, where he worked for 12 years. He found a job at Thales thirteen years ago and worked at Siemens after. He has now been working as the head of project management at ROSEN Europe Oldenzaal for three and a half years: back to his home in Twente after a wonderful time in the west.

Of course, my accent made me the ‘odd man out’ in The Hague, but it never bothered me. I was always able to make friends, and the school was the only one of its kind, so people from all over the Netherlands were taught here. So I was not the only ‘outsider’. I joined Royal Dutch Airlines (KLM) after an internship at Transavia. "I became a planner instead of an engineer", he says. "It was during the aircraft crisis, and I thought I would get the opportunity to move to a technical profession once I was part of the company." Things turned out differently: he saw that the technicians had to work a lot during the weekends and evenings. Since his supervisor thought he was suited for the job, he chose to study Technical Business Administration in the evenings. He met his wife Babette, and the three of them moved to Twente once their son reached primary school age.

“My wife is from Limburg. The easy-going atmosphere we both had when we were young, with people in the street who knew each other and were there for each other, was very important for us. We wanted the same for our son." They could have moved to Limburg just as easily had it not been for the fact that Bart is a faithful Twente supporter and continued to attend the matches even when he lived in the west. "All of them", he clarifies. "I would sometimes drive past the Arena on my way to Enschede to catch the bus to the Arena for the Ajax-FCT game and back, only to get in the car and drive past the Arena to get home. There is a great atmosphere before, during and after the matches; I simply have to be there." Babette knew what would happen if they moved to Limburg: he would be away from home even longer for the matches. "So yes, to be honest, that is one of the reasons we moved back here twelve years ago."

The time of attending all matches has passed, but Bart is still always present at home matches. “We always make time for them”, he says. He is just as enthusiastic about FCT as he is about his job. "At ROSEN, we inspect pipelines worldwide and develop the tools we need to carry out and read the inspections ourselves. The R&D department is in Lingen, and the tools are configured in the workshop in Oldenzaal to make them suitable for specific projects. Each project is different; materials and sizes vary, just like the substances that pass through them, though they are mainly oil and gas. The materials react differently, so customisation is required every time to detect or predict leaks, cracks and other abnormalities in pipelines. Inspecting storage tanks is also an important part of the activities at ROSEN.

Bart manages a team of 14 project leaders who are active in the Netherlands, England, France and India. “I like being able to implement my own vision on project management here. In the past, it could take years before someone became a project manager because they were expected to have all the technical knowledge before they could have that position. Now, we recruit people who can lead projects and leave the technical details to the experts. And, the technology I have always loved is still close by at ROSEN.

Bart would no longer move to the west. His daughter Iris (11), his son Jochem (16) and his wife Babette love Twente. “The peace and quiet you have here is priceless, and so is the space”, says Bart. “And as I always say: Twente has everything except for De Bijenkorf, but I can do just fine without it.”