Rising Stars 2024: Emily Schmitt

Emily Schmitt, 36
Senior director of tech strategy, governance
Union Pacific Railroad

Nominator’s quote: “As a strong community leader, Emily donates her time to numerous nonprofits and resource groups within UP. She often volunteers at the Food Bank for the Heartland, packing rice, popcorn, and other food commodities for distribution to food banks in Nebraska and Iowa. Emily also supports women garnering their education for career development and advancement through the Lydia House, by reviewing resumes and providing other career development support.” — Lindsey Becerra, Union Pacific Railroad

Education: Bachelor of arts in sociology and business, Carthage College; master of science in organizational leadership, College of Saint Mary.

Job responsibilities: Leads the office of CIO with responsibility for company technology strategy, department spend and governance, vendor management office (contingent workforce), and user-experience/customer-experience teams. Focuses on setting the vision and path to achieve outcomes, ensuring vendors and suppliers are strategic partners along that journey; and measuring results for company outcomes and return.

Career path: I started at UP in 2010 and spent the first 12 years of my career in marketing and sales, holding various roles in commercial marketing, pricing and strategy. I joined the technology team in 2022 in a strategic capacity, leading several initiatives. I was promoted to my current position, with expanded responsibilities, in March 2023.

My career has been a path of saying “yes” to intriguing work, learning about the railroad industry with a keen focus on customer-first business enablement.

Why did you choose the rail industry for your career? I’m a third-generation Union Pacific railroader. My grandparents each served 30-plus years with the company: my grandfather in building management, and grandmother as an executive assistant. My father worked at UP as a civil engineer in track and bridge design for many years, and my uncle still works at UP today (20-plus years) as a lead welder. To say it came naturally was an understatement.

There’s a rich legacy of UP in our family. The breadth of opportunities in railroading for various careers is amazing.

What’s the best career advice that you’ve received? Never compromise your integrity. As simple as it sounds, it’s one thing you can never get back. I heard that advice from my grandfather on the first day of my UP career. It’s held true these past 14 years and will stay with me forever.

What advice would you give to a new railroader? Get to know how railroads run at the front lines as quickly as possible. Visit the field any time you can and soak up the insights from those experts. I still apply what I learned from my early field experiences to my work today.

What was your first job? Working as a camp counselor for the Boys & Girls Club.

Share a fun fact about yourself. I’m an avid traveler and my family prioritizes travel every year, always to one new place.

If you could have dinner with anyone, who would it be and why? Carol Tome, CEO of UPS. She’s the first outsider and first female to lead UPS. She led supply-chain distribution planning for delivery of the COVID-19 vaccine in 2020, and is often regarded as both a relatable and authentic leader by her teams.

Who has had the most influence on your career? I’ve been fortunate in my career to learn from many excellent leaders at UP. I work for a visionary leader in Rahul Jalali and I know my career has been forever shaped by his influence. Rahul often encourages me to bring a customer-centric purview to the table.

Describe a major obstacle in your career and how you surmounted it. My biggest career obstacle isn’t unlike most who were working in 2020, COVID-19 is considered unprecedented for a reason. I don’t think there’s been a bigger challenge to work-life balance, team engagement or work output that compares.

I faced this experience at a pivotal time during a large-scale strategic delivery. We were tasked to maintain our glidepath while balancing the unknown during the pandemic. Managing 75-plus key participants and dozens of stakeholders while measuring quality from a remote-only environment was challenging to say the very least. That’s where relationships are key and cannot be replaced. Through that experience, I learned to build strong relationships with colleagues and teammates.

What do you think is the biggest challenge facing the rail industry today? Sustained growth. It’s important we think holistically about how rail can continue to innovate technologically, advance ease of doing business and partner within the industry to provide meaningful supply-chain solutions that cement rail as a preferred mode.