Video from RöKo 2026: Beckelmann on workforce reform, leadership, and radiology supply

The managing director of Beckelmann GmbH on why renaming a profession changes nothing, and what actually could.

Germany renamed its radiographers, yet it did not raise their training to bachelor level. For Bettina Beckelmann, managing director of Beckelmann GmbH and one of Germany’s voices on workforce reform in German radiology, it's not enough. "It's a highly responsible position. And we just renamed it. There was no shift in the profession itself," she told AuntMinnie Europe in a video interview at RöKo 2026 in Leipzig.

Building her own path

Bettina Beckelmann, Managing Director of Beckelmann GmbH, a Dortmund-based family-owned radiology supplies company.Claudia TschabuschnigBeckelmann took over a family business in a traditionally male-dominated field, a move that came with its own set of assumptions. "People look quite critical, because a lot of times the assumption is that it's just given," she said. 

At a certain point, she stopped trying to prove herself against that and focused on understanding her environment instead, the market, customer needs, the technologies reshaping radiology supply. At RöKo 2026, she said, the generational shift was visible. "You see so many rising stars, female and male. We are shaping the future of it."

What's next

Beckelmann GmbH has moved well beyond physical products in a warehouse. The company now works across AI-driven workflow optimization and digital solutions, a shift Beckelmann described as driven by the reality of constrained budgets alongside genuine innovation pressure.

Her next focus is systematic. "We already have all these technologies. The question is how we actually use them, and when, and what the consequences are." The goal: workflow optimization that holds up under real clinical conditions and contributes to patient safety. In German radiology, she said, that work is only getting started.

Our full coverage of RöKo 2026 can be found here.