Elena Galbally Shares About Her Supply Chain Journey—And Leading Through Kindness

Women In Supply Chain™ hold about 26% of the C-suite and executive-level roles, a number that is historical and still growing. And Women In Supply Chain™ leadership are transforming the industry when it’s needed most, during endless disruptions that have only exacerbated over the last year, rattled by climate change, geopolitical tensions, and an all-out tariff war. The same rinse-and-repeat approaches don’t apply anymore, and that means that fresh perspectives and diversity in thought are increasingly important.

The latest negotiated “reciprocal” tariffs went into effect on August 7th. The administration first announced the tariff plans in April to give U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials time to collect taxes. Tariffs on Canadian goods will jump from 25% to 35% unless covered under the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement; however, behind-the-scenes negotiations are ongoing. Goods from Mexico received a reprieve from the 25% tariff rate when U.S. and Mexican officials announced a 90-day extension to negotiate a long-term trade deal on July 31st. Those are big numbers to consider, with Mexico ranking as the top U.S. trade partner in June of 2025 at $73B followed by Canada at $58B. Meanwhile, at the start of August, the president shared his plans to raise tariffs on pharmaceutical imports into the U.S., eventually reaching up to 250%.

Now is the time to innovate and bring together new voices from different backgrounds with different perspectives and knowledge sets—including women’s. Because with the industry all but upended by the “new normal,” 26% of Women In Supply Chain™ leadership is simply not enough. And, while emotional intelligence is not inherently gendered, research suggests that women frequently score higher on measures of empathy and interpersonal sensitivity, huge factors in leading in a modern and disruptive supply chain space.

And at Let’s Talk Supply Chain, we are making our Women In Supply Chain™ series more than a call to action; it’s a movement. There’s a growing workforce of Women In Supply Chain™ who see and approach things differently, and have new strategies and flavors of leadership. Our Let’s Talk Supply Chain Women In Supply Chain™ program, blog, and podcast series showcase the importance of greater gender representation. This month’s featured leader is the embodiment of the importance of leading through kindness and empathy.

We are proud to feature Elena Galbally. Elena is a senior robotics engineer at Mytra, building robotics and AI-driven solutions to empower resilient, modular, and reconfigurable material flow and storage. She boasts both a PHD in Mechanical Engineering, Robotics and a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University. She also graduated from the University of Maryland with a Bachelor’s in Bioengineering after first attending the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.