Employees

The Volkswagen Group is one of the world’s largest employers in the private sector. As of December 31, 2016, the Group, including the Chinese joint ventures, employed 626,715 people, 2.7% more than at the end of fiscal year 2015. The ratio of Group employees in Germany to those abroad remained stable in the reporting period. At the end of 2016, 44.9 (45.7)% were employed in Germany.

Pact for the future

In the 2016 reporting period, the Volkswagen brand signed a pact for the future with the General Works Council for greater economic viability and a more secure future at the Company’s German locations. Among other things, this envisages losses of up to 23,000 jobs in Germany over the coming years, which will be accomplished in a socially compatible way and without compulsory redundancies. The job cuts will take the demographic curve into account, which means that some of the positions that become vacant as a result of employees entering retirement will not be filled. At the same time, we are planning to build up new competencies at different locations and create about 9,000 additional jobs with a secure future, which will mainly be filled with existing employees.

Human resources strategy

The Volkswagen Group has long been providing stimulus for innovation in its employment policy. In its pursuit of personnel management excellence, the Company has been implementing an individualized approach to human resources management since 2008 with the primary objective of ensuring supreme performance by providing optimal personal support for employees.

In October 2016, when adopting its program for the future TOGETHER – Strategy 2025, the Volkswagen Group also approved a new human resources strategy with five overarching objectives:

• The Volkswagen Group aims to be an excellent employer with all of its brands and companies worldwide.
• Highly competent, dedicated employees strive for excellence in terms of innovation, added value and customer focus.
• A sustainable work organization ensures optimal working conditions in factories and offices.
• An exemplary corporate culture creates an open work climate that is characterized by mutual trust and collaboration.
• The Board of Management department of the Volkswagen Group responsible for Human Resources ensures the greatest possible efficiency in its own structures and processes, meeting the requirements of high-quality personnel management at the same time.

Many of the goals of the human resources strategy are underpinned by measurable indicators, and the extent to which these are achieved is reviewed on a regular basis. They include the Group’s attractiveness as an employer and diversity factors such as the proportion of women in management.

With its new human resources strategy, the Volkswagen Group is continuing the successful key approaches of its human resources policy. These include the pronounced stakeholder focus, the granting of comprehensive participation rights for employees, outstanding training opportunities and long-term service through systematic employee retention as well as the aspiration to appropriately balance performance and remuneration. The new human resources strategy is also setting innovative trends: modern forms of working such as agile work – whereby executives and team members work together to increase the efficiency with which all tasks are completed – will be expanded on a broad front in many areas.

Before 2020, the Volkswagen Group will introduce a diversity management system to prevent forms of discrimination such as of people with diminished capabilities. In addition, cultural change initiatives are currently concerned with anchoring flatter hierarchies, a more open form of collaboration and a greater focus on the big picture in the Company’s divisions. Furthermore, working times and places of work will be designed to provide greater flexibility. We plan to give social sustainability more weight and tie it in with our human resources strategy: In the future, social and cultural megatrends such as the desire for employee participation in decisions will be implemented faster and more systematically in personnel management. A new “Human Resources Strategy and Sustainability” organizational unit has been established for this purpose.

The Code of Collaboration, which is part of the program for the future TOGETHER – Strategy 2025, defines the rules for working relationships in the Group and is therefore a key pillar of this strategy. A cross-functional team from different brands, countries, divisions and generations supported the development and implementation process from the outset. The Code of Collaboration was initiated at the Global Top Management Conference in June 2016. It describes the form of collaboration in the brand alliance with the terms “open and honest”, “uncomplicated”, “without prejudice”, “on an equal footing” and “for one another”.

The traditional focus areas of personnel management such as providing optimal support and training opportunities for employees as well as careful planning and deployment of human resources will continue to apply in the new strategy.

EMPLOYEES BY CONTINENT
in percent, as of December 31, 2016