Advancement of women, family-friendly HR policies

For Volkswagen, family-friendly human resources policies are a key aspect of being an attractive employer and go a long way to achieving greater equality between the sexes. We therefore work continuously on further increasing the proportion of women in leadership positions. Targets have been set for every division in the company to encourage women with high potential in their decision to aim for a career in management in the Company.

This approach is supported by many different measures including the cross-brand “Management Mentoring Program”, which is designed to support women on the way to management positions. Volkswagen has also launched the “Career with Children” project that supports young mothers and fathers during and on their return from parental leave, helping them to continue their career as effectively as possible. Volkswagen offers the “Compass” program specifically to encourage women with high potential in their decision to aim for a career in management.

We use our Germany-wide Woman DrivINGAward and the Woman Experience Day to focus on female engineering and computer science students and graduates, so as to recruit them for technical positions at Volkswagen. We use target group-specific events to help the participants understand our products and give them an insight into the attractive tasks in our Company.

In the reporting period, Volkswagen AG reached the target quotas it had set for the proportion of women in management in accordance with the German law regarding the equal participation of women and men in leadership positions in the private and public sectors: by the end of the year, the proportion of women was 9.8% (target: 9.8%) in the first management level and 13.5% (target: 13.3%) in the second management level. For the new period up to the end of 2021, Volkswagen AG is aiming to have 13.0% women in the first management level and 16.9% women in the second management level.

In addition, Volkswagen intends to raise the proportion of female skilled workers and forewomen in Germany to 10%; in fiscal year 2016, the proportion of women in the Volkswagen Group in Germany (without Scania, MAN and Porsche) was 7.6% working as skilled workers and 5.1% as forewomen. In order to increase the proportion of female vocational trainees in the industrial and technical area from the current 23.3% to 30%, Volkswagen specifically targets the recruitment of women, for example by arranging special work experience and orientation days for young women.

In the Volkswagen Group, a large number of operational arrangements are in force to enable individuals to combine the demands of work and home. These include working time flexibility, variable part-time working and shift models, leave of absence to care for close family members, as well as on-site, company-run childcare facilities.

Volkswagen is continuously working on further improving these options. In September 2016, Volkswagen AG introduced a far-reaching collective agreement for work performed outside the facility (mobile work). At AUDI AG, staff have had the opportunity to work in any location and with flexible working hours since October 2016, if this is compatible with the job tasks at hand. The collective agreements have fulfilled employees’ request for greater flexibility with regard to working time and the place of work.