Training and Education

We offer our employees a wide range of initial and advanced training and education opportunities regardless of where they are on their career path. We tailor these to their respective qualification level and also give consideration to their personal background and work situation.

We attach great importance to the training and education of our employees, because attracting, promoting and retaining qualified skilled employees and young talents is a key factor for sustained corporate success. Our central HR department therefore coordinates this area as a priority issue and advises employees at the locations in consultation with human resources managers, training managers and site managers should questions or conflicts arise. Staff can also seek the advice of works council members at all times.

Promoting young talent: a win–win situation

With their unswerving commitment, it is our employees who guarantee that we fulfill our promise of quality to our customers every day. We therefore closely support our junior staff from the very first day of their training, equipping them with the right tools from the get-go and imparting our values to them. We offer 18 different apprenticeships, including mechatronics engineer, professional driver, industrial clerk or, since 2022 for the first time, HR services clerk. In addition, there are three dual Bachelor’s degree courses, including Freight Forwarding, Transport, and Logistics. In the reporting year, we filled 77 new apprenticeship places, bringing the total number of trainees to 146 – 34 of these in technical/trade and 112 in commercial professions, which also includes qualification as a warehouse logistics specialist. The decline compared with prior periods reflects the shortage of skilled workers at higher entry levels, with there being noticeably fewer applications for apprenticeships. We are countering this with recruiting campaigns aimed at specific target groups, and in the reporting year focused on young people just starting out in their careers – among other things with a video series on YouTube, which answers questions about apprenticeships at BLG. In line with our company guarantee, we again made all qualified graduates an offer of employment in 2022, thus transferring 71 percent of our trainees at the Bremen location to permanent employment contracts or, for example, to dual degree programs within BLG.

We continued the support offered to our employees in recent years in qualifying as a warehouse logistics specialist and, more specifically, in preparing for the external examination at the Chamber of Industry and Commerce (IHK). All 22 candidates successfully passed their exam.

www.blg-logistics.com/en/career

Trainees

Number at BLG LOGISTICS*

Building on this success, we will offer this 12-week full-time course sponsored by the German Federal Labor Agency again in 2023, with even more participants.

Active sourcing, which was introduced as a pilot project in the previous year, was also continued. Initially aimed only at IT specialists, we have now extended the direct approach of candidates by our HR Marketing department to all areas of work.

Opening doors, unlocking opportunities

In cooperation with the maritimes competenzcentrum (ma-co) center of excellence and the Bremen youth employment agency, we have for the past several years offered courses to train as a “Hanse logistics specialist” which open up vocational opportunities in the field of logistics for the long-term unemployed. Through this cooperation, we are deliberately reaching out to people who are not currently part of the primary labor market. Funded by continuing education vouchers, the participants receive 100 days of training – 50 days of theoretical instruction and a 50-day practical assignment in the company – making them fit for a new career start. Candidates who complete the course successfully are guaranteed a job with BLG; in the reporting year 27 out of 42 Hanse logistics specialists were hired. To attract even more potential job recruits for this program in the future, it was recently expanded to cover the whole of Germany and is being implemented by ma-co and the local youth employment agencies.

New is our involvement in the Ausbildungsverbund (Training Network). As part of two initiatives in Bremen and Bremerhaven, adolescents embark on extra-company vocational training with the aim of switching to a regular apprenticeship via internships. In the reporting year, the first interns started their training with us with the goal of becoming warehouse logistics specialists.

Sustainability must be incorporated into all processes. That is why we are keen to pass on our knowledge and enthusiasm for all things sustainable to our employees. For the first time in the reporting year, we held a sustainability workshop with our trainees and dual students.

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Needs-based continuous skills development

We invest continuously in the development of our employees, regardless of where they are on their career path. In the reporting year, we conducted 4,364 centrally organized training days, which following two years under pandemic conditions could again also be held face to face. Where meaningful, webinars and blended learning formats were retained so as to give participants more flexibility in terms of time and location, thus once again increasing the number of training hours. We also expanded our central Tutorize learning management system, which now has around 1,900 registered users, an increase of 33 percent year on year. Users can choose from among 15 e-learning courses or book one of 26 courses from the central training catalog.

The “DigiPortSkill2025” project aimed at digitalizing continuing education in the German seaport industry and funded by the European Social Fund was completed in 2022. A total of 90 employees took part in the training courses in the reporting year. Together with our cooperation partner ma-co as well as the ver.di trade union, the Central Association of German Seaport Operators (Zentralverband der deutschen Seehafenbetriebe – ZDS), Hamburger Hafen und Logistik GmbH (HHLA) and an IT partner, we launched the “PortSkill 4.0” joint project at the end of 2021. The focus is on the transformation in port operations and the associated changes with regard to required skills and qualifications. The project is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport and aims to develop new learning concepts and methods to impart the necessary skills.

With SMALO – Smart Learning in Logistics, 2022 saw the launch of another project in which we are involved as a member of the Advisory Board. This will among other things draw on AI-assisted methods to create a learning ecosystem that enables individual learning based on flexible learning paths.

Management trainees from our own ranks

Through our Junior Management Program (JMP), we recruit qualified employees from our own ranks and train them up to assume responsible roles at management level. The two-year program includes workshops on leadership, communication and conflict resolution. Seven employees are currently taking part, all of whom have already found their desired position in the company. A total of 169 managers have successfully completed the program to date, 42 of whom now occupy a tier 3 management position or higher. The next cohort will start their training in 2023 parallel to our new program for the specialist career path.

We also launched further qualification programs for operational managers in the reporting year with a total of 45 participants. These cover various levels from coordinator to shift manager to director of operations/regional manager and last between 12 and 24 months. We also continued our “TAKE THE LEAD” management training courses, with the third management workshop entitled “Impact Orientation” being rolled out for the first time. For management levels 1, 2 and 3, they took place in person; all other employees were able to subsequently access the content in the e-learning version. As many as 1,300 managers have so far participated in the format.

Feedback as a lever for further development

We conduct employee appraisals on an annual basis in order to review and discuss individual performance according to defined criteria. If desired, Tutorize can be used to conduct and document the interviews – an option that had already been used in over 1,100 cases by the end of 2022. The appraisals are supplemented by assessments of potential, which serve as the starting point for individual development plans. For particularly qualified employees, these are mandatory and form the basis for selecting participants in our qualification programs. However, all other employees can draw up such a development plan with their manager should they so wish.

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