Associates and Young Talent

Diversity is not just an integral part of the Bosch values, it is also a key condition for worldwide success. We strengthened our commitment to diversity in 2007. We joined the “Charter of Diversity” in December 2007. This impassioned appeal for fairness and respect was initiated by German companies and enjoys the patronage of the German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Also in our Basic Principles of Social Responsibility, as a signatory of the United Nations Global Compact, and in our Code of Business Conduct, equal opportunity for all associates at all locations is one of our fundamental creeds.

As our business is increasingly shaped by work in international teams, we continue to develop the intercultural skills of our associates. New associates attend training courses and information events to learn about our value code and accepted ways of dealing with business partners. Special seminars are held for associates who take on longer assignments outside their native country, to prepare them for life abroad. The families of these associates are also expressly welcome to attend these intercultural seminars.

One of the central objectives of the Bosch Group is to hire women and advance their careers. As young women are often reluctant to choose technical and scientific courses of study, we seek to interest them from an early age. The “Girls Campus” academy is staged in cooperation with the Robert Bosch Stiftung, with the aim of getting young women aged between 13 and 15 interested in technical and scientific issues. After its successful debut last year, we are continuing the initiative in 2008. Trial internships are also available to encourage young women at school to opt for a technical profession.

As a member of femtec (a higher education career center for women), we conduct projects with young female engineers and deliberately target young women at our events for university graduates. In fact, we have already met our first target for new hires, which is that the proportion of women appointed should be in line with the proportion of female graduates in the respective disciplines. Now, 50 percent of newly appointed economics graduates at Bosch are women, while the figure for engineering graduates is 17 percent. 

However, it’s not enough just to hire women. We also want to increase the share of women in management positions. Initiatives at Bosch designed specifically to support the professional development of women include a twelve-month mentoring program and women’s networks in which female associates provide one another with advice and support. Contact partners have been appointed at all German locations, and Bosch in India has had its own women’s network since 2006. Thanks to these measures, the share of women in management positions at Bosch has more than doubled in the last ten years. However, at seven percent, this figure is still much too low in our view. Therefore, we intend to step up our activities to get women into management positions over the next few years.