Mercedes-Benz tries to dispel attitudes about older workers as Germany faces the challenges of an aging society
The luxury brand owned by Germany’s Daimler AG is waging a company-wide campaign to combat those mistaken im pressions. „We wanted a paradigm shift in attitudes,” said Sylvia Huette-Ritterbusch, a Mercedes personnel expert whose job is to decide what skills the firm will need in future. One initiative Daimler has developed is an exhibition to challenge stereotypes about aging. It has already been visited by 80,000 people, including 2,500 of its factory managers and has now been brought to Berlin and opened to the public. Visitors are asked to choose between the „young” or „old” door to enter the exhibition. Many retired visitors, who obviously feel young at heart, come in through the „young” door. Once inside, you can take tests to measure memory, balance, ability to work in a team, the tightness of your grip, how high you can jump and how easily you can relax. It turns out that this correspondent, real age 45, has a biological age of 36, but 119 years of life experience. The initiative has been championed by Mercedes production head Markus Schaefer, who says: „Many prejudices about aging are long out-of-date. Every age has potential… age diversity means diversity of experience, perspectives and new ideas.”
The average age of Daimler’s 136,000 employees in Germany is 44.7 years. Germany faces a serious skills shortage as the post-war „baby boomer” generation retires. The working-age population is expected to shrink by some 2 million by 2030. The German government has moved to discourage people from retiring early and the pension age is scheduled to rise gradually from 65 to 67 by 2030. In addition to the exhibition, Mercedes has introduced demographic audits across the company to encourage employees and management to openly discuss the age structure of their teams and address ways to promote cooperation between young and old. Initiatives that have come out of that process include the launch of a corporate video platform where older workers can post YouTube-like tutorials on complex working processes to pass on their expertise to the next generation.
Mercedes is not alone in seeking to address the challenge of an aging population. BMW has taken steps including installing wooden floors to soften the impact on workers’ knees and rotating jobs during shifts so staff avoid too many repetitive movements.
Company initiatives and government policies seem to be bearing fruit: the employment rate among those aged 55 to 60 has risen sharply in the last decade. Germany now has one of Europe’s highest rates of older people working.
EMMA THOMASSON
Text pochází z agentury Reuters Zdroj LN
SLOVÍČKA
dispel rozptýlit, vyvrátit
society společnost
wage vést (kampaň)
combat bojovat proti
initiative iniciativa
measure změřit
grip sevření (pěsti)
turn out ukázat se, vyjít najevo
champion prosadit
prejudice předsudek
diversity rozmanitost
shortage nedostatek
shrink zmenšit se
government vláda
gradually postupně
introduce zavést
address zabývat se
promote podpořit
launch spuštění
tutorial instruktáž
seek snažit se
take steps učinit kroky
impact vliv
repetitive opakovaný
policy strategie, taktika
bear fruit přinést výsledky
rate míra
NAUČTE SE GRAMATIKU PODLE TEXTU
V dnešním textu jsme se setkali se slovesem soften, a sice ve větě „BMW has taken steps including installing wooden floors to soften the impact on workers’ knees…“ Toto sloveso je odvozeno od přídavného jména soft (měkký). Když ke slovu soft přidáme příponu -en, získáme tvar soften (změkčit, zeslabit). V angličtině existuje celá řada přídavných jmen, ze kterých můžeme pomocí přípony -en vytvořit sloveso. Patří mezi ně např. black – blacken (začernit), quick – quicken (zrychlit) nebo damp – dampen(navlhčit).
Pozor na pravopis v případech jako wide – widen (rozšířit)!
PŘELOŽTE:
1. naostřit 2. zkrátit 3. vybělit 4 .prohloubit 5. osladit 6. ohlušit 7. zdrsnit 8. utěsnit 9. zjasnit
Řešení: sharpen / shorten / whiten / deepen / sweeten / deafen / roughen / tighten / brighten