Employees
We invest in our employees and their skills
Employee development
We promote a model of lifelong learning for all and support our management in their role as managers of change to strengthen MTU’s performance for the future.
A solid, forward-looking apprenticeship is the starting point for a vocational career. We rely on new, digital learning methods such as augmented reality.
Innovative strength and competitiveness are key factors for success in our industry. In addition, the transformation of aviation is bringing about profound changes. We are playing an active part in this and shaping the future of aviation. That is why we train and qualify our employees for specific important future fields such as propulsion concepts for emissions-free flight, digitalization, innovative production technologies, and new working methods.
We firmly believe that continuous, intensive employee development is essential for MTU. We invest specifically in the training and development of our talent, and we have continued to do so during the coronavirus pandemic. In times of change, MTU is expanding its leadership skills to include the forward-looking management concept of change leadership, which actively initiates and supports change, reinforces personal responsibility and the ability to act, and conveys trust and stability. Continuous personal and professional development of our employees also makes us an attractive employer for new hires and our own talented individuals.
In addition to industry-specific vocational training and dual work-study programs aimed at building up knowledge over the long term, we support and promote the development of all our employees—this is a key principle of corporate social responsibility as defined in the company’s Code of Conduct. In many areas of our business activities, aviation authorities prescribe additional qualification measures, such as mandatory training on human factors (failure through human error). Promoting training and development as well as avenues for personal development for employees and managers is also enshrined in the MTU Principles and in our HR strategy.
The head of human resources is responsible for the training and development of employees Group-wide. The full Executive Board receives an annual update on training indicators and discusses selected training initiatives.
Huge significance of training and development
The huge significance of training and development is reflected in the scale of opportunities we offer and how much we invest in them. This is based on our Group-wide works agreement in Germany, which guarantees access to training for all employees and requires management to conduct an interview with each employee once a year to discuss their development opportunities (training interview). This directive applies to 83.2% of the total workforce. At our three sites in Germany, the works council is also involved in employee training in accordance with the German Works Constitution Act (Betriebsverfassungsgesetz) and has a say in the annual training and development program. International sites have their own regulations; at MTU Aero Engines North America, for example, an annual development plan is agreed with all employees.
Our welcome-on-board program provides new employees with important introductory information about working at MTU. In the spirit of lifelong learning, we then continuously encourage and challenge them to develop their skills. The broad spectrum of opportunities reflects the various aspects of the world of work and MTU’s business. We establish training requirements annually in a standard process (training interview). Employees evaluate training courses they have completed in a personal meeting with their manager, or in some cases via a feedback form. An individual training history documents completed training and development courses. Training officers are on hand to answer questions relating to needs-focused training.
We continuously invest in the development and training of our employees. Our investments in this area in 2021 were almost as high as before the crisis. MTU has a wide range of development offerings and formats.
A multilingual online learning portal is the cornerstone for expanding multimedia learning. Increased use of digital and hybrid learning formats should ensure and flexibly support the training of specialists at all levels. Employees can use the portal to organize their own development in consultation with their manager.
Our Future Readiness Program, which focuses on digitalization, consists of various formats through which all employees can learn more, exchange ideas, and network. The aim is to continuously promote a digital mindset among our workforce.
In Rzeszów, Poland, we continued with “MTU positive thinking & action,” a coronavirus-related online platform that provides links to free webinars, courses, specialist articles and podcasts relating to various aspects of training and development.
At our MTU Aero Engines North America site, we have a program for entry-level graduates that rotates them through a variety of departments focusing on different areas of engineering. Moreover, we cover a certain portion of tuition fees for employees there who return to university to obtain a master’s degree as part of their development plan.
In 2021, the second year of the coronavirus pandemic, we again continued our extensive investment in employee training. The cost of all in-house and external training activities (without apprenticeships) throughout the Group stood at EUR 4.2 million (2020: EUR 3.0 million). This increase in training costs is mainly due to the fact that for a certain period of time during the pandemic, more face-to-face training was possible again. At 21,141 days, the number of training days was also up on the previous year (2020: 17,717), which brought the average number of training days per employee up to 2.0. This means that the KPIs for the training of our workforce approached the pre-crisis level.
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Employee training GRI 404-1 |
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2021 |
2020 |
2019 |
|
Training days (total) |
21,141 |
17,717 |
27,174 |
|
Training days per employee (Group-wide) |
2.0 |
1.6 |
2.5 |
|
Training days according to employee category per manager |
2.4 |
2.1 |
3.2 |
|
Training days per employee category per pale-scale employee |
2.0 |
1.6 |
2.7 |
|
Proportion of women in training courses (Group-wide) |
16.0% |
16.3% |
16.1% |
We started recording training days by employee category in 2019 for Germany; starting in 2020,
the figures cover the Group.
Developing managers into change managers
Change leadership has become one of the most important management skills. That is why MTU is developing its managers so they become managers of change with a view to securing MTU’s performance now and in the future. Especially in times of change, the MTU leadership values—“We transform, we empower, we create trust”—take on even more relevance as a shared basis for managers’ values and conduct. The values are intended to provide orientation and formulate expectations for leadership behavior. That is why we have continued this leadership values process, for example with training courses on remote leadership.
Moreover, we are constantly providing our managers with orientation and inspiration through offers such as the “Forum Leadership” blog, which is updated every two weeks, as well as through regular online short formats, or “leadership nuggets.” These offers also address current challenges such as remote leadership, virtual teamwork, resilience in times of crisis, managers as change leaders, or dealing with hybrid working environments. The human resources department’s change management team supports managers in implementing changes in their work situations.
We also offer development opportunities and programs across all levels in order to identify and best cultivate new talent, while supporting our existing managers in their professional development. A key tool is the Development Center, which, by way of exercises and interviews, supports talented employees in honing their individual development plan for assuming a management position. The Development Center is designed to objectively evaluate talented individuals and promote their visibility within the company. Some 60% of new managers appointed in 2021 had participated in Development Center activities. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, not all Development Center activities could go ahead as planned.
Furthermore, we have added a new module to talent management: potential candidates from the German sites can participate in a mentoring program for professional and personal development and for cross-hierarchical and cross-divisional exchange and networking.
There are also special development programs for new managers: a Leadership Exploration Program for departmental managers as well as a First Leadership Program for managers at the team leader level.
MTU also offers new and experienced managers the opportunity to receive management transition or pit-stop coaching with optional reflection and sparring components.
Our programs
We have numerous Group-wide initiatives that we use to develop our managers and support them both professionally and personally:
- Development Center
- Leadership Exploration Program
- First Leadership Program
- Management transition coaching
- Building on Talent/International Building on Talent
In addition, there are site-specific offerings for managers, such as an MTU Management Academy run by MTU Aero Engines Polska.
A promising career start through a solid apprenticeship
For us, vocational training is a central component of securing promising young employees. In Germany, we offer a solid grounding in ten different trades as part of a dual work-study approach, while the places we offer for students taking dual-track courses of study offer different specializations. We pursue a holistic approach that goes beyond specialist topics to also cover social and ecological aspects, for instance through health and environment days or through corporate social responsibility. → For examples, see the section about Corporate social responsibility. We continued training in Germany at the usual level in 2021, giving 95 people the chance to start their apprenticeships.
Starting their careers: The new apprentices at the three German sites in Hannover, Munich and Berlin (from left to right)
Apprentices have made up a constant proportion of MTU’s workforce for many years; last year they accounted for 3.3% of the total workforce (2020: 3.1%); in Germany, where most of our apprenticeships take place, the share was 3.8%. As of the end of the year, MTU employed a total of 349 apprentices (2020: 324). In addition, we offer practical courses of study in collaboration with selected vocational academies.
For the new location in Eastern Europe, MTU Maintenance Serbia d.o.o, the training concept based on the dual system used in Germany got underway for first-year apprentices at the Aviation Academy Belgrade. As part of the cooperation with the Academy, Serbian teachers themselves spent time as trainees at the training shop in Munich. To ensure a high level of qualification for the new employees and prepare them as effectively as possible for working with the specific requirements of aviation, a large number of them are trained at our German sites.
Educational initiatives in which MTU participates
In an effort to attract potential recruits early on, numerous MTU sites take part in educational initiatives including:
- Training Night
- IdeenExpo science exhibition in Hannover
- Nature and Technology Days
- Teachers in Industry
- Girls’ Day
- Research Camp for Girls
- EUROTEC
- Jugend forscht contest for young researchers
- Komm, mach MINT! (a German STEM initiative)
- Business4School
By training our workforce, we can help achieve the following Sustainable Development Goal:
→ Learn more about our contribution to the SDGs of the UN’s 2030 Agenda
