F30POST
F30POST
2012-2015 BMW 3-Series and 4-Series Forum
BMW Garage BMW Meets Register Search Today's Posts Mark Forums Read
BMW 3-Series and 4-Series Forum (F30 / F32) | F30POST > BIMMERPOST Universal Forums > General BMW News and Cars Discussion > BMW's special factory for older workers.
GetBMWParts
Post Reply
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
      12-20-2011, 02:09 PM   #1
E91 Hoarder
Captain
E91 Hoarder's Avatar
No_Country
118
Rep
831
Posts

Drives: E91 AWD, E91 RWD, E90, X535i
Join Date: Oct 2011
Location: On the Road

iTrader: (8)

BMW's special factory for older workers.

Interesting article by BBC about aging workforce in Germany. This one talks about BMW factory specifically.

After the government raised the retirement age to 67, there more and more of aging workforce on German factories. At the same time there is a shortage of young experienced workers. BMW has started adopting its factories to be more comfortable for older workers:

Quote:
Around the world, BMW employs 96,000, three-quarters of them in Germany. With the changing demographics, the average age is around 40 but it expects that to rise to 46 by 2020.
Quote:
It's not quite what you expect on a relentless production line in a BMW plant in Bavaria: as the shells of cars trundle by, a sixty-year old man in his company overalls bends and stretches under the instruction of a young physiotherapist in a white coat.
Quote:
It's one of the ways in which the huge plant at Dingolfing has been adapted to make the working lives of its 18,000 employees better - or at least longer.


Quote:
Apart from the exercises on the shop floor and in gyms near the assembly lines, the work-stations where workers sit and stand have been modified to minimise stretching and awkward movement.

There's more daylight - where most factories don't have windows, Dingolfing does, and psychologists say this cuts stress.

Workers can see each other and this, too, reduces stress, according to the doctors who redesigned the factory with age in mind.

There's also much more flexibility to the speed of the assembly line. "It removes stress from the operator," said manager, Barbara Bergmeier. "If you think that you're the slowest component of the system, it really creates stress for you. If you consider that if you make a defect, the whole shift has to do half an hour overtime to get the volume - that's a source of stress."
The rest of the article is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16257072
Appreciate 0
      12-20-2011, 04:14 PM   #2
Bobby Pynes
Second Lieutenant
Bobby Pynes's Avatar
United_States
31
Rep
287
Posts

Drives: 2012 G37S Loaded
Join Date: Jul 2011
Location: San Francisco

iTrader: (0)

Cool story bro...

Just kidding
__________________
Bobby Pynes
Appreciate 0
      12-20-2011, 09:05 PM   #3
queensfield
First Lieutenant
United_States
21
Rep
364
Posts

Drives: 2006 330i E90
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: So Cal

iTrader: (0)

They had a piece on it too on 60 minutes. It talked about special shoes and floor that are easy on the knees, special tools to make vision easier etc. They tracked the statistics on the older worker plant only and found that after implementation of their older worker-friendly environment, the defects went down substantially.
Appreciate 0
Post Reply

Bookmarks

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off



All times are GMT -5. The time now is 01:23 AM.




f30post
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions Inc.
1Addicts.com, BIMMERPOST.com, E90Post.com, F30Post.com, M3Post.com, ZPost.com, 5Post.com, 6Post.com, 7Post.com, XBimmers.com logo and trademark are properties of BIMMERPOST