Long-term Employability
Remaining healthy, committed and competent until you retire, that is what long-term employability is about. Right now, but also in the future.
We do this by investing in various projects that fit within one of the following themes:
- Organization
- Work
- Involvement
- Health
- Personal development
- Work-life balance
We believe that if we pay attention to our employees, they will be more involved. We encourage people to think about certain aspects of their job, in order to be prepared for the changes that their environment will entail.
Because we want employees not only to be employable right now, but also create awareness for their employability in the future. Together we are fit for the future.
Change
Katja Wouters is Program Manager Long-term Employability and responsible for the various projects that are initiated. She explains: “Long-term employability is relatively new within DAF, but we are completely aware of the need of it. The retirement age is rising and there are many new technological developments,” Katja explains. “How can we sufficiently support our employees to adapt to all those changes? That is something we keep in mind with the projects and programs we develop.”
A frequently mentioned example within DAF is the flexible working arrangement. This regulation ensures a better work-life balance for employees. If possible, you can schedule your own working hours. If you come a bit later to the office, you just continue working a little bit longer. Very convenient if you want to bring your children to school or if you need to go to the dentist.
Supporting a healthy lifestyle
One of our major points of attention is the physical strain of our employees. We look critically at workplaces and several workshops are given in order to further reduce the load, both in the production facilities as well as in the office environment.
Healthy eating is stimulated, by making clear which products are healthy. Further, every employee gets the opportunity to do a health check, called the DAF fit test. And if you want some extra movement on the large DAF campus, it is possible to use one of the DAF bikes, for example to visit an appointment in another building.
Creating more awareness
Katja emphasizes that she sees a movement within the organization: "You see that more employees are thinking about their employability. It takes time for everyone to get used to it. We have developed a discussion card about long-term employability, to make the subject open to discussion in conversations between manager and employee. We already notice that there is more attention for the subject, that is a good thing, because our goal is to contribute more awareness and knowledge for this subject. So that we can be employable right now, but are also employable for the future.”
