Preventive healthcare and occupational safety

Volkswagen’s holistic healthcare management system extends far beyond traditional preventive healthcare and occupational safety; it also covers aspects of work organization, ergonomics, prevention, integration and rehabilitation, leadership and prospects for all individuals.

The check-ups established as standard at the German locations help to maintain and improve employees’ health and performance and help keep them fit. It is a free and comprehensive screening for all employees. The employees appreciate its high diagnostic quality and the follow-up programs.

Check-ups are now also successfully carried out at almost all international locations. Other preventive healthcare programs have been brought into line with Group-wide standards. In some cases country-specific supplementary examinations, such as HIV and tuberculosis tests, have been added.

Healthy eating concepts and a wide variety of sports and leisure activities – from the weight loss and healthy eating campaign at Volkswagen in South Africa to internal running events at Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles in Hanover – complement the holistic approach to health management in the Volkswagen Group. In addition to the check-up, ŠKODA introduced a new Healthy Living Week in 2015. The extensive offering of different medical check-ups and special healthy living programs was very well received among the workforce. In recognition of its preventive healthcare and health promotion activities, ŠKODA received the “Health Promoting Enterprise” award from the Czech Ministry of Health.

In September 2015, SEAT became the first company in Spain’s automotive sector to be awarded the sought-after “Healthy Company” certificate by the Spanish Association for Standardization and Certification (AENOR) in recognition of the high quality of its health management system.

At the same time, Volkswagen makes improvements along the entire product development process in order to guarantee that the quality of workplaces and the strains on employees that arise as a result of production are already taken into account in the planning and design stages of vehicle models. This involves using both science and practical experience with the aim of combining state-of-the-art ergonomic workplaces with innovative work processes. By using so-called ergo assistants on the production lines, employees are given advice and instructions directly at their workstations on how they can perform their workflows more ergonomically and consequently modify their behavior.

Using the Group occupational safety management system, all Group companies covered by it analyzed their occupational safety organizations and processes. The results are available throughout the Group in a central database system. A total of seven Group audits were conducted in the reporting period. This includes the systematic exchange of examples of best practice in the Volkswagen Group.