When we publish a new set of working rules, it always reflects the development of a company that started with three friends and now has over 1,300 employees on more than a dozen sites. It's time for some nostalgia with two people who have (almost) lived it all.
*For the interview, Conny purposely brought along an old set of work regulations (version 1.2.3 dating back to December 2007).
How does today's document differ from that of the past? Florian: it has changed massively! You can already see it in the length of the content. It used to be six pages long. Now it's 18. <Conny: what's more, everything has become much more complex, especially with insurance! The more people you hire, the more people you have to question things.
Be it at our warehouse in Wohlen, in our shops or among the accountants: In this jungle that is Digitec Galaxus, I swing from vine to vine, combing through the undergrowth on the lookout for juicy stories.
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The Swiss Parliament recently proposed it, we were already a little quicker: since 1 September 2019, young fathers at Digitec Galaxus have had two weeks' paternity leave. This fits in with our philosophy, because staff development is at the heart of the promise we make to our employees. Many companies are very creative when it comes to employee benefits. But fuss is not our thing. Here's what we offer in concrete terms:
* Everyone can lower their occupancy rate to 80%. Yes, everyone. Even executives. Life doesn't stop just because you've been promoted. * Possibility of extending paternity or maternity leave by 10 weeks of unpaid leave. The company will still be there when you return. * Employee discount. Because: we know our products, we buy them, we test them and we evaluate them. * Five weeks' holiday a year for everyone. A matter of honour.
Cornelia Möller has been with us in HR for 12 years and has already fought many battles. Florian Teuteberg founded the company in 2001 with Oliver Herren and Marcel Dobler (Photo: Stephanie Tresch)
Do you remember the first version of the work regulations? Florian Teuteberg, CEO: it's almost the first version. Dating back to 2005! We had already been in existence for five years at the time. During the first few years, the work rules were always developed in this way: if you were reprimanded for one reason or another, it was noted in the work rules. A good example: in the past, there were these blank CDs. Some employees simply used the stock to burn their music and take it home. At some point, we had to put a stop to this and wrote this ban into the work regulations. Cornelia "Conny" Möller, HR Manager Payroll: my work regulations still stipulate that in the event of illness or accident, you must inform the team leader by telephone. By telephone! Emails and text messages were not allowed. And the funniest thing about it all: when the team leader wasn't available, you had to call Marcel Dobler; if he wasn't available either, Florian; if you couldn't reach him, you had to call Marcel on his mobile.😊 And it still said that you had to save their number on your mobile. Have you ever received calls like that? Florian: yes, of course. Ok. I used to get a lot of calls when people were ill!
What are the other changes? Conny: back then, we always printed two copies, one for the employee and one that we had to return signed for the file. My file is still very thick because there are a lot of things like that: safety regulations, work regulations, flight regulations. Now we send the work regulations by e-mail with an attachment listing all the regulations. Now you only sign the attachment and not the whole document. After all, it was only in 2009 that HR appeared in the form we know it today. In the past, HR and accounting weren't separate; the two areas came together. Initially, Marcel (Dobler) also did the pay slips. He did them whenever he had the time. At a certain point, we decided that this was no longer possible and that employees should always be paid at the same time. It wasn't until 2009 that there was too much work to do both things at the same time.
What points have disappeared? Conny: we had a points system. Do you remember that? Florian: yes it was elaborate! I was devastated when we abolished the system. The principle was that if you arrived too late, you didn't get a warning straight away, like other companies do. But we had a sort of penalty point system, like in traffic. For example, it would say: Don't respect break time; arrive too late; didn't report an illness or accident; customers have complained about someone's behaviour; uses the telephone, mobile phone, etc.".We also had department-specific rules. In total, you could 'get' five points. After a while, we abolished the system. The problem was that nobody ever gave five points. It was hard enough for superiors to give a point. "You've got one point" was already a form of warning. Later, it was decided to make the whole thing more individual.
Florian: now we have a whole page on our philosophy. We've also cleaned it up a bit and adapted it to the company's new mindset. What's even clearer now is that we start from the positive and don't try to solve every problem head-on. It's not necessary to cover every case in the work rules, but it's essentially assumed that employees use common sense and simply try to resolve cases that are unclear or extremely important. For example, it's obvious to everyone that theft is not accepted.
Can you be piratical with work regulations? Florian: good question. To tell the truth, I've always had trouble with work regulations. We've often thought of leaving it aside. But I think that in the end, it gets in the way of day-to-day discussions... these points come up anyway. Holidays, sickness, working hours: everything has to be regulated. If we don't write them down, these points will come up everywhere and there will be discussions. It's not worth investing all that time and energy. It's better to start with a clear foundation and then concentrate on real piratical missions.
Do our work rules differ from others? Is the DG mindset also reflected in such a formal document? <Florian: In our company, the culture of 'being on first-name terms' is certainly emphasised explicitly. It makes everything less complicated and more personal. We've also tried not just to document the factual side, but also to explain why we do things the way we do. For example, when it comes to discrimination, we have a short introduction. And we explain in detail why diversity is extremely important to us.
Are you happy to be able to put the finishing touches to it after weeks of work? Conny: yes, indeed. This document took us a lot of work.😊 Florian: I think there's now a clear perception of the mindset of our company. At the end of the day, a work regulation like this also reflects the most important relationship we have as a company, the one we have with our employees. We are confronted with the day-to-day and not so day-to-day concerns of our employees at every review. Taking a closer look is well worth the effort.
Hackers sometimes have to have things in black and white too: Work regulations over the years (photo: Stephanie Tresch)
