At the end of the business year 2023/24 on March 31, 2024, the voestalpine Group had 49,082 employees, excluding apprentices and leased personnel. This corresponds to an increase of 851 employees or 1.8% compared to March 31, 2023. Including 1,513 apprentices and 2,822 leased employees, the total full-time equivalent (FTE) is 51,589 person-years, an increase of 0.8% (+386 FTE) compared to the previous year. 27,969 employees (FTE), or 54.2%, are employed at Group sites outside of Austria, while 23,620 employees (FTE), or 45.8%, are employed at voestalpine sites in Austria. Of the 1,513 apprentices at the end of the business year, 68.9% were trained at sites in Austria and 31.1% outside of Austria. Overall, the number of apprentices increased by 111 or 7.9% compared to the previous year.
EMPLOYEE SHAREHOLDING SCHEME
voestalpine has had an employee shareholding scheme since 2001, which has been continuously expanded since then. In addition to all Austrian employees, employees in Great Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Italy, Switzerland, Romania, Spain, and Sweden also have a share in “their” company. The voting rights from the employee shares are bundled in the voestalpine Mitarbeiterbeteiligung Privatstiftung (employee foundation for the Group’s employee shareholding scheme), which makes it a stable core shareholder of voestalpine AG. As of March 31, 2024, a total of around 26,550 employees hold shares in voestalpine AG. They hold around 25.5 million shares, which represent 14.3% of the company’s share capital due to the general pooling of voting rights (previous year: 14.3%). In addition, former voestalpine employees hold around 0.9 million “private shares” through the foundation, which corresponds to 0.5% of the voting shares. The foundation exercises the voting rights of these shares, too, as long as the former employees do not exercise their free right of disposal. On the whole, as of March 31, 2024, the voting rights of around 14.8% of voestalpine AG’s share capital are therefore pooled in the foundation.
THE STAHLSTIFTUNG
In 1987, the Stahlstiftung (Steel Foundation) was established in Linz, Austria, as a legally independent non-profit foundation. Its aim was to provide employees of the VOEST-ALPINE Group (as it was called at this time) who had left the company due to the crisis, as well as employees of companies outside the Group, with opportunities for professional reorientation. Training and continued professional development (CPD) are paid for a period of up to four years. The foundation’s services are financed by solidarity contributions from employees and administrative cost sharing arrangements with all member companies. As of the March 31, 2024, reporting date, the Steel Foundation supported 229 individuals, 155 of whom came from voestalpine Group companies. The total number of active Stahlstiftung participants in the business year 2023/24 was 379, 18.0% less than in the previous year (462). In the 2023/24 business year, 84.2% of job-seeking participants found new career prospects with the help of the Stahlstiftung. The fact that this figure fell by around 2% compared to the 2022/23 business year reflects the situation on the labor market in the reporting period. In addition to the participants in the Stahlstiftung as a traditional employee foundation, 30 individuals were supported in their activities as part of educational leave in the reporting period. In addition, a total of 154 employees of the Stahlstiftung member companies received individual consultations in the 2023/24 business year to ensure their employability.
APPRENTICES & YOUNG SKILLED WORKERS
voestalpine remains committed to the goal of providing sound training for young people: 535 places are planned for the start of training in the Northern fall of 2024. The company invests around EUR 90,000 per apprentice in the extensive three- or four-year training program. In order to present the approximately 50 different apprenticeships at the 39 voestalpine training locations in Europe’s German speaking region (Germany, Austria, and Switzerland), voestalpine AG once again carried out a cross-media advertising campaign this year, aimed at young people as well as their parents and relatives. The goal is to provide the Group companies with the best possible support in their search for future young skilled workers. The campaign is being advertised in the geographical vicinity of voestalpine sites, using the global platforms TikTok, Snapchat, YouTube, and Instagram—in other words, on social media channels that young people like to use. The campaign also addresses the target group of parents via Facebook and Google, as well as through cooperation with regional print media. The focus is on the young people themselves. The visual language and wording were developed involving voestalpine apprentices, who also appear as the main actors and testimonials. The campaign slogan “I choose” stands for self-determination, but also for the youthful touch and forms the creative bracket of the campaign. The campaign website www.voestalpine.com/ichoose has the same look and feel as the numerous short videos and photos, and forms the link to the application for an apprenticeship at voestalpine.
The voestalpine Group Apprentice Day is an annual fixture and took place for the 11th time — after three years of virtual events, it was held for the first time as a live event at voestalpine Stahlwelt in Linz. All apprentices in their final year of training are invited to the headquarters in Linz to experience an eventful day with a talk with the Management Board, a tour of the plant, team challenges, and lots of fun and action. Around 400 apprentices from 39 sites in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland took the opportunity to meet in person and get to know the Group headquarters in Linz at the voestalpine Group Apprentice Day on October 10, 2023. As a highlight, the entire voestalpine Management Board was on hand to answer questions from the apprentices in a roundtable discussion. Current topics such as the greentec steel step-by-step plan and the new special steel plant at the Kapfenberg site were of particular interest to the young people. EU Youth Ambassador and watchado founder Ali Mahlodji gave a keynote speech to motivate the young professionals to take their future into their own hands. Between the program items, there was also an opportunity for in-depth discussions with colleagues from other locations. A festival of appreciation and a strong sign of the importance of teaching. In recent years, over 4,000 apprentices have taken part in the previous Apprentice Days and experienced this special spirit.
Excellent apprenticeship completion figures in the Group promise a solid base of skilled workers for the future: 97.0% of apprentices in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland passed their final apprenticeship examination in the 2023/24 business year. Of the Austrian graduates, 61.6% even passed the exam with good or excellent grades.
Numerous successes achieved by voestalpine apprentices confirm the quality of their training, such as the European vice-champion title in the plant electrics vocational category at the EuroSkills vocational championships in Gdansk. voestalpine was also successful at the AustrianSkills2023 vocational championships: state champion and 1st to 3rd place in the plant and operating technology category. This means that voestalpine will once again be represented at WorldSkills2024 in France and EuroSkills2025 in Denmark. This shows once again that voestalpine’s training of skilled workers is a showcase example in the industry. But our young professionals have also won numerous awards at national level: In September 2023, a total of six young skilled workers from Kapfenberg were honored as part of the “Stars of Styria” awards. All of them are graduates of a regular apprenticeship who passed their final apprenticeship examination with distinction. A total of 17 awards were presented to our voestalpine apprentices at the Upper Austrian Chamber of Commerce’s Apprentice Award in Linz.
We are particularly keen to encourage women to take up technical apprenticeships. The proportion of women in technical apprenticeships has more than doubled in the last ten years and currently stands at 21.7%. Measures such as participation in careers fairs and visits to schools as well as Girls’ Day are intended to further increase the proportion of women in technical apprenticeships in particular.
DEVELOPMENT OF EXECUTIVES
In the last business year, voestalpine continued to focus on broad Group-wide management development based on the proven “value:program.” In 2023/24, 171 employees from 20 countries started the multi-stage leadership program. We also succeeded in increasing the proportion of women to 32.7% from around 23% in the previous year. The target group-specific training and development programs take place for all management levels as classroom and online training courses and are supplemented by external postgraduates and business schools. In addition to extensive skills training by internationally renowned experts, the intensive involvement of representatives from the voestalpine management team is proving particularly valuable. They are involved as speakers, project facilitators or as “sparring partners” as part of a broad exchange of experience. The mix of external and internal expertise and the commitment to high qualification standards make the voestalpine Leadership Program a central component of the “one step ahead” claim.
OTHER EMPLOYEE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMS
The voestalpine Group runs a number of other programs to promote and strengthen the relevant skills of its employees, both professionally and regionally. These include the “Purchasing Power Academy,” the “HR Academy,” the “Early Career Program” in North America, and the “Young Professional Training Program” (YPTP) in China.
The last Early Career Program in North America started at the end of the 2022/23 business year. After eight exciting and eventful months, 31 participants successfully completed the Early Career Program in October 2023: A unique program that provides intensive support specifically for employees of our North American Group companies during the early stages of their career development. Theory was taught and practical examples exchanged in three face-to-face modules in Atlanta (USA, GA), Toronto (CAN, ON), and Chicago (USA, IL).
EMPLOYEE SURVEY
Following the last Group-wide voestalpine employee survey in the Northern fall of 2022, the review process began in December 2022 with the presentation of the results to the Management Board committees and the distribution of the respective results to the companies worldwide. Once the results had been analyzed, the companies were asked to report at least the two most significant measures to the Group. A total of 440 measures were reported by 210 companies. In addition to the engagement score recorded in the survey, these focused primarily on the surveyed areas of action “Information & communication,” “Appreciation,” and “Cooperation between colleagues.” For the first time, respondents were also asked which of voestalpine’s three corporate values the measures contribute to. Multiple answers were possible, which is why the results added together exceed the number of measures: 339 measures are aimed at “Living appreciation,” 171 at “Sustainable action,” and 133 at “Entrepreneurial thinking.”
In the final reporting of measures (until March 31, 2024), the companies are asked to report on the implementation status before preparations for the voestalpine Employee Survey 2024 begin. This will again take place worldwide from September 30 to October 27, 2024.
COOPERATION WITH EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS
Many voestalpine companies offer students the opportunity to complete internships. One focus is on scientific work in cooperation with voestalpine companies. Numerous diploma and master’s theses as well as dissertations are currently being written in cooperation with the Group. voestalpine relies on innovative formats for different target groups in order to present itself to future employees: These include numerous training cooperations, sponsorship commitments aimed at kindling young people’s interest in technical degrees, and participation in job fairs or the “#voestalpinetalks” at the University of Mining and Metallurgy in Leoben, Austria—a cooperative event with all student representatives.
