D&I Stories

Valuing Innovation and Creativity of Diverse Minds

We are a global organization and feel proud of our diversity in gender, age, sexual orientation, appearances, abilities, religions, and cultures with a workforce belonging to around 70 different nationalities. Get to know some of our global, regional and local D&I Stories!

Weina Ren | Commodity Manager and Godmother at ‘Elles bougent’

 

“Female students often choose maths and sciences and are good performers, but in the end, many do not pick technical careers. I decided to join the initiative because it is an opportunity to encourage young women to take up technical professions.”

Adèle Gauriault | Lessons Learned Group Manager and Godmother at ‘Elles bougent’

 

“I’m a mother of two daughters and would like them to perceive the engineering jobs positively. Women need female role models, so why not become an engineer like me?”

Françoise Guillo  |  Specialist Sales Support and Godmother at ‘Elles bougent’

 

“We strive for a balanced gender ratio in the teams. This is important to inspire other women to join our team. We see every day that diverse teams create better solutions and word gets around.”

Empowering Women for Technical Jobs in France

Our plant and Tech Center in Nantes, France, is a member of “Elles bougent” (‘They Move’ in English), a French voluntary association created to mentor, inspire, and assist young women in pursuit of careers in engineering.

Vibracoustic joined “Elles bougent” as part of its Diversity & Inclusion strategy, furthering the idea that careers in the automotive sector are open to all. The partnership is encouraging the curiosity and involvement of young women from all backgrounds to become engineers, highlighting the rewarding and challenging career paths on offer. Vibracoustic ‘godmothers’ encourage young women to pursue technical vocations through various events across the year.

more

Marianne Bousquet, Human Resources Manager at Vibracoustic Nantes, comments: “While automotive is a male-dominated field, we are proud that along with our managers we have been able to increase the percentage of women in production and engineering roles at the plant by more than 50 % since 2019. This positive development is the result of our ongoing efforts to foster a fulfilling diverse work culture.”

Yann Le Berre, Vice President Advanced Engineering at Vibracoustic Nantes adds: “In recent years, the proportion of women in technical and leading positions is increasing. During this development, we have experienced that diverse teams work better together and achieve better results. They arrive at solutions faster and are more innovative than homogeneous groups.”

More Parental Leave for Brazilian Families

As part of our efforts to promote Diversity & Inclusion (D&I), we seek out and embrace local opportunities for positive change. A good example of this is our participation in a Brazilian government program called ‘Citizen Company’.

Citizen Company was started in 2010 to encourage employers to offer greater parental leave, enabling employees to spend more time with their children. Typically, the law in Brazil allows for four months of paid maternity leave and five days of paternity leave. As part of Citizen Company, participating companies offer up to six months of maternity leave and 20 days of paternity leave.

more

Seeing the value in this policy shift – and understanding the importance of time at home for new parents – we implemented Citizen Company policies as part of our own D&I local action plan in Brazil in our plant in Taubaté.

Saulo José Gomes, operator at Vibracoustic Taubaté, has already benefited from the implementation of this new policy, and said:

“At this very special moment, I was able to give my family the attention and time that they needed and deserved. This was due to the new parental leave policies, which I’m very grateful for.”

D&I Children’s Drawing Activity

We believe that discussing the topic of Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) should not be confined to the office. Our Children’s Drawing Activity provided employees the opportunity to reflect together with children in their families on how we can acknowledge, accept, and respect the differences in people around us.

more

Over 150 young artists from around the globe expressed what diversity and inclusion means to them with bright colors and bright ideas. Through inspiring drawings, the children explored different dimensions of diversity like culture, language, nationality, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, and professions, among others. They highlighted the importance of living together in peace and harmony, spreading love, and supporting each other with our strengths. The Drawing Activity gave us the chance to understand D&I better and make it a natural part of our everyday lives, starting from an early age.

China: Driving Excellence in Engineering

Our team in China continues to build an inclusive work environment and a more diverse team. Since 2020, the number of women in engineering roles has increased by 20 per cent in the Application Teams, Product Engineering and Tech Center – a significant achievement given the long-standing gender imbalance in technical jobs within the automotive industry.

Successful efforts to promote Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) have been made by the regional Human Resources department and managers, by creating special activities, and bringing about changes to internal processes in our Chinese plants in Chongqing, Yantai, and Wuxi.

more

It starts during the hiring process, with equal opportunities provided to both male and female candidates. During the interview phase, increased attention and weight are placed on the professional skills and qualifications of candidates applying for engineering roles, effectively avoiding making decisions based on their gender or age.

In addition, workshops and activities have been held to promote D&I and awareness across the entire Chinese team. This includes regular D&I training, ‘Lunch & Learn’ sessions, International Women’s Day activities, ‘Family Day’ activities, and more. Continuation of these efforts will help Vibracoustic grow the number of women working in the site’s technical and senior roles.

Jin Han, Vice President, Business Unit Mounts APAC, comments: “We are thrilled to see more women joining technical functions and managerial positions within Vibracoustic’s Asia Pacific organization. We appreciate the different perspectives that women bring to our engineering teams. Diversity is a cornerstone of innovation and idea generation, so this shift has greatly contributed to the effectiveness and success of our teams.”

Mary Zou, Head of HR, APAC, remarks: “With the progress of D&I sessions and efforts from the entire team, we are creating a more inclusive business. On the ground, this is enhancing our decision-making and providing us with a more robust understanding of engineering challenges and how to overcome them. With the benefit of greater diversity, we will be able to improve the functioning of our business and achieve sustainable growth.”

Creating Opportunities for all: Vibracoustic Hamburg Supports Elbe-Werkstätten as a Reliable Partner

Diversity and inclusion are not just hollow phrases for us, but day-to-day reality, as the following example shows: For more than 20 years, our site in Hamburg, Germany, has actively partnered with Elbe-Werkstätten. This sheltered workshop provides a wide range of educational and work opportunities for people with disabilities in close cooperation with local companies. As many as 3,100 people in Northern Germany currently use the services of Elbe-Werkstätten. Vibracoustic has taken on a pioneering role in this initiative. As one of the first companies to collaborate with Elbe-Werkstätten, we have inspired many other enterprises in the region to follow our example.

more

An all-round win-win situation

The partnership brings clear advantages for all those involved. Employees of Elbe-Werkstätten are integrated into the labor market through the work they do for our company, and we benefit from having a reliable team on our side. Some 35 employees of Elbe-Werkstätten are currently assigned making products such as clamping rings for us, assisting in the assembly of jounce bumpers and bearings, or making cardboard packaging.