Jochem Freyer, the Head of FOE, told Der Tagespiegel that the plan is to recruit people mainly from Brandenburg and Berlin, who are unemployed or in the midst of changing jobs.įreyer also revealed details about salaries – which are higher than the current median wage in Brandenburg. The company says it will recruit 12,000 workers – from warehouse employees and engineers to printing technicians – and will begin production in Summer 2021.įrankfurt Oder Employment is just one of many agencies assisting Tesla with recruitment. Tesla’s Gigafactory is taking shape at lightning speed in the municipality of Grunheide, just southeast of Berlin. So will the unions put a spanner into Musk’s plans? Or will they learn to work together? Tesla’s hiring spree Musk’s round-the-clock work ethic proved problematic for the German workers, and t he wages he offered were initially up to 30 percent lower than the German average, according to a report by Handelsblatt. Musk has already collided with German unions before when Tesla acquired Grohmann Engineering in the small town of Prüm in 2017. US retailer Walmart left the German market after a string of failures thanks in part to its inability to get along with the unions.Ī conflict with the unions could be a stumbling block for Musk in his mission to turn the Grünheide factory – which will make 500,000 electric vehicles a year – into a central pillar of the company’s European strategy.
IG Metall alone has 2.4m members willing to shut down industrial operations in defence of overtime payment, fixed working hours, and a minimum holiday entitlement of 24 days a year. These tensions are significant as unions wield serious power in Germany. “We could take that as a hint as to what to expect of Tesla in Grünheide. “We are in touch with our sister organisations at other Tesla facilities, so we are fully aware of personal allegations, as well as legal accusations and litigations against Tesla,” says Birgit Dietze, District Manager for IG Metall, Germany’s largest metal workers union, in Berlin-Brandenburg-Sachsen. And Musk himself has repeatedly opposed employee efforts to unionize.
#Ig metall learning factory serial#
In the United States, Tesla workers have filed serial complaints about low pay and poor working conditions. But while engineers are thrilled about the chance to work for a man who is something of a celebrity in Germany and a hero to many, the country’s powerful unions are wary: Musk is no friend of organised labour.
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