Dr Schuster (BP) "Modernizing the Workplace – diversity and technology as key levers"

It is not everydays business, if a top-management-member of an internationally listed corporation travels to Vienna, just to be present at an Austro-British Society’s event to give insights, how a worldwide player sees the future.

So it happened on Monday, 12 October, as Dr. Helmut Schuster, BP Group HR Director, gave an interesting lecture under the headline: „Modernizing the Workplace – diversity and technology as key levers“. With the amazing panoramic view of the city of Vienna from the 11th floor of Oceans Sky on top of the „Haus des Meeres“, he gave new perspectives how the working environment is due to change in the near future. He took more than 100 guests back to the 1980s to the invention of the Macintosh and created awareness how dramatically the technological chance influenced the working environment. From the present, he took us all to the future and highlighted megatrands, for which we need to be prepared and with which corporations have to cope. These trends are:

1. Private and professional lives merge more and more,
2. Everybody is faced with increasing transparency, as everything is public because of new media,
3. We experience a transformation of learning from „memorising" to „thinking",
4. The best want the best, now and much more in the future, and finally
5. Machines will replace workforce extensively.

Dr. Schuster pointed out, how these trends must influence our view to education and attraction provided by companies, as only the best people will contribute to develop companies and secure their future. The lecture and the following Q&A-session gave many inputs for interesting discussions at the get-together with excellent drinks and food. ABS president and former top-executive manager with BP, KR Dr. Kurt Tiroch stated: „This was an extraordinary event and the society expresses its highest appreciation to the Austrian CEO, Gerlinde Hofer, and Dr. Schuster, for the highly interesting content and the generous inivitation to a top-location and the outstanding hospitality! It is the society's great pleasure to have BP amongst the 60 corporate members and it is a brilliant example of a flourishing partnership.“

(Jochen Ressel)

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