HZB still a certified family-friendly employer

The Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie (HZB) offers a family-friendly environment for its employees. The charitable Hertie Foundation has confirmed this once again, and has awarded the research centre the “career and family” certificate for another three years. The HZB management decided to undergo this external audit in 2011 and has agreed on new targets to increase the family friendliness even further. This certificate awarded by the experts confirms that HZB now ensures better long-term reconciliation of family and career.

Over the past few years, the HZB has introduced a series of measures including telecommuting, flexible work hours and an agreement on family-friendly meeting times. “The HZB is proud of its family-friendly corporate structure. The audit is incentive for us to continue improving this,” says Moritz Badel, head of the HZB Human Resources and Social Affairs department.

For the coming years, the family-friendly measures shall be communicated more clearly throughout the centre to ensure they are more strongly accepted and adopted. This culture is strongly exemplified by the managers and their leadership behaviour. The HZB therefore understands the promotion of reconcilability of family and career as an essential management function. Managers can already take a self-test. This helps to recognize the needs of employees of families and to make the working conditions friendlier for families.

The Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin has held the “career and family” certificate since 2011. In the time since, the certificate has developed into a recognized seal of quality for a family-conscious personnel policy.

You can find more information about the auditing process and the agreed targets on the Intranet (in German).