Employees

The commitment of our more than 190,000 employees worldwide forms the basis of our success. Their achievements, skills, and dedication help our business segments to hold leading positions in their respective markets. We want to continue attracting, retaining, and integrating talent at Fresenius. To this end, we need to consolidate and build on our position as an attractive employer in a market environment characterized by a shortage of personnel. Employee-friendly working conditions, attractive benefits, and a dialog-oriented corporate culture all help us to achieve this. 

As a global company, we create various incentives for our employees depending on the country and location. These include flexible working time models among others. We pay attention to diversity and promote international and interdisciplinary cooperation. We aim to comply with internationally recognized labor and social standards in all aspects of our operations. This is set out as mandatory in our Code of Conduct and our Human Rights Statement.

Employee development

We offer our employees the opportunity to develop professionally in a dynamic international environment. To this end, we use different concepts and measures for personnel development - depending on their own customer and market structures. We constantly adapt our approaches to current trends and requirements.

In ­addition to Group-wide mandatory training courses on the respective Codes of Conduct and on integrity, there are mandatory training courses on environmental management, and occupational health and safety in the business segments, and, where appropriate, quality management.

Attracting and retaining outstanding talent is crucial to our success. That's why our HR development measures are rounded off by segment-specific talent management and individual further training offerings for employees and managers.

Occupational health and safety

As a healthcare Group, we are responsible not only for the well-being of our patients, but also for the health and safety of our employees. We have implemented numerous management systems and measures throughout the Group to prevent employee accidents and work-related illnesses. Creating a safe and healthy working environment is our priority.

In health protection, prevention is our guiding principle; this is why we offer our employees comprehensive programs that promote their health and prevent occupational diseases.

The Fresenius Code of Conduct states that we must take the necessary measures to protect our employees and to prevent work-related accidents. All business segments focus on preventive measures and promote employees’ responsible conduct when it comes to occupational health and safety. Occupational safety concepts are adapted to the specific business models of each business segment. Our concepts focus on occupational health and safety within production, as well as occupational health management for employees in our healthcare facilities or administration.

Employee participation and exchange with employee representatives

Trust and cooperation between management, employees, and employee representatives is well established at Fresenius and is an integral part of our corporate culture. An open and ongoing dialog between management and employee representatives, as well as unions, is important to us.

In recent years, we have established various dialog formats to strengthen communication between management and employees – both at Group level and in the individual business segments. This allows the Management Board to provide employees with information on important issues personally. In addition, we promote our feedback culture and the constructive exchange of ideas.

Employees liaise with their supervisors, but they can also turn to their HR or compliance officers, as well as to the works council, their union representatives, or other employee representatives for assistance. In Europe, about 84% of our employees are covered by collective bargaining agreements. On a global basis, about 74% of our employees are covered by collective bargaining agreements.