Ideas during the outage

ideas during the outage

Early bird catches the worm

During the shutdown, ŠKODA AUTO generated a variety of ideas that are still helping

n the current coronavirus-affected state of the economy, only a few things are still working exactly as they did before. At ŠKODA AUTO, we have come up with various tweaks to deal with the situation, help each other and make it easier for suppliers and dealers. Here we discuss some of them.

Using a protected workplace

Employees are obliged to wear face masks, and the carmaker is encouraging the use of disinfectants, which need to be provided for and distributed at all sites. Employees from the CKD Centre Protected Profile Workplace have been tasked with picking and distributing protective equipment; they also pour the disinfectant from industrial packages into the dispensers.

Unconventional supplier

There is a very unusual story behind the provision of the disinfection stands. The Borovka Event company, which usually specialises in organising events and company presentations, has supplied them to meet ŠKODA AUTO’s needs during this time. “All the standard suppliers had nothing in stock in mid-March”, says Jiří Lang from BAD – Purchasing Services and Logistics. Thus, the idea was born: “We figured that if our agencies are capable of organising a monthly event abroad for 8,000 people and have many contacts, they might find a solution to this situation”, he explains. ŠKODA AUTO approached them and chose from among several offers.

Simply Clever door opening

Not only disinfection but also as small a thing as a hands-free door opener help to maintain a hygienic environment for the carmaker to operate in. The plastic part allows you to push the handle and also to pull it towards you and open the door with your forearms without touching your hands. In the EGV department, employees had to modify it for several variants of specific door handles and then print it out. Luděk Vokáč

Chill out and focus 

The carmaker focused on the difficult situation of dealers and their customers. “We initiated the Recover and Sustain business project, providing worldwide advice regarding what to do in the current situation and what not to forget”, says Jiří Matějíček from the VB – Business Development department. The Road to ŠKODA platform serves the dealers by helping to pass on information that the carmaker normally uses to get to know the products. The Simply Share section, where dealers from all over the world share their best practices, was supplemented by a special “Covid” section. “There was also a video on how to approach the customer at the workshops, and we are now preparing a similar project to describe the new car sales area. Dealers from all around the world can subtitle videos and share them with customers”, says Matějíček. Safety and hygiene measures are a matter of course in our showrooms.

Professionally and remotely

The carmaker also promotes home-office work. “We were already working on strengthening the home-office support infrastructure for employees when the situation in China started deteriorating dramatically”, says Luboš Patka from the FIO/1 – IT Terminals department. Thanks to an increase in capacity, thousands of employees can now use home office at the same time. “We can handle up to 25,000 parallel users”, he says, adding that more than 28,000 calls and teleconferences have been taking place daily on the Skype for Business platform.

Distance education

Thanks to the digital infrastructure, online education has also strengthened. “In addition to the standard courses that took place online, the #STRONGERTOGETHER – Successful Leadership in Uncertain Times initiative was created”, says Alois Kauer, Head of SE – ŠKODA Academy. It aims to support not only leaders in their current difficult situation with remote team management but also all the employees. Following the current situation, the ŠKODA Academy has prepared a video for employees on how to manage the crisis and related stress, as well as online training for Successful Leadership in Uncertain Times targeted at managers. “We used the user-friendly Zoom platform for such training”, he adds. The ŠKODA Academy is now intensively preparing to expand its offer of online education.

On stock

The ŠKODA website’s car configurator also helps our dealers and customers. It includes a Stock Cars function, which, based on a dream car configuration, shows the customer cars matching the selection or very close to it that the carmaker has in stock. “Up to 20 percent of customers on the Czech market are using this service, which is why we’ve decided to expand it to other countries as well”, says Zuzana Filipová from the VCK – Customer Management & Rollout department. She states the function is available on 11 markets, from the Czech Republic to Australia. “We are currently preparing 12 other locations where we can implement the solution”, she adds.