Sixth month in the company - end of probationary period, open positions and search for HR system

June is gone and with it my trial period at NOBO Automotive in České Budějovice. I have successfully completed my first six months in the company and it follows that I will write some more articles for you. The work we did here in the first six months was part of the reporting for NOBO's top officials in China. The feedback I received was very positive. Considering the positive feedback I was getting from my direct supervisor and, after all, from you, my regular subscribers, I was quite optimistic before the presentation and believed that my time with the company was not over. I am of course delighted with the successful completion of my probationary period and am grateful for the cooperation with the new HR team and the direction it is giving our plant Robert Maška. Last but not least, I'm glad for your reactions to my blog, I wouldn't believe that my writing reaches more than 100.000 readers in six months.

My joining the company was to some extent a leap into the unknown - at the time of accepting the job offer in October 2023, NOBO Automotive did not exist, had no facilities in the Czech Republic and no contracts with suppliers. Currently, these basic things are already standard for the company and I, together with my colleague, have already Daniela Víznerová RACRI focus primarily on HR topics. This year it is, and will be, mainly recruitment, creation of external communication, visa issues related to the arrival of colleagues from China to the Czech Republic and last but not least the selection of HR systems.

Visit BMW

In June, we were visited by colleagues from BMW to see the progress of the construction of our new plant. Here is a photo of the first floor, where my office will be in about six months:

And this is what it looks like now down on the "shopfloor":

Currently open positions

We have a number of open positions at the moment. We are looking for colleagues in the quality department, HSE, logistics, maintenance, technical department, IT and last but not least we would like to welcome another member of our HR team in the second half of the year. Of all the positions, I would currently like to highlight the following two:

Maintenance coordinator

From 1 June he took up the position of Industrialisation Manager Jaroslav Hrabák and after reviewing the hiring plan, we posted a new position, his right-hand man in the maintenance department. This person will be in charge of a team of 8-10 employees in the future and his main tasks will include:

Maintenance planning: Creation and monitoring of maintenance plans (financial plan, preventive and predictive maintenance plan including HSE) for all equipment and machinery within the production facility.

Maintenance coordinationA: Ensuring that all plant, machinery and equipment is in a safe and efficient operating condition.

Troubleshooting: Working with the maintenance, technology, production or other teams to solve problems and improve processes. This includes identifying and resolving issues that may affect maintenance and operation of equipment.

Maintenance records management: Maintaining and updating maintenance records and documentation.

Compliance with regulations: Ensuring compliance with all safety and environmental regulations.

Maintenance efficiency management: Continuous evaluation of set KPIs (meeting IATF requirements, VDA 6.3, ISO standards, etc.) ;. performance of staff and taking measures leading to their achievement.

Spare parts warehouse management: Performing receiving, dispensing, ND identification, min/max determination, inventory, setting up a sustainable warehouse management system.

Supplier management: During repairs, new installations, service work, it communicates with suppliers and ensures safety at the workplace of our employees and employees of external companies.

Another position I would like to mention today is the position of:

HR specialist junior - position suitable for graduates

We are looking for someone to join me, Daniela and Allen from China in the HR team to help us with the increasing number of tasks. The ideal candidate has:

University degree in economics, management, HR etc.
Willingness to work
English at a level that allows daily communication - one member of the team is from China and does not speak Czech, so all meetings are in English
Knowledge of MS office - we prepare various presentations and reports every week, we have recruitment plan in excel, we use scalar product functions for cost budget plan, SVYHLEDAT for data combinations from various spreadsheets, we create all kinds of graphs in Powerpoint for senior management regarding progress of activities from our plant
Diligence - supporting our team in administration with onboarding and offboarding, monthly closing, data entry into HR systems, keeping track of deadlines - medical exams, onboarding schedules, etc.

In the past, I chose to join the team at my former job Anna Vokurkova. At that time she was fresh out of school, spoke perfect English and was open to learning new things. After more than two years, she is now an Acting HR Manager. It was and is great to see her grow in the company. I myself started in HR as a trainee during my college studies at Bosch in Budejovice and I am still grateful to my first manager. Barbora Schelová for a chance to start in corporate without any relevant industry experience. These two examples also make me open to hiring a graduate with minimal experience and a great appetite for the job. If you know of anyone like this in your area, please let me know in the messages.

HR Systems

In the companies where I worked before joining NOBO Automotive, HR systems were selected by the company's headquarters and I admit that I was a frequent critic of the selected solutions. They didn't work to my liking at the time, we had several different systems, some data had to be entered multiple times in different places, etc. Now we have the chance to set this up correctly from the very beginning.

My vision is to have one An HR system that will work for employee administration, payment of their wages, attendance management (so that we don't have to migrate attendance data to payroll software), will respond to changes in the Czech Labour Code, will help with communication with employees, we will be able to set up employee evaluations, training plans, will monitor legal training and health checks and most importantly it will be a 21st century system = it will help us to have as few printed documents as possible. We currently have some bids on the table, but would be happy for any recommendations for an HR system that can meet our expectations fully or at least for the most part.

Does anyone have an HR system that you are happy with and are willing to recommend it to me? Most HR colleagues I have interviewed so far are rather dissatisfied and do not want to recommend their solutions to me.

Thanks for any recommendations for systems and candidates and have a great summer.

David Havelec

HR Manager in Nobo Automotive Czech Republic

1 July 2024