Dissertation_Paula Aleksandrowicz_12 ... - Jacobs University

The internalisation strategy – job retention of persons with decreased workability –
consisted of job switching to easier (but still value-adding and not sheltered) workplaces, or
the provision of sheltered workplaces created with the explicit aim of keeping pregnant
women, handicapped workers and other workers with impaired health on the job. Examples
of job switching are assigning another region to postmen which can be easier serviced (e.g.
better reached by public transportation), moving impaired workers from manual work to
automatised work, or workers who have lost the medical qualification for construction work
at high level to work at low level. Another form of job switching, pursued less often, was
the replacement of older workers in burdening positions with younger ones, and vice versa.
Such a measure may temporarily have a positive effect insofar as it raises task
diversification. However, it entails the risk that burdens solidify and young workers suffer
from early wear and tear (Gerlmaier 2007. 122-3). Positive examples have a preventive
rather than palliative character – e.g. in the form of job rotation as is pursued in Firm PL-16
(every eight hours at noisy workplaces) or in Firm PL-12 (every three months). Prevention,
another internalising measure, was applied very seldom and was restricted to the provision
of protective gear, soundproof covers for machines, or soundproof cabins for regeneration.
However, even in firms which practiced internalisation strategies in the field of health
and integration management, shop stewards reported problems with executing
improvements to working conditions and preventive measures due to pressure on costcutting.
E.g., in one firm the transparency of accounts on health impairments which
necessitate regular job switching and job rotation is seen by the CEO as a risk as the US
American investor could „move the manufacturing to China“ (Firm PL_12_TU).
The externalisation strategy was pursued with the help of dismissals, pre-retirement
benefits or disability pensions in the majority of firms, either as main measure of
´integration management´ or next to other measures. E.g. in Firm PL-13, the low chances of
older workers to reach standard retirement age on the job stem from unsuitable working
conditions (that opinion was shared by one personnel manager and the interviewed shop
steward) and from releasing older workers as the basic strategy of dealing with the problem
of impaired health. The low standard of occupational health in the firm paradoxically
secures the retention of some incapacitated older workers – the shop steward fears that if
there were more health check-ups, then more people would lose their jobs as they would not
fulfil the requirements of the job profile. In Firm PL-17, all persons with work impairments
are offered a cancellation agreement and a severance payment amounting to twelve monthly
wages (in case of persons entitled to a disability pensions – eight monthly wages).
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