The recruitment and development of excellent scientific assistants in scientific and science-related fields is at the heart of IAB’s personnel policy. What matters most to us is supporting diversity, targeted personnel development, and a good work-life balance.
IAB: a family-friendly employer
IAB has been certified as a family-friendly employer by the “audit workandfamily” management tool since 2009. By offering flexible working hours, IAB makes it possible for its employees to strike the right balance between work and childcare duties or qualification phases. Mobile work has been an option at IAB for many years. Moreover, we are raising awareness among managers and employees for a more balanced way of dealing with flexible work. Offering mutual exchange, networking opportunities, and a good working climate at IAB matters to us.
Our personnel instruments are fine-tuned to deal with the requirements regarding work-life balance while also offering very good development opportunities for employees with childcare duties. During the pandemic, we provided special support to researchers with childcare duties to help them maintain an excellent level of research under difficult conditions.
Offers for a better life-work balance
IAB offers a wide range of family-friendly measures in order to support the work-life balance of its employees:
- Offers by the Federal Employment Agency/by the IAB
- Childcare and holiday activities in and around Nuremberg
- Tips and information
Flexible working hours and mobile work
Regular working hours are 39 hours per week. These hours may be completed at any time Monday through Friday between 6:00 am and 9:00 pm. The use of working hours accounts allows for a plus or minus in these working hours. Employees may also cut back on their working hours in accordance with the statutory rules. IAB offers a variety of working hours models to that effect.
Mobile work, too, has been a regular option at IAB for several years. The establishment agreement on working hours supports a combination of mobile and on-site work. To that end, our employees are provided with either BA hardware or special access privileges to work from anywhere, as requested. By now, the majority of our events are held in hybrid form, too.
Flexible working hours for managers
To promote flexible working hours for managers, the internal IAB rules support different variants and relief structures for near-full-time management and tandem models.
A family-friendly working climate
IAB strives to be a family-friendly employer. That objective is supported through contractual, technical, and structural measures on the one hand and a family-friendly culture on the other. Thanks to a family and breastfeeding room, children may be brought to work. Moreover, short-notice childcare may be organised through the Federal Employment Agency’s family service in case of, for example, conference attendance or sickness. Children are also welcome guests at all IAB employee parties.
Gender Equality Plan of the IAB (2022 – 2025)
Read the abridged version of our equality plan to find out which goals and measures are planned at the IAB over the next few years.
Gender Equality Plan of the IAB (2022 – 2025) (PDF)
Personnel development
Personnel development at IAB is target group-specific and attuned to the respective employees’ professional phases. In cooperation with its university network, IAB offers junior researchers very good conditions for doctorates, either as part of the structured graduate programme “GradAB” or through a doctoral position in a specific research department. In-house qualifications, external further training and summer schools, conference attendance both domestic and abroad, and the opportunity for research stays provide an excellent starting point for a career in research. In addition, the institute offers various formats for scientific exchange and networking.
More senior employees and postdocs may make use of the many further development opportunities offered by IAB, such as taking charge of a working group or focus area, outstanding research positions, or the support of one’s own qualification to teach at university (habilitation).
Vacant management positions are posted in a transparent manner at IAB. In a research department, they are usually connected with a non-tenured teaching assignment at a university.
Offering planning security and perspective by means of long-term contracts, where possible, and individual career advice matters a great deal to us at IAB. An in-house tenure track procedure offers the (limited) option of extending the employment of research staff for an indefinite period of time every year.
In addition, the fact that IAB is close to both practice and policy advice means that there are good chances for a career in a government agency or ministry.
Diversity and inclusion
We firmly believe that diversity and a gender-oriented personnel policy will help IAB advance. Therefore, we are actively looking for women to fill any open management positions, making them individual offers tailored to their respective life phases. Currently, 48 % of our managers identify as female. Our institute has a long history of employing managers working part-time. And our mentoring programme is designed to help women in their professional careers.
International employees are recruited by IAB via a large, comprehensive network, via job ads posted on the relevant portals, and at recruitment events such as the European Job Market. Specific onboarding measures help them get integrated at the institute.
Inclusion is another important matter for us. In the next few years, IAB will continue to try and hire people with severe disabilities to work for the institute. We will equip the workstation accordingly and make accessibility a matter of course. Treating each other with respect and tolerance is a key factor in our institute’s culture.
Contact
You may also contact us via email at: IAB.PQI@iab.de.