German digital bank N26 is facing outcry from its staff over management

Post by sdoering » Fri, Aug 14, 2020, 10:09 AM UTC

arrrg wrote: post #12

arianvanp wrote: post #3

At least here in NL the Works Council is mandatory _By law_ if you have more than 50 employees. I suppose the laws in Germany are similar. and I also suppose N26 has more than 50 employeees ;) A healthy organization should have one, in my opinion. Management being against it is an unhealthy sign. Just so you have some context. a Works Council has the following rights: Right to discuss: they will have a bi-yearly meet…

Worker Councils seem to have broadly similar but slightly different rights and responsibilities in Germany. They are never mandatory, however employees do have the right to form one if there are at least five employees who are eligible to vote (18+) and if at least three of those can be elected (>6 months with the company, broadly speaking no one in an important management role). At least three employees have to take…

Post by admg » Fri, Aug 14, 2020, 10:13 AM UTC

ragebol wrote: post #24

admg wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's fascinating. I can see both the positives of it and the downsides. I recently (around two years ago) worked for a startup which grew too quickly and made some really bad hiring decisions which left them with a lot of loud, disgruntled employees - these works council right's would've crippled the company instead of just setting it back a few years. On the other side I've worked for a larger financial services c…

In short: if you have bad people in your organisation and they can make decisions, that might be bad for the organisation. So hire good people.

Post by ArgyleSound » Fri, Aug 14, 2020, 10:15 AM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #25

dtech wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding the last point, the Netherlands is very different from the US, especially at-will employment states. Once you give an employee a permanent contract, you cannot fire them except for a set of reasons defined by law. Most interestingly compared to US, if you need to lay off people you need to lay of your employees in order of most junior to most senior (seniority in terms of time they have been with the compan…

> Once you give an employee a permanent contract, you cannot fire them except for a set of reasons defined by law. Americans be like: "Shock! Awe! How would anyone ever hire an employee under such a requirement?!" (Meanwhile Netherlands unemployed rate is ~ 4.3%, and the US one at ~10 - and the latter with lots of under-reporting, e.g. people giving up looking for a job, and so on).

Post by lumberjack » Fri, Aug 14, 2020, 10:17 AM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #25

dtech wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding the last point, the Netherlands is very different from the US, especially at-will employment states. Once you give an employee a permanent contract, you cannot fire them except for a set of reasons defined by law. Most interestingly compared to US, if you need to lay off people you need to lay of your employees in order of most junior to most senior (seniority in terms of time they have been with the compan…

> Once you give an employee a permanent contract, you cannot fire them except for a set of reasons defined by law. Americans be like: "Shock! Awe! How would anyone ever hire an employee under such a requirement?!" (Meanwhile Netherlands unemployed rate is ~ 4.3%, and the US one at ~10 - and the latter with lots of under-reporting, e.g. people giving up looking for a job, and so on).

Post by corty » Fri, Aug 14, 2020, 10:24 AM UTC

sdoering wrote: post #21

readarticle wrote: post #5

The alternative to the Works Council should have a representation of employees who are not only based in Germany, but also all other countries, including Brazil and the United States I find it hard to believe these councils don’t have the ability to account for international employees, is this a specifically “outside the EU” issue since the examples given are in the Americas, and not any of the neighboring countries…

Actually they could include non German employees in their works agreements. But none the less these binding agreements are, as far as I am aware, only binding for German work contracts. So even if these protections were written down, that wouldn't protect the international colleagues.as long as they are not employed in a German legal entity. Our works council for example isn't able to represent our Czech colleagues.