Today was a bittersweet end to such an amazing trip to Sweden. As our group came together over the last ten days it is unbelievable to think how we’ve only known each other for just over a semester. Our final day was packed with activities at Volvo’s headquarters in Gothenburg, including corporate meetings, a nice lunch, and a tour of the company museum.
To begin, we sat in on presentations from HR representatives from the Swedish truck manufacturer, Volvo. There were four employees who spoke at the meeting, all discussing how Volvo structures its HR practices to foster an innovative and engaged employee body.
Probably the most fascinating of the information was presented by the manager of Volvo’s talent acquisition. As the last speaker in the group of professionals, she was exceptional at discussing how Volvo enhanced their employee engagement to support the companies strategic vision. Using metrics and careful analysis of the contributing factors that had caused lower levels of morale, she was able to lead initiatives that improved the profitability and overall success of the company.
All of these guest speakers excellently presented information about their HR practices in their own respective areas of expertise, and it was enlightening to learn about how they addressed common HR problems at such a massive international company.
Later we took a tour of the car museum located nearby the corporate offices. The museum was laid out in chronological order telling the history of Volvo cars since the company was founded in the early 20th century. The museum was very well done, and it was amazing to walk through the building to see the overall history of the company. The best part of the museum was definitely the portion where they had all the prototypes of cars that never made it to market. In this display, there was a car that was exclusively developed by females and it was an excellent example of how diverse teams can bring increased idea generation, often leading to greater success. While this car never made it to market, many of the ideas that this all-female team introduced in their groundbreaking car have been integrated into their current car models.
It is sad to think that we will all be going our separate ways tomorrow, but we are excited to get home and all hang out as friends in the future. This has been such a great experience and we are so glad to have taken part in this journey.
-Nick Delano, Alex Bowden
