German Skilled Labour Award for the South Region
The REWE Region South was awarded the German Skilled Labour Prize 2025 by the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs for its REWEkombi programme, beating 400 other applicants.
Ali Rezaie
Ali Rezaie came to Germany from Iran more than seven years ago. Then came the separation from his wife and the biggest challenge was how to organise the care of his young son The partial qualification as a sales assistant at REWE gives him the opportunity to manage everyday family life and complete an apprenticeship.
Ines Barkowsky has looked after people with dementia. This work requires great mental stability and is impossible if you are in poor health and a single parent. As part of her partial qualification as a sales assistant at REWE, she has found a shop assistant who allows her to work family-friendly hours.
Dirk Hoffmann, Senior Consultant Talent Acquisition
The shortage of skilled labour is reflected in falling numbers of applicants. At the same time, there are around 1.5 million people who are unemployed and low-skilled. In the spirit of a strong community, we open ourselves up to people who fall through the cracks due to their biography or life circumstances and offer them a qualification programme to (re)enter working life.
Project GO! - Internal job market
... and we want to prevent employees from leaving simply because they are unaware of these prospects: In future, it should be more attractive and easier to change careers internally than to hire externally with the valuable expertise acquired over the years. To this end, we are currently setting up an internal job market for employees willing to make a change as part of the Step up cultural initiative with the GO! project. Find out all the details in the interview with project managers Franziska Halstrick and Christopher Ranft.