Education Spotlight

Vocational training or college degree? In the automotive trade, it has been possible to combine the two since the fall of 2014. The Automotive Bachelor Plus program is an innovative concept – a single, integrated model that combines training as a mechatronic technician, qualification as a master craftsman, and a bachelor’s degree. High-school graduates can spend five years gaining job experience at a business while at the same time profiting from ongoing education in the form of training, professional development and college studies. The Steinbeis Business Academy at Steinbeis University Berlin (SHB) offers this integrated program in cooperation with the Carl Benz School in Gaggenau and the training academy of the Karlsruhe Chamber of Skilled Crafts.

Step by step, participants work toward their technical and academic credentials while receiving additional qualifications in the fields of high-voltage vehicles, exhaust emissions testing and gas systems. The multi-faceted program lets participants earn widely recognized qualifications, making it the perfect way to launch a career on a broad range of professional paths.

The coursework for the vocational training and the master craftsman‘s certificate takes place in two-week blocks. The vocationally integrated degree program consists of weekend seminars and lectures. Since the program dovetails with their professional employment, employers can count on the students’ availability during the five-year program. The employers cover the training and professional development costs and pay the students a fair salary.

As part of the Project Competence Degree (PKD), students must also successfully complete a project for their company. Their bachelor’s thesis is then based on this project work. Participants might examine how to choose the right location for a new subsidiary, for instance, or look at ways to optimize processes in complaints management.

After completing each of the program’s qualifications, participants may also chose to leave the program and take a position as a journeyman or master craftsman. All students in the first program, however, are certain that they will stay until they have received their bachelor’s degrees.

The Automotive Bachelor Plus program offers businesses an opportunity to train professionals with lots of hands-on experience. Thanks to the optimized integration of practical training and academics, the students are quickly able to take on responsibilities in the project order department, the workshop, customer service and sales, office management, HR or marketing. For small and medium-sized enterprises, the program is a great way to plan for the future and train up successors over the long term. Large car dealers profit from the participants’ comprehensive, interdisciplinary training and the wide range of positions they can move into.

In the four-semester program students not only examined questions of jurisprudence, but also looked at criminal tactics, evidence analysis and criminology strategies, learned interrogation and investigation techniques, and studied forensic psychology. “These are all necessary skill sets for a career in fighting all types of crime,” underscores Birgit Galley, director of the Steinbeis Transfer Institute School of Criminal Investigation & Forensic Science | Institut für Kriminalistik (School CIFoS).

Among the first graduates are corporate security specialists, defense lawyers, private investigators and police officers who plan to apply what they have learned in their future careers. Philipp Grabensee, one of the first graduating students, says of the program, “As a defense lawyer, the casual learning environment here has provided me with exactly the network I need and supplemented the knowledge of criminology that was missing in my original academic studies.“

The third class of criminal science students started the degree program in October 2014.

Continuing professional development in risk management for managers

Every day, company employees have to assess the potential risks of situations, plans, activities, projects and decisions. To this end, businesses have risk-assessment methodologies – and sometimes entire departments – devoted to evaluating risk. But how do the employees actually carry out these evaluations and assessments? What factors influence their conclusions? These considerations are particularly relevant to SMEs who retain their managers and therefore have an interest in maintaining and improving their performance and leadership skills. Steinbeis Transfer Institute “StressManagement, Holistic Health Care and Preventive” has developed a program aimed at medium-sized businesses which incorporates these criteria.

In contrast to many other occupational health management programs, it specifically targets managers, a group who applies their experience and responsibility within the business to drive performance and lead their team by example. When they are absent, they leave a gap that is extremely difficult to plug in times of professional shortages. The Steinbeis Transfer Institute program systematically addresses precisely these topics. The program, designed as a modular toolbox, achieves appreciable results. As a variety of studies has shown, each euro that is invested in innovative and sustainable preventive measures can add up to sixteen euros in value. The three modules in the program address the topics of recognizing and taking advantage of new resources, value-based leadership, and achieving a healthy work-life balance. Each module is presented by an expert team of experienced management trainers, consultants and psychologists.

The Steinbeis Transfer Institute “StressManagement, Holistic Health Care and Preventive” offers long-term solutions for maintaining health, quality of life and performance. In addition to continuing professional development in risk management, a mindfulness training course for managers and a management retreat on Lake Constance are also offered.

Once a diagnosis and a decision in favor of surgical intervention have been made, what happens in the operating room (OR) will be a deciding factor in the patient’s recovery. In addition to the ICU, the OR is one of the most cost-intensive workstations in any hospital. This means that perioperative planning and the organization of all surgical processes must be carefully implemented, monitored and documented. This is why the expertise of the OR team is important – not to mention professional workflow planning and the interactions with postoperative care and follow-up operations. To achieve these aims in a professional manner, hospitals have created the OR manager and OR coordinator functions. However, until now no standard training for these positions has been offered. The Association for OR Management (VOPM) and the Steinbeis Transfer Institute called Business Excellence, which is part of Steinbeis University Berlin, worked together to identify the expertise and organizational skills required for the two functions and developed a corresponding certification exam for future use.

To qualify to take the exam, participants must have completed training in a medical nursing field, be licensed to practice medicine or hold a degree in health economics or a similar field. Knowledge of OR management, patient management, financial management, HR management, project management, legal issues relevant to the OR, labor law, hygiene, risk management, supply chain management, quality management and marketing is also expected. Upon successfully completing the examination, participants are awarded the title “OR Manager certified by Steinbeis University” or “OR Coordinator certified by Steinbeis University.” TQU Verlag publishes practice exams to help participants prepare for the written test.

Participants benefit from having their skills recognized through formal certification, from being able to set themselves apart from others, from the opportunities for further professional development with the MasterStars © concept, from universally valid personal certifications and from the reduced liability risk with the applicable professional liability insurance. Hospitals and medical facilities, on the other hand, benefit from employees who master the skills necessary to perform the functions of OR manager and OR coordinator, which are so essential to the image and performance of the institution.

The Institute of Business Excellence at Steinbeis University Berlin has worked with well-known companies and institutes for many years. It works with experts to develop practice-oriented curricula and draws up regulations for examinations and certifications, sets up a professional examination board, maintains the quality of continuing professional development activities, trains instructors, and plans and conducts certification exams. A popular service provider, it has issued more than 1000 certificates.