Inside training: Interview with digitalization management specialist Max

BAUR has always been very present in my mind. You know it's a big company in the area and you also know a lot of people who work there. I used to go to the Baur department store as a child. My father also works for the BAUR Group and I myself did vacation jobs as an electronics technician at BAUR for over two years.

After graduating from high school, I applied to train as an e-commerce and digitalization management assistant. In the end, I ended up doing the latter. The most important reason why I opted for this apprenticeship is the versatility of the combination of commercial and IT content. During the apprenticeship, you specialize depending on where your interests and strengths lie. I really like the overlap between the two areas, as you get an overview of the big picture.

We change departments every 6 months. Our training manager Max always asks us what we would like to do and where our interests lie. So we get to help decide where we want to go next. However, it takes a bit of luck to find space and enough time for you in the department of your choice.

I would say what I enjoyed the most, especially at vocational school, was programming. I discovered that for myself. With programming, as long as it works, it's the coolest thing in the world. But if you spend three hours working on a bug and your head is spinning, you get really frustrated. But it's fun to see when you've written down a text, executed it and it works.

That went somewhat unimpressively. The elections were about a year ago. My father is on the works council and so I noticed that not that many people were standing for election. Then I found out about it and realized that it sounded quite interesting. Another incentive was that you get information that not everyone gets. It's really exciting to find out what's discussed in the works council that you'd never hear about otherwise. Then I stood for election and the others thought "oh, we can vote for him.

It has always been very pleasant in the departments I have been in so far. It's easy to talk to everyone on the same level. The "you" culture in particular is very pleasant, it makes you feel more confident to ask questions. If the whole thing is more formal, you're less likely to approach someone. The colleagues are also all in an extremely good mood, you can talk to them and even joke around. So far, I haven't met anyone I didn't get on well with.

I sometimes get help too late or too little when I need it. I've often been told in departments that it would sometimes help to simply say "ok, I need help" when I'm stuck, instead of getting stuck in the problem and simply not getting anywhere. In other words, simply being more communicative and really communicating "I have a problem and I'm stuck". That would save you time and help you make faster progress.