Trading Places at Work
When a company has thousands of employees around the world, it is nearly impossible for employees to know everyone and what they do. It takes so many departments, teams and positions to make a company function smoothly, but it’s easy to get caught up in your own job and forget that others exist. That’s why in 2019, Radiall launched the Live My Life initiative.
The idea for this initiative emerged from the Quality of Life at Work transformation group at L’Isle d’Abeau. The purpose of Live My Life is for employees to learn more about a job that interests them by spending half a day in a coworker's shoes. The "visiting" employee can ask questions, observe their coworker's daily tasks and even assist with some of those tasks. Then, on a different day, the employees switch places. This helps employees understand each other's responsibilities better and see how different jobs are essential to Radiall’s functioning. Furthermore, exploring new departments and job functions can help employees make more sense of their own job and see how their responsibilities contribute to the bigger picture at Radiall. So far, 125 employees across three different sites have participated in this event.
Anaïs and Sébastien are two employees from Château-Renault who stepped into each other's shoes for half a day. As a production worker, Anaïs wanted to learn more about the Design Office in order to see how the products she assembles are created. So she reached out to Sébastien, a product designer, about “living each other’s lives.” Anaïs was able to see all the steps it takes to design a product before it reaches the manufacturing stage. When they switched places, Sébastien was able to tour the white room and see how the products he designs are actually made.
Reflecting on the experience, Sébastien shared, “It was a perfect match!” Anaïs said, “It was a very enriching experience. I got to see the tools that product designers use to create the instructions we use to manufacture products.”
Radiall sites around the globe will continue to host Live My Life sessions throughout the year to give employees the opportunity to build relationships and gain a better understanding of what coworkers do. Learn more about our transformation project and other transformation initiatives.