Tognum presents sailing yacht as floating further training center

• Official launching ceremony for employees´ yacht “Tognum”
• Innovative project for qualification, further training and team-building

Friedrichshafen, 25 May, 2009. In a launching ceremony at the Kressbronn-Gohren yacht harbor on Lake Constance, Tognum, the specialist for propulsion and power solutions, named its employees´ yacht “Tognum” and presented the vessel to the company’s workforce. The launch was one of the highlights in a program of events marking the centenary of mtu, the Tognum Group’s largest subsidiary.

The ocean-going yacht will now be available as a floating training center for team development courses and for employees training for further qualifications. The unusual and innovative project was born in July 2006 when the Group´s name Tognum was first unveiled. The underlying concept was the promotion of active, global cooperation involving employees from all the Tognum companies: the yacht was to be developed, designed and built by an international team of employees, working together with a boatyard, for Tognum staff throughout the world.

The project aims to foster group identity within the company and to use the communal spirit on which the team sport of sailing is built, to further team-building and staff development as targeted elements within Tognum’s further training program.

During the course of a team-building sailing trip, far removed from their workaday environment, staff can spend several days on board learning the sailing skills they need as a group. The goal of sailing the vessel is only attainable through cooperation and an open approach; processes which relativize the hierarchies and professional roles prevalent in the workplace. Project teams made up of members from different disciplines also move closer together during a voyage as they learn to channel individual strengths towards increasing group productivity.

Over the years to come, the ‘Tognum’ will be putting in at exhibitions, regattas and special events to provide a public demonstration of the Tognum team spirit.

Until October 2010, the yacht will remain on Lake Constance where 6,000 of the company’s approximately 9,000 employees are based in and around Friedrichshafen. She will then pay visits to Tognum locations in the Mediterranean, South Africa, America and Asia to continue the program of qualification, further training and team building for Tognum employees in those regions.