Ever since the Fischer company was founded it has been a major and substantial employer in the Innviertel region. The family firm, well known for its pioneering achievements in winter sports equipment, is not only a magnet for skilled workers in the region, but also attracts any number of specialists keen on sport from the skiing areas and Bavaria. Currently just under 500 people are employed in the company headquarters in Ried; another 1,300 men and women are at work in the production facility in the Ukraine, in the ski boot sector in Italy and in the subsidiaries in Germany, France and the USA.
The company's headquarters are in Ried. This is where research and development, product management, marketing and sales are located, together with other departments. In Ried the product range is developed and the skis for top-level Alpine and Nordic sport are manufactured.
The company is committed to well-trained staff, business acumen and a holistic style of leadership. In recent years greater emphasis has been placed on management training at several levels, while social skills and leadership competence have been strengthened. Fischer supports and promotes the employees' occupational skills and ongoing personal development. Acquiring know-how and gathering experience, developing abilities, using them on the job and sharing them with colleagues – that is the "knowledge capital" specific to the company, which provides the lead necessary for a successful future and ensures that Fischer stays competitive as a high-tech company.
Special attention is paid to training apprentices. Fischer offers apprenticeships in four different technical trades: ski maker, production engineer, electrician and metalworker. Every single apprentice receives the best possible individual encouragement and is accompanied all the way to successful qualification. Experienced trainers develop the apprentices in their respective occupational field. Apart from occupational training, e.g. in the training workshop, the young colleagues are put to work in the various company departments during their apprenticeship, can contribute to the product or service in question, and thus have the opportunity to acquire practical skills and especially to get to know the process sequences and the interrelationships specific to the company step-by-step. "The apprentices realise pretty soon which field they'd like to work in after completing their apprenticeship," trainer Roman Petermann is aware. He is justifiably proud of "his" apprentices' commitment and their success in the final examinations.
"Karriere mit Lehre" ("Career with Apprenticeship") is in no way an empty slogan, but something tangible. For apprentices who take it seriously, Fischer provides not only interesting jobs, but also the chance of a great career. Any number of responsible jobs and top positions in Alpine and cross-country ski production, in engineering pattern making, in process and product development, in metalworking and in the electrical workshop are held by men and women who started off as apprentices.
In 2011 Fischer Sports and Löffler found the "Fischer + Löffler Apprentice Academy". "Hands-on specialised knowledge is very important; personal and social competence are equally important. And so we build these up early on, during the apprenticeship," explains Elisabeth Kriechbaumer, Head of Human Resources. Fischer Sports is awarded the "ineo 2013", a distinction granted by the Upper Austrian Chamber of Commerce to firms which train apprentices where the training approach is serious, innovative and sustainable and there are worthwhile chances of personal development within the company.
What makes Fischer's employees so outstanding? There is the passion for skiing, the close links to top-level sport, pride in the brand and the products, excellent know-how, the urge to improve things, the technological developments and innovations, uncomplicated familystyle cooperation and the awareness that the company's success is everyone's collective achievement. Talent, abilities and skills, coupled with hard work, ambition and motivation – these characteristics make the staff the basis of a successful future for Fischer Sports GmbH.
