There is no typical working day at zeb/

At or shortly after you start work, you will attend the introductory zeb/start programme that comprehensively prepares new colleagues for everyday life at zeb/. In addition to organisational information, you will get an insight into specialised topics of relevance to zeb/ and train key skills for consulting activities.

The projects are in line with highly diverse customer requirements. Therefore, projects may take only a few weeks or several years and involve one or two or a team of twenty zeb/consultants.

As we co-operate very closely with our customers, zeb/ consultants usually work at the customer’s office to implement the projects. We apply a 4-to-1 working week model, which means that you usually travel to the customer site on Monday morning and return to your office on Thursday evening. Fridays are used as office days.

Consultants at zeb/ are free to choose from the German locations (Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Münster, Munich, Ulm) to avoid relocations. However, positions in zeb/’s internal departments are tied to a specific location which is explicitly stated in the respective job descriptions.

There is no typical working day. Each consulting day has its specific challenges: drawing up a proposal presentation, preparing a customer workshop, documenting the results, attending a steering committee meeting at which project results are to be presented, etc. All consulting days have a few things in common: usually you get up early in the morning, go to the customer’s office to work on a project and return to the hotel after work. While some end the working day with sports, others meet colleagues.

Our general working week comprises five days and no weekend work. During consulting project stages, single peak times with weekend work might occasionally occur. However, this is the exception rather than the rule.

We offer individual and performance-based career development and continuous advancement and training possibilities – true to zeb/’s principle of “stay and grow” instead of “up or out”.

Training at zeb/
The zeb/training programme offers diverse opportunities for further training. In various seminars, our colleagues can acquire zeb/-relevant know-how, train their methodological capabilities and develop their consulting skills and social competence.

Training on the job and feedback
Line managers and project managers support each employee in his/her individual development. In close co-operation, they will define objectives for projects, provide coaching, monitor the achievement of objectives and identify any needs for further development. Each consultant receives feedback on the project work performed from the project manager and feedback from his/her superior on the overall annual performance at the end of the year. However, feedback is not unidirectional. Each employee also gives upward feedback to the relevant project manager and his/her own superior. Thus, both employees and managers have the opportunity to improve permanently and develop through continuous feedback.

Mentoring
During their first year at zeb/, new consultants have a mentor who provides advice and support.

zeb/PhD model
zeb/ supports employees in their PhD projects, for example, by giving them leave of absence and supporting them in the publication of their PhD theses.

zeb/consultants work in line with the 4:1 principle, i.e. on the project at the customer’s office from Monday to Thursday and at the zeb/office on Friday. To allow for time off for your personal or professional development or for family orientation, zeb/ currently offers several variants of sabbaticals or special leaves. In addition, you can use various measures to shape your own work-life balance. These include flexible working time / part-time models and the option of working at your home office. Modern management tools and our living corporate culture support our employees in their daily work.

With regard to the work-life balance, another important element is our health promoting actions. The spectrum of the specially designed and continually growing "zeb/wellfit" programme ranges from nutrition counselling, sports and back fitness training as well as co-operation with fitness studio chains to campaign days focusing on selected themes of healthy living. An example of a very successful programme is “zeb/geht ab” (“zeb/takes off”): In May 2010, 350 employees embarked on a virtual hiking tour with the aim of covering the distance from Münster to Berlin with a minimum of 10,000 steps per day within 60 days.

At present, zeb/ has 12 offices — six of them abroad (Budapest, Kiev, Prague, Warsaw, Vienna, Zurich) — and diverse projects in various countries. That is why it is possible to be assigend to a project abroad. Language skills and professional competence are however decisive factors for such projects.

zeb/ pays competitive salaries made up of a fixed and a variable component. Colleagues with professional experience (manager career level or higher) can use the zeb/company car model.