Home again

Good evening!

Since Saturday I'm at home again.. It was nerve-racking...

I didn't want to leave my lovely host-family, and that country..... but I had to.
 The first thing we had to do in the morning, was taking some pictures of us. Unfortunately Frederick wasn't awake at that time, but I'm sure, we will meet again, and he can't duck out of this again ;)






At 8:06 my train left for Nässjö. Afterwards I took the train to Copenhagen and then a bus to Gedser.
Yes, you may ask, like my mother did three times until now:
Why did you take the ferry from Gedser back?
Well... It's easier to travel, because otherwise I had to leave on Friday night or so, to catch the ferry at 13.30 in Trelleborg... And I didn't want that. Via Gedser I saved some time^^...

15.30 my ferry arrived in Geser, and in addition, some of my friends and my boyfriend. They thought it would be fun to pick me up at the ferry and surprise me with some German lunch. Rolls and Mett...or, as my dictionary says: German minced pork meat, haha. Nice transcription, isn't it?


Around 5.20 pm the ferry arrived in Rostock, where we had to wait for the bus for one hour. I hate the schedules on weekends... So finally I arrived at home one hour later...

I absolutely can not put those three weeks in a nutshell... Every day was different. The people have been friendly all the time. The landscape of Sweden is fantastic. The culture is quite similar to the German, but in the next moment, it's completely different...
I will never forget those weeks and I would always recommend such an exchange.

Thank you to all the people who were involved in planning everything.
I'm so glad, that I answered 'Yes' when Jocke asked me in December, if I'd like to come to Sweden for some weeks.

That's the end of my little blog-baby... Unfortunately. I had a lot of fun, writing all those things...

If there is something you'd like to know, don't hesitate! Ask me. I'm in Rostock/Warnemünde again and I have plenty of time after work in the evening ;)

I hope you enjoyed reading all those entries and you kind of liked it...

Bye and thanks for reading!

Last Day at Schenker

Hello, people out there!

No, I didn't forget about you, but I wasn't able to write something yesterday ;)

It was my last day at Schenker, and the weather seemed to know that. Rain, rain, rain...

First I joined the Traffic departement again, because last week I started with Christian, but I had to go to the next departmen. That's why I bothered him again ;)
He is responsible for the Norway traffic. That's quite hard to plan, because Norway has bad roads and higways and many fjords. So you have to think even more about the drivers, about their travel-times
 and where you actually CAN drive.
Let's say, it is a biiiiig puzzle.
When I watched the planning, so many things I have learned at school were present. Especially calculating loading metres <<.. But it was very interesting to hear, that most of the times the cubic metres, the weight and loadingmetres are mentioned on the CMR, we only state the weight. 

After lunch I went to Carolin again, just because I liked the department and the people there.
Again, many returns had to be arranged. There even was one return, after the receiver said, he doesn't want the consignment.

I also learned about the past of Schenker Värnamo. The company today is a product of a fusion of some forwarding companies. On the picture e.g. is an old lorry from 'Bilspedition', one of the companies ;)


To put the last 1,5 weeks in an nutshell - Thank you for giving me the opportunity to be here and getting to know all those lovely people!! It was perfect for me, and I wouldn't want to change anything to make it better. The people were absolutely open-minded, nobody said 'I don't want to explain something' and there was nobody who didn't want to talk to me. Everyone was nice to me, and thats why I had so much fun at Schenker.
And I think, they liked me as well, at least a bit. I was so touched, when Karl-Johan handed me a 'thank you bag' over, and said I can always visit them.

Well, as you can see, it's hard to explain my feelings today ^^

I have to excuse myself for this.

Now I have to  prepare some 'Senf-Ei' for tonight. I hope it works out, the mustard here in Sweden is quite sweet. This makes it even harder to make a good sauce ;/

Lean Production And Correcting Mistakes

Hello again!

As you can see, it is raining all the time today. It's quite depressing, but there can't be sunshine for 3 weeks!

Today was a bit long, perhaps because people told me some things I already saw, but it's better to have some repetition, so I can tell you more about it.

First I got lots of information about 'lean production'.. A quite good tool for high quality within a company.
It's about talking about problems, searching for the reason of them and solving those problems.
When there is e.g. a customer who doesn't fill in the street of the receiver all the time and doesn't react on tries of the emploees to correct him, the responsible people should make a list, when it has happened and how frequently, and in the aftermath you can show this to the customer and have a talk with him.
Most important task for all, is to respect each other. There are no stupid ideas or proplems which are too small to be solved. So  this works for smaller problems as well. That's why every departure has a whiteboard with those problems, reasons, responsible persons and when it should be solved. That's quite nice, isn't it?

Afterwards I joined the ladies from Indata. Here all corrections are done. Missing, streets, wrong postcode, wrong customernumber,..
There are around 7 women in this department, and one robot, haha. That's a computer nobody uses. Here a system works on its own, and corrects around 30% of the mistakes of a day, because it's too much to do for those women. There are only two more Indata departments in Sweden, but Värnamo has to do the most of it... They even get incorrect papers from Smalandsstenar... So you can imagine how much it is..
Sorry for almost no pictures, but I think everyone knows how an office looks like ;)...

The Warehouse And Security System

Hey folks!

This day started a bit negative, because it was raining, but, believe it or not, the sun is shining and it's quite warm outside ;)
Last night I got a lot of sleep, that's why I feel much better than yesterday, so no cold, no headache or stuff like this anymore!

This morning it was time for being in the warehouse.
Well, I have to say, I have never had that much fun in the last 5 days, like today. I drove a fork lifter and I think I did a pretty good job, even when it came to lifting a pallet with goods on it and driving around a bit ;)
But let's stay serious!

Today I was introduced to a pretty handy machine, which scans the small parcels by itself and then it splits those goods into several areas in Sweden. So the only thing the people out there have to do, is putting the parcels into the right box for further transport. Okay, that is, how it meant to be. Every gadget has its problems. Sometimes the scanner isn't able to read the barcodes, because something is wrong with it. Then it has to be taken of the whole track, oterwise the wohl machine will stay still until someone notices the mistake. I think this comes very handy, especially when there are tons of parcels.
Today there were around 1300 parcels for only ONE customer, so you can imagine that it would be almost impossible for only some persons to scan them by themselves.

After lunch I joined a very cute lady, who is responsible for the salary, invoices and stuff like that. I liked to be with her, because in the beginning she felt very unconfortable to speak English, and she translated a lot on the Internet, but after some time, it worked without this! She is perhaps the best example for showing, that nobody has to be afraid of speaking a foreign language. Some people at Schenker still do not want to talk in English, maybe because they are scared , somebody would laugh about them. I don't know how I can change this... but I'd like to...

Afterwards I joined a very smart guy who is responsible for the dangerous goods and security system... oh no, I shouldn't say 'responsible', because he doesn't feel like that, let's say, he is taking care of the dangerous goods and security system.
First he showed me those huge books about ADR  and dangerous goods on sea.  I was intimidated by it. He has to know so much about all those things and we had perhaps 5h about it at school>.<

In addition he showed me the difference between several security-camera-systems. There can be a lot of differences, but it is essential, that you can use them to identify, when something unexpected is happening. As I told you before, Schenker has hundrets of cameras (well, that's how it seems to me) and even an electric fence around the whole building. Reason for this is a special citificate which they achieved and they want to achieve in future again ;)

All in all it was again a reeeeeeeaaaally interesting day, even though I wasn't that motivated in the morning.
Tomorrow will be my second last day, and I don't know, if it should be happy or not. The people are taking really good care of me, and they explain everything I want to know. But now I'm at the point, that I miss my company, and all the people. So I'm looking forward to work next Monday again^^...

An Ordinary Weekend?

Hello poeple out there! Sorry for not writing anything the last two days. I try not to write a gigantic entry today ;)

Friday I joined the people from the Service Department again. Well, it was Friday, so you could feel that the
motivation was a bit low, but that's nothing new I think ;)...
It was verry funny, when Daniel told me about a shipment which had to be returned, because the destination-store hasn't opened yet. So the forwarders were maybe a bit too eager to deliver it, although the shop would probably open in a couple of weeks.

On Saturday, Frida and I took a walk to Jönköping. It was a loooong journey about 1,5 h and I was completely exhausted afterwards, but it was nice to see the surroudings^^
We stopped by the tourist information because of my way back home, but it wasn't that informative.
That's why Jocke helped me at home by arranging some possibilities for next Saturday. Now I'm a bit calmer about that.


In the evening I accompanied Frida to a confusing event.
We went to Mjölby, where we first attended something like a ceremony. I think I can compare that to a solemn ceremony for apprentices who finished their studies. It was a really religious meeting, in a room which can be compared to a chapel. In the end, those two girls were knighted with a sword, well, that's how it seemed to me ;)...

Afterwards we went to the 'Företagsbanketten' in Mjölby. 
It started at 6.30 pm. All popular persons from around this area attended this very important banquet. Pretty exciting for me, an ordinary person from Germany, who doesn't even know what is going to happen here ;)
The whole event was accompanied by the Dackeskolan of Mjölby, that means, every dish, which they served, was prepared by the apprentices of this school. They are very famous for their ambition, that's because they won 6 out of 7 prizes at popular competitions! It was perfect!

After every course, at least two awardings took place, for the best entrepreneur, merchant, innovation, green entrepreneur, UF and company. It was a very spectacular evening for all those nominated people.
Between the awardings, a very smart host prentented himself as a magician. He was so funny! Now I know, that, even for the Swedish people, Finnish is a very funny language! He alwas declared it as 'language of love' ;) Well, I don't understand, how they manage it, to speak with almost only vowels .

All in all it was a verry funny evening, altough I felt a bit uncomfortable in the beginning, but these feelings settled down after I got to know the people around me.

Today Jocke and Frida took me to Gränna. A very cute town on the other side of Vättern . They are very famous for their sweets, especially for those red and white ones, you buy for christmas for the tree ;)
We strolled though the city and bought some nice things.
I was pretty amazed, that you can watch how they are pruducing those candies. I was reminded of 'Karls Erdbeerhof' where they do this as well ;)

As you can see, a lot was happening the last few days, and I still can't believe that there are only 5 days left to explore everything.. I'd like to stay here, if some of my loved ones would visit me.
I really learned to love Sweden and especially all those friendly people.  Until now I have never met someone who doesn't want to help me if I ask.
Sweden seems to be a peaceful country, so I'd like to come back for vacation. Definitely.

The Service Department

Hello again ;)

Finally there was some time for the terminal today!
The support department seems to consist of many people, but I wasn't able to count, because always there were people from the warehouse and after some time, I gave up to think about, which one of them belongs to the department I was in ;)

Today I joined a really nice woman! She actually wanted some conversation, not just some talking about the job. Sometimes it feels better to talk about some ordinary things instead of work, you feel much more comfortable. Yeah, but anyway...

This department is responsible for the documents for the transports. If something is wrong, like there is a name, but no address, they have to do everything to find it out. That's pretty amazing! People make mistakes and others have to correct it, otherwise the consignment won't arrive.
Then we had some different examples today, e.g. a good  without any label, two goods with the same label or one good with a label but without a shipmentnumber on it. So as you can see, the mistakes can be various! That's why this department won't ever be boring, I think. There are always new challenges during the days and you can't tell, what is going to happen the next day ;)
In between, Caroline showed me the terminal again, where the small goods, or parcels are stored until they are spread over the area around Värnamo.
I also saw one big problem for this department. Some parts are outsourced to Malmö. So e.g. Värnamo has to send a blank list about derivations to them and the people in Malmö fill it in. It doesn't make sense, that people, who do not see what is going on in Värnamo have to do their work.. But sometimes the bosses decide like this and you have to live with this decision. Anyway, the people in Värnemo do a very great job. They manage the impossible by finding information, the customer didn't gave them.
This reminds me of a small dialogue Frida and I had one day. She told me, that Pontus really likes to draw Christmas-cards, and when he was younger, he wanted to send such a card by post to one of his teachers. And he only wrote the name of the teacher and put it into the letterbox (without stamp or address) and it was actually delivered! Unbelievable, isn't it??

I have to tell you something besides work, because I was so amazed. And maybe I acted like a child :3..
Jocke picked me up at work and we had to collect some food for the next days, and we drove to this really big shopping center (A6) in Jönköping. Can you see this little scanner on the picture? When you come into the super market, you can 'check-in' with your bank card and then you get such a scanner. Then you can continue shopping and scanning, and in the end, you give back your scanner and can leave the store. So you avoid queues pretty good ;).. 

As you can see, as always, I do not learn only something about work but about culture as well, haha. And it always surprises me, how much the Swedish people use a card, instead of cash..

Traffic and Production Support

Hey, hey!!

It was a 'traffic-day' again for me ;)

That means, until lunch and even one hour after that, I joined the guys from the Norway- and Finland-traffic.
They have a similar system to the one the domestic traffic uses.
So they can see the bookings and put them on the lorrylines. Again it was interesting to see, how many loading-places are provided and especially how hard it is to find a very good solution for everyone, so the truck won't be driven empty from e.g. Oslo to Jönköping. But those guys have a lot of experiences, so they know their drivers and they know the area arround the destination- where possible customers are located, to import goods from Norway to Sweden.
Again, the drivers get all information on their phone or computer by this very handy application from Schenker. As I told you before, there, they have to accept the destinations and can receive SMS from the forwarder.
The Finland-traffic has to deal with ferries everyday, so they are quite busy to check if the driver has accomplished his duties so he will be in time for the ferry, because there are only a few of them. One at 9 o´clock in the morning, then there is one at 11 and another one at night.
I think we all know the problem of ferries. They do not go very often and it takes always so much time to arrive and they are always punctual when it comes to the departure ;)

After lunch I had to join the terminal... ookay, that was actually said, but afterwards I stayed with another guy from the Norwaytraffic and he was SO incredible. Somehow he didn' stop to talk! All of the others were a bit shy and insecure while speaking English, but he was soooooo confident of himself and his job, that it was a pleasure to listen to him! He again explained how they arrange the transport routes and showed me on Google Maps where all those towns are located, haha ;) He is really skilled in his job and I noticed how much fun he has in this job!

After a short time I was taught a bit about the Production Support and the Indata department by one very skilled man.
First, he introduced me to the Production Support, which is.. something like a department for everything what can happen  during the whole transport, starting with the collection and ending with the discharge at the customer. So this department is responsible e.g. for all the damages which can occur at the interfaces.
Another thing they check, is the system, which shows the drivers what they have to load etc.
It's not only this, but moreover it is a backup for the forwarder, because the driver and the terminal, depends where the good is during the transport, have to register every step they do.

I tried to outline it a bit on the right side. As you can see, that's the first thing, after accepting this trip, is to register, when he loads the goods and then every reception, every new part has to be registered. Otherwise there would be an error in this department, and the forwarder has to do everything to find the error. As I think of it now, it's similar to GPS, because you can see what has happened, or not happened to the consignment ;)... The sketch is only an example.
If there would be a direct load, it would be just the registration of collecting and discharging the consignment.

Then, he spoke about the various systems they use for correcting errors etc.
Actually there was one very interesting programme, which I thought, would be impossible, because otherwise, some day the computer can rule the world, haha.
It's the system for e.g. the scanned EDI-lables and specifications on the goods, because there is a programme which filtres right ones from wrong ones. Don't ask me how, but anyway, it can see, if there is e.g. a mistake in the postcode of a town. Then it pops up in this system and the Indata and Production Support has to change it, because from this point, work stays still until it is corrected.

It's completely insane, that there is a programme, which can identify what has been done wrong, even the consignor doesn't know! Like today, there was a lable with EE instead of SE on it. The consignment would have been forwarded to Estonia instead of Sweden, but the system noticed this and stopped further actions.
Is it only me, who is impressed by this? I'mean, it's crystal clear, that nowadays, time of Internet and so on, everything is connected and can be found very quickly, but... it just confuses me... o.O..

Ha, you see, I end up with confusing myself, but it's already late, and there were so many impressions ;) So, see you tomorrow and good night ;)

The Traffic Department

Hej, it's me again ;)

Today was again veeery, very interesting.

First I joined Daniela, who is responsible for the traffic to Denmark, Belgium, Holland and Germany. The lorries can be tracked and traced via GPS, which makes everything a lot easier. Moreover, she can communicate with the drivers via this programme. It shows where the lorrydriver is located at the moment, when he should deliver, his phonenumber and she can even send SMS to the driver via this system.
Quite interesting, isn't it??

She also explained me, that the dispatch is not a separate office. As you can see on the left side, it is a very small area where the drivers 'register'. That's because not many drivers come to Värnamo. Most of the times it is like.. a driver collects the goods at the customer and transports it to the receiving country to another Schenker department. Then another driver is responsible to spread the goods. That's the case for bigger goods over 1500kg but the smaller goods are mostly stored in the warehouse and a lorrydriver has to fetch them. In this case, he has to get the documents from Daniela.

After lunch I joined the three lovely ladies from the domestic traffic department. They use a completely different system than Daniela does.  In their programme they can see the bookings which were made and they have to divide them between the 40 lorries they have. So in the system, they switch the lines of the bookings to another part for the drivers. They get the information what they should load via a small computer, which is connected to this system.
Today there were around 800 bookings, and the 40 drivers had to manage it to spread the goods. I think it must be veeeeeeeeeery exhaustive for them, to be responsible for so many goods. But as I said before, Schenker has a lot of small consignments, and sometimes it's only one pallet, so it is manageable. In addition, they do not have to provide the whole country, it's only the area around Värnamo. But I was surprised, when I saw that each of the drivers had around 30 bookings to spread, anyway.

Yeah..Now some things which amazed me as well, haha.
First... I'm so impressed by the office-tables! You can adjust the height of them!!! Some of the employees work while they are sitting, others when they are standing. I think that's a perfect way of variation!!
I tried to take a picture for that, but it looks a bit strange, haha. On the left side there is a table where you can sit, right a table where you can stand while you are working ;)

Another reaaaally interesting point is... working with the screens. Every employee has two sceens. So on one screen you can e.g. see all the new bookings you have to divide for the drivers and on the other screen you can read your e-mails. It's very handy. You can't lose sight of the most important things, which update every minute.

Reflecting today, I have to say, that the differences between Schenker and ECL increase. But I don't mean it in a negative way. It's nice to see other possibilities and that I still have to learn a lot to survive in this vocational field. 


 That's all for today! Tomorrow I'll continue in the traffic department until lunch, because there is another part for Finnland and Norway, and after that I'll see how the terminal works ;)