Bilfinger launches Youtube-style skills videos

Bilfinger, a German construction group, has created a series of videos in response to the German working age population falling from 49mn in 2020 to 44mn in 2030. With 50% of Germany’s blue collar workers set to retire over the next five years, these videos seek to capture the skills/domain knowledge of the workers before they disappear into the sunset.

“Industrial Tube is a software program enabling workers with little experience of filming and editing to make quick “how to” videos to teach others specific niche skills built up over decades.”

Microsoft has helped Bilfinger with language recognition software so that spoken words are automatically sub-titled. Workers follow templates so that the videos are shot in snippets thus obviating the need for editing.

In the meantime, Bosch is planning to launch BoschTube in January, a learning platform for workers in the manufacturing sector.