The campaign #womencancraft has started

What matters is not whether a woman or a man practices a trade. What matters is the will and the ability. The #frauenkönnenhandwerk campaign aims to raise awareness among companies to focus more on women when recruiting skilled workers.

This article is part of the special feature on women in the trades.

There are still not enough women in the skilled trades, especially given the shortage of skilled workers . This is despite the fact that female apprentices have a better success rate than male apprentices in their journeyman's examinations. Overall , however, 70 percent of them leave the profession after successfully completing their training. Despite their excellent qualifications, they too rarely consider the skilled trades as a career option. They are not choosing against the skilled trades, but rather opting for other paths.

As part of the "Skilled Workforce Centers for Crafts" project, the #womencancraft campaign was developed. "We want to show that there are other ways," says Eckhard Sudmeyer, Managing Director of the Braunschweig-Lüneburg-Stade Chamber of Skilled Crafts. Dispelling myths and clichés – that's the approach of the #womencancraft campaign.

Women as skilled workers

"Women are skilled tradespeople, and outdated gender roles are no longer tenable," explains Sudmeyer. The campaign aims to raise awareness among businesses about the importance of actively recruiting women. If craft businesses can attract more women, the skilled worker shortage can be alleviated. This requires more flexible work and working time models, concrete career prospects , and support with childcare. Furthermore, gender-sensitive job descriptions should appeal more strongly to young female talent.

The #womencancraft campaign showcases young women from the chamber district who have successfully established themselves in the skilled trades. On posters and postcards, they are shown roofing or repairing cars, drawing attention to themselves and their stories with a cheeky slogan.

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The hashtag #frauenkönnenhandwerk (women can do crafts) is being used to promote the campaign on social media in order to initiate an active exchange and to encourage women and girls in crafts to adopt the hashtag and spread the campaign.

Campaign materials: Five women are the faces of the campaign, which aims to encourage and motivate businesses to hire women in the skilled trades. Information about the campaign, as well as the order form for campaign materials, can be found on the website www.hwk-bls.de/fachkraefte.