Verdi BW has a new face: Maike Schollenberger becomes country manager!

Verdi BW has a new face: Maike Schollenberger becomes country manager!

A new face for the Verdi union in Baden-Württemberg: Maike Schollenberger was elected as the new state leader at the state district conference in Leinfelden-Echterdingen with an impressive 96.1 percent of the vote. She is succeeding Martin Gross, who has led the union's fortunes since 2016 and recently retired. Schollenberger, who is only 35 years old, is drawing attention to herself with her rapid rise in the union. Her path took her from letter delivery at Deutsche Post, where she worked until 2014, to various positions in the union, including the role as state district youth secretary from 2019 to 2023, to Gross's deputy.

At the conference, which was attended by around 160 delegates and numerous guests, including Economics Minister Nicole Hoffmeister-Kraut and Social Affairs Minister Manne Lucha, Schollenberger emphasized the need to position Verdi as a participatory union. She wants to strengthen the voice of employees in social movements, especially against issues such as poverty in old age and right-wing extremism, as well as within the climate movement. According to current figures, Verdi is the second largest union in Germany with around 1.9 million members, including over 200,000 in Baden-Württemberg, and has always championed the interests of employees in areas such as public services, transport and social services. The Stuttgarter Nachrichten report that collective agreements and the use of strikes to improve working conditions are among Verdi's central concerns.

The challenges of the future

Schollenberger faces enormous challenges - especially at a time when the gap between rich and poor is widening. In her first statements after the election, she made it clear that she wanted to focus not only on collective bargaining issues, but also on political issues. This approach is groundbreaking, because social changes in particular require unions to rethink and actively shape the working world of tomorrow. She announced that she would fight harder against the “threatening neoliberalism” and rely on solidarity, as SWR reported.

What does this mean for the members of Verdi? Schollenberger announced that she is committed to actively representing the concerns and wishes of employees and to addressing the diversity of work streams. At a time when unions' leverage, such as the right to strike, is constantly being debated, the need to negotiate clear collective agreements remains. Unions like Verdi negotiate collective agreements loudly Statista according to the Collective Bargaining Act, a process that is crucial for the regular improvement of working conditions. The willingness to take strike action is also extremely important in order to enforce demands.

Schollenberger's path

The new boss of Verdi, who comes from Markgröningen and lives in Stuttgart, has her roots in the union's youth representation. She repeatedly emphasizes the importance of free time and unpaid care work, topics that are becoming increasingly important in the current debate about working models. She has won the trust of her colleagues with a unified nomination and the overwhelming voting results in this election. Schollenberger is also non-party, while her deputy Hanna Binder wants to be elected to the state parliament as an SPD member next year. It remains exciting to see how the union will develop under her leadership and what challenges it can overcome.