Career
A quarter century on the market, a presence in 23 countries, 1,100 employees, and shipments covering 100 million kilometers. In 2019 alone, the AsstrA-Associated Traffic AG team completed over 165 thousand orders and gained experience that cannot be digitized. In its silver anniversary year, the transport and logistics group launched the AsstrA Wiki portal. We discussed the new resource with Karina Budinskaya, AsstrA Training & Development Center Director.
- How did the idea of a corporate portal come about and what is the project’s priority goal?
In a logistics and transportation organization, interactions between structural divisions and knowledge transfer within the company are crucial. AsstrA has a mentorship program for new employees. Each employee, regardless of their position, receives a mentor's support during his or her first 3 months of work. As a part of the intensive program, a new employee gets acquainted with the necessary workflows, talks about the job, and learns about the corporate processes in the AsstrA group. After the first 3 months, the official mentorship program ends but professional questions still arise, of course.
The AsstrA Wiki is a knowledge sharing platform. The team includes specialists working since the founding of the company. Over many years spent in the logistics industry, our experts have gained extensive professional experience. At the same time, new employees are constantly joining the group of companies. AsstrA is growing and expanding its geographic presence.
The initial idea behind creating a portal was to unite AsstrA team members via a convenient platform for interaction. This way, every team member can not only access expert knowledge within his or her professional domain but also help others. Everyone’s overarching goal, regardless of role, structural unit, or office location is the same - to provide AsstrA clients with professional transport and logistics services.
- How long did the work on the corporate portal last?
The idea arose last fall. I wanted to launch the portal in AsstrA’s 25th anniversary year. Thanks to the team work of the Training and Development Center, the Advertising and PR Department, the Department of Information Technology and HR, we launched the AsstrA Wiki in 6 months.
Today, a pilot version in Russian is available to every AsstrA employee. In the initial stage, it is important to collect feedback from users so that the next language version of the portal can be prepared taking into account our colleagues’ requests and preferences. The project team is working on filling in the AsstrA Wiki and fixing bugs. I want the AsstrA Wiki to be convenient for everyone.
- Why should we go to the portal?
As planned, the portal will be AsstrA team’s start page. In the morning, when you turn on the computer you will see a summary of the latest corporate information. If you are beginning you logistics journey, you can refer to the “Forwarder's Textbook” available on the portal. If you face a difficult task and are not sure about which colleague to consult, you can create a “Discussion.”
The portal offers interviews from industry experts, best practices, company news, and a training calendar. Information on the AsstrA Wiki is constantly updated. The goal is to make the portal a universal internal platform that will help the professional growth of each employee and, as a result, improve the quality of the services we provide.