Audi to slash 9,500 jobs; maybe work shouldn’t be your passion, and more top news

The news professionals in Europe are talking about now, curated by LinkedIn’s editors. Join the conversation on today's stories in the comments. 

Audi is set to cut 9,500 jobs — 15% of its German workforce — by 2025. The move is part of the carmaker’s plan to free up €6 billion as the Volkswagen unit prepares for the costly transition to electric vehicles. At the same time, the company will create 2,000 jobs in new areas such as electric mobility and digitalisation. The announcement follows that of Daimler, which revealed two weeks ago it plans to slash more than 1,000 jobs by the end of 2022. ? Here’s what people are saying.

The Netherlands’ largest supermarket chain is under fire for requesting that staff upload semi-naked photographs of themselves to an app to help with uniform sizing. Albert Heijn apologised after receiving widespread criticism on social media, and says it has now abandoned the trial in which employees were told to “upload a personal photo in close-fitted clothing or underwear for automatic analyses”. Earlier this year, a Russian firm was criticised for offering bonuses to female employees for wearing skirts. ? Here’s what people are saying.

Italians have the shortest working lives in the EU, according to new data from Eurostat. The average Italian spends just 31.8 years in the labour market; at the other end of the scale, those in Sweden and the Netherlands can expect to spend 41.9 and 40.5 years working, respectively. The study also found that men work longer than women in all countries — except in Latvia, where there was no difference, and Lithuania, where women have a longer average working lifetime. ? Here’s what people are saying.

Global use of coal-fired electricity is expected to log a record fall this year, a move researchers claim could help stall rising carbon emissions. Data released by Carbon Brief shows that coal-fired electricity is expected to decline 3% in 2019 — more than the combined coal generation in Germany, Spain and the UK last year — as demand for coal power plateaus in India and China. The US has made the deepest cuts to coal power among developed nations, while the EU reported a record slump in coal-fired electricity in the first half of the year. ? Here’s what people are saying.

Make your work your passion? This advice may not be for everyone, warns Harvard Business School's Jon Jachimowicz. Yes, pursuing a passion does wonders for our wellbeing. But that passion need not be our job. In fact, it may be best if our passion is not our work, as that dynamic can lead to us staking a large part of our self-worth to something as fickle and changeable as a career. What should we do instead? Pursue activities we enjoy, professional or otherwise. ? Here’s what people are saying.

Idea of the Day: People are starting to realise it's time to focus on answering the question, "What do you do?" in a way that impresses only one person: themselves, writes J.T. O'Donnell, CEO at WorkItDaily.

"Once you realise there are no career mistakes, just opportunities to learn and grow, the power to build a career that makes you feel happy and satisfied gets much stronger."

What's your take on today’s stories? Share your thoughts in the comments.

— Capucine Yeomans