This summer, Boden is taking a new approach to staffing in elderly care. In an exchange with Spain, which has lack of job opportunities for trained nursing assistants, five Spanish nursing assistants have now arrived for a summer placement at a dementia home in Boden.
The supply of skills is one of the major challenges for many municipalities. The municipality of Boden will make a 20-year leap in development within a few years. It requires ingenuity, innovation and a willingness to try new solutions to attract the necessary skills.
“The need for trained staff in elderly care is already very high. For the 2023 summer recruitment, the municipality of Boden’s social services department decided to look more broadly. The solution went far beyond traditional recruitment thinking,” explains Kristina Lindqvist, quality developer at the unit for development, welfare technology and quality management at the municipality’s social administration.
The initiative has been called a recruitment success, but has also raised questions.
Spanish staff
What Boden Municipality has done is to turn to Spain, where there is a major unemployment for assistant nurses, to attract trained staff to northern Sweden, where there is a demand for trained nurses. As a result, five trained nurses from Spain have now arrived in Boden. Assistant nurses also come from sithern Sweden to spend a summer in Boden.
Before coming here, the Spanish nurses have received an intensive basic course in the Swedish language and Swedish nursing terms. Once on site, their service begins with a more extensive introduction than usual.
The accommodation is solved through Boden Business Park’s student accommodation, which remains empty over the summer.
“My role is to assist in finding accommodation and transportation solutions for the candidates in this pilot project. One of the solutions has been to buy bicycles that the municipality owns and that the candidates can use during the summer,” says Stina Leden, process manager for the Competence Supply Team in the municipality of Boden.
After the first day at the new job, one of the new summer workers says this:
Are you also keen to move here and try life in the north? On the Move to Boden website, you can register your interest and be matched with employers looking for your skills.
