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Labour market education: a pathway to work? More knowledge is needed
Sep 13, 2013 Labour market education was the hot topic for the discussion between employment ministers and the social partners at the Nordic Minister meeting in Övertorneå on 27. august. The debate unveiled large differences between the Nordic countries, and a lack of knowledge about the efficiency of such measures. A new Nordic initiative aims to give a nuanced insight into systems and the way they operate.
tema
Successful vocational training for long-term unemployed in the Arctic
Sep 13, 2013 The Arctic Vocational Foundation is a joint Nordic institution providing individualised training within more than 30 vocations to unemployed Finns, Swedes and Norwegians. This, is where Sweden’s Minister for Employment Hillevi Engström invited her Nordic colleagues and working life representatives to consultations. What makes this training so special?
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More companies take responsibility in fight against youth unemployment
Sep 13, 2013 What does a successful anti youth unemployment project look like? The Nordic labour ministers have asked Danish consultancy agency Damvad to map Nordic youth projects that are based on cooperation between authorities and companies.
Insight
One in five construction workers in Sweden are posted
Sep 12, 2013 Over 18,000 workers were this spring posted by companies from other countries to work in Sweden, most of them in the construction industry. The number of posted workers in that industry was nearly as high as one fifth of all the working members of the Byggnads union – Sweden’s main union for construction workers. These are figures from the first comprehensive attempt at mapping the posted workers in Sweden.
Portrait
Christina Colclough is fascinated by the Nordic cooperation model
Sep 09, 2013 After living in the Nordic countries for nearly 30 years, British-Danish Christina Colclough, the new Secretary General at the Council of Nordic Trade Unions, NFS, is still fascinated by the Nordic welfare and labour market model. It fuels innovation, competitiveness and productivity, she says.
Comments
Editorial: Job engagement is pure gold
Jun 19, 2013 How do you achieve job engagement and work commitment? In this summer edition of the Nordic Labour Journal our writers, experts and researchers explore what happens with job engagement when work pressure increases. Does job engagement really equal increased productivity? Is job engagement pure gold?
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Could increased job engagement improve productivity?
Jun 19, 2013 There seems to be an obvious link between job engagement and high productivity. Nordic politicians highlight the work environment as a competitive factor and hope it can lead to increased growth. But it’s not that simple. There are loose cannons and lost sheep among workers too.
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Experts: action needed to combat bad psychosocial work environments
Jun 19, 2013 A Nordic proposition to systematically measure businesses’ psychosocial work environments is getting expert backing. But the businesses must also play their part, and hiring a consultant is not always the best solution.
tema
Pressure on online journalists challenges job engagement
Jun 19, 2013 New technology puts more pressure on journalists to be ‘online’ and makes their job situation more diffuse and the journalists more vulnerable. Meanwhile support systems have not changed. If you want to create commitment and job engagement you need to strengthen work environment resources, say researchers.
News
Moving public services to fight social marginalisation
Jun 19, 2013 The Swedish Equality Ombudsman, DO, has been asked by the government to prepare a move from Stockholm city centre to the suburbs of Tensta/Rinkeby – the areas which only weeks ago were shaken by riots. The Stockholm city council has also just decided to move its education department with 400 staff there.
Portrait
Iceland’s Minister of Social Affairs: The importance of writing off debts
Jun 19, 2013 Eygló Harðardóttir is the Minister of Social Affairs in Iceland’s new government. The low number of female ministers and women in parliamentary committees has created heated debate. Most committees have an uneven gender distribution, which goes against the law. But the new minister is not particularly worried. She reckons the number of women will rise soon.
News
EU standardisation of services worries trade unions
Jun 19, 2013 Common EU standards are aiming to speed up cross-border trade in services. Just as long as this doesn’t mean introducing EU rules through the backdoor which would be in breach with member states’ labour law and collective agreements, say trade unions – whose concern is shared by the Swedish government.
News
OECD: Economic worries fuel immigration debate
Jun 19, 2013 The number of asylum seekers in the whole of the OECD topped 400,000 for the first time in eight years in 2011. Preliminary figures shows this trend carrying on in 2012. There are large differences within the Nordic region. In Sweden last year nearly twice as many people sought asylum as in Denmark, Finland and Norway combined.
Insight
Munch in the canteen – for Freia’s workers only the best was good enough
Jun 19, 2013 Edvard Munch’s iconic The Scream created art history when it was sold at Sotheby’s in New York in 2012 for €91,033,826. The Scream is also part of the Anniversary Exhibition Munch 150, because Munch didn’t paint just one, but often several pictures of the same motif. The anniversary also features the Freia Frieze, which Munch painted for the workers’ canteen at the Freia chocolate factory in Oslo.
In focus