Implenia lends a hand

In Sweden, Implenia is giving students, refugees and unemployed people opportunities to join the labour market – and is recruiting talented staff in the process.

Implenia is the first company in the Swedish construction industry to enter into a recruitment partnership with the City of Stockholm. Under the agreement, signed in March 2017, the city will help Implenia recruit staff for at least three years.

The plan is to find six new employees a year. As most of these will be students, refugees and unemployed people who have previously found it difficult to access the labour market, Implenia is helping to integrate disadvantaged sections of society – true to the city’s aim of being a “Stockholm for all”.

So far, the partnership has resulted in four appointments. One of the latest recruits is 21-year-old Ilyaas Sheikh, who couldn’t find a job until Implenia took him on. He now works as a tunneller on the Johannelund project, gaining valuable professional experience in his first job.

“I’m thrilled to have this opportunity,” says Ilyaas. His shift partner Erik Ståhl had already been working at Implenia for several years when Ilyaas started. “It’s gone really well with Ilyaas; he soon became one of the team,” says Ståhl.

“This partnership with Stockholm is very valuable to us,” says Fredrik Björckebaum, CEO of Implenia Sverige, “because the city has huge resources for finding and training talent. Everyone involved benefits from the scheme: the company gains promising new employees while providing jobs for people who have not previously had a chance to enter the labour market.