Effective Proposals

Are companies in your location trying to attract international talent to your city amidst a shortage of skilled nationals? Is the support you have given to assist their efforts falling short? And do you struggle to create a welcoming environment to help expats choose your city?

If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then your local economy is suffering too. The inability to fill vacancies is counter productive to business, highly expensive for companies and damaging to success of stakeholders.

Longterm Damage

Internationally well known corporations in your location as well as your own local champions often find themselves in a similar situation. The position and renumeration are excellent, yet applicants choose to join another company. The choice is often due to the offer of locating to a more attractive location. This can be the result of the poorer image that is portrayed and this should change.

To remove obstacles to growth Finland needs to attract literally tens of thousands of skilled workers from abroad. When travelling, I have asked others for their impression of Finland dozens of times. Cold, dark and mosquito infested. That image is counterproductive when requesting expats to relocate. This is worse that no international image at all and even spectacular Helsinki suffers.

Mosquitos are nowhere near as widespread as is believed. Furthermore, Finland has hot, 30º summers where nights are as light as day. These facts are more inspiring and thus enable companies to attract more successfully.

This is just one example and perhaps extreme. That said, even with the inevitable negatives, painting a truthful portrayal improves the chance of creating a viable image that attracts. As other cities know all too well.