Sammen om en jobb Mentor Program in Rogaland

- connecting people to create value -

Sammen om en jobb’s mentor program in Rogaland was established in September 2022. The program connects skilled migrants looking for relevant work with mentors from the local workforce who share a similar industry background.

We started with 5 members and a handful of newly recruited mentors. Today, we are a steadily growing community of candidates, committed mentors, and collaboration partners.

Our work in the region creates results. The mentor program delivers between 40 and 50 mentor-mentee matches per year, supporting a more diverse and equitable workforce and contributing to bridging the skills gap in the region.

• In 2022, approximately 30 % of our mentees found relevant work in the 6-month mentor program period.

• In 2023, 37% of candidates found relevant work within the 6-month mentoring period. Another 6 months later, 50% of candidates had found relevant work in the region: In Equinor, at British International School Stavanger, NATO, Aider, OKEA, Baker Hughes, and Dynamo Analytics, to name a few.

• In 2024, 50 % of candidates found relevant work within 6 months.

Social Return on Investment

Sammen om en jobb’s social return on investment is around 8. That means for every 1NoK invested, 8 NoK in social impact is created. Unsurprisingly, the largest gains come from increased income and increased tax payments. The image below is from Wilstar’s 2022 report on SROI. EY conducted an independent assurance of numbers.

Are you interested in how we calculate SROI?

Head over to this article for a summary.

Who are the Candidates in the Mentor Program?

While quoted percentages of key performance indicators met are important, more information is needed to fully appreciate the program’s scope. The datasets below are from 2024, but the picture they paint has been consistent over two years.

• The typical skilled migrant job-seeker in Sammen om en jobb Rogaland is a woman from a non-EU country. She lives in the Stavanger region because her partner works here, and she holds a master’s degree in engineering, business, or tech/IT. She is often a mother, but she is unlikely to have a long career gap behind her before relocating to Norway.

• Our second largest, and fastest growing, member group in Rogaland is international students. They are typically resourceful young professionals with master’s degrees in engineering or business from the University of Stavanger, eager to join the Norwegian workforce.

Norway needs all hands on deck for the future. Supporting dual careers in international relocation and supporting international graduates’ search for relevant opportunities is key to attracting and retaining global talent in the region. In addition, employing people who are already here is a sustainable use of available human resources.

I invite you to click through the slides below to learn: Who are our mentees? What are their professional backgrounds? Who finds work?

Collaboration partners in Stavanger

One of the main challenges when navigating how to enter the workforce in a new country is a lack of social and cultural capital. ‘Social capital’ describes who you know and what they can contribute in terms of information and influence. ‘Cultural capital’ relates to how well you understand and interpret cultural values, norms, and expectations, and how you signal cultural identity. In practical terms, this can relate to:

• ability to communicate and signal skills and competence appropriately, for example through application papers

• ability to interpret cultural signs and act appropriately, for example in an interview context or through online activity

• gaining access to relevant industry-specific information and opportunities through other relationships with other people

We strive to facilitate connections and act as both social and cultural bridgebuilders. Our collaboration partners contribute enormously to this work by engaging in partner mentor programs. Sammen om en jobb matches volunteer employees from a partner company with suitable candidates in a fully coordinated, best-practice in-house mentor program.

With a collaboration partner mentor program, you can:

• Gain access to new talent and new perspectives

• Gain new insights into diversity, inclusion, and the candidate journey

• Gain insights into structural inequalities in the hiring process and the relevance of variables like ethnic and religious identity, gender, or visa status

• Be a trailblazer for social sustainability

• Let your employees volunteer as mentors: an engaging, meaningful, and motivating experience

Since 2023, we have run collaboration mentor programs in Stavanger with Sval Energi and Worley Rosenberg:

• Sval Energi’s mentor programs in 2023 and 2024 connected 31 mentor-mentee pairs. Today, 14 of those 31 candidates work in relevant, full-time positions. Here’s a post on LinkedIn sharing some of Sval Energi’s takeaways.

• Worley Rosenberg’s mentor program in 2024 connected 12 mentors and mentees. 5 mentees found work in the 6 months of mentoring. Here’s a post on LinkedIn detailing the results.

The film below, created at a networking event hosted by Sval Energy, will give you an idea of how we work in collaboration partnerships, and why people want to collaborate with us. You can also contact program manager Tone Indrelid in Stavanger, or click the button below for more info about partnership mentor programs.

Sammen om en jobb Stavanger’s Events

Sammen om en jobb i Stavanger hosts monthly in-person events, funded by Stavanger kommune. Please click here to access a full Sammen om en jobb events list.

Join us?

Are you interested in learning more about Sammen om en jobb? Or perhaps in joining us as a member or as a mentor? Welcome! Hit the button below to learn more and sign up.

The small print:

Sammen om en jobb is a membership organization. We charge 200NoK for a 6-month membership. As a member, you are eligible to apply for a place in the mentor program. The mentor program Sammen om en jobb in Rogaland is free of charge for members. This is currently made possible by funding from the PA Foundation and Wilstar, and collaboration with local mentor program collaboration partners.