How to promote work integration – the experience of the Samaritan Association of Latvia

Already more than 20 years ago, when the Samaritan Association of Latvia started providing group apartment services, we also started to get to know the challenges of work integration. Not only in theory but very practically – in the experience of our customers, in real life. A group apartment is a place where people with mental disorders can live and learn the skills and abilities needed for independent living, including those needed in the labor market.

Skills are one of the keywords when talking about the inclusion of target groups exposed to social risk in the labor market. The beginning of everything is the development of household skills, and we see that our clients have become more independent and confident in their abilities. They call the group apartment their home and feel like full members of society. They appreciate that they can work because it is not just a job, but an opportunity to be accepted, to be worthwhile.  We, on the other hand, are aware that not all of them are and will not be able to be integrated into the labor market, both due to health and other aspects, as well as the fact that skills to achieve the goals of labor integration are necessary not only for them, potential employees but also for employers who employ or want to employ these people.

Deinstitutionalization as an accelerator

As part of the deinstitutionalization process, the number of group apartments, day centers, and specialized workshops has increased, where we provide social services and continue to work on the fuller inclusion of people with mental disorders in society. It is also significant that in the last 10 years, there has been an increasing shortage of labor, especially in the low-skilled labor sector. There is talk of bringing in labor, but there are plenty of potential workers here. That’s why we looked for ways to promote work integration and use every opportunity to help make it happen.

Targeted training

For example, four years ago we accepted the challenge of becoming partners in an international project to develop a unified strategy for promoting work integration across Europe, which also included the development of training for both people with support needs and their mentors and managers in the workplace. Our manager of social services for Latgale and Vidzeme regions Inga Brente-Mieze was a trainer for one of these training programs, which we piloted in the Valmiera group apartment, training its residents. We tried to learn what it means to fit into the labor market – job interviews, communication skills, aspects of individual and teamwork, and much more, to integrate into the labor market as successfully as possible. It was interesting to see how interested they are in it and how motivated they are to learn new things and to receive encouragement: “You can do it too!”

On the other hand, in order not to stop there, last year we took another big step forward, together with the Valmiera Development Agency, we launched the Central Baltic Sea region cross-border cooperation program project “Stronger Together” (Interreg). 

This is also an international project – with partners in Sweden. Before we tested the training program and tried to introduce clients to the labor market, improve various skills, and provide knowledge, now we not only continue to tell, teach, and provide support, but in accordance with the goals of the project – to actually include a certain number of people in the labor market. Plus, a certain number of entrepreneurs will demonstrate their willingness to make their company an inclusive workplace, including employing people with mental or functional disabilities. In this project, the training will be even more targeted, given the specifics of the particular company, and the necessary skills.

Why should employers also learn the skills necessary for work integration?

There is a real shortage of workers, so entrepreneurs are also interested and ready to adapt to the new conditions. For example, if it’s about folding and painting boxes, it might not be done by one person, but by two. There may be one person who can fold perfectly and another who can paint. The “Stronger Together” project envisages that we work with entrepreneurs, providing them with the necessary information and providing support. We will create training courses to provide information about the skills and abilities of specific employees, and opportunities for their integration into the specific company. What we have often encountered – a person with support needs empathy, understanding, and patience from the employer, while the employer expects an immediate result from his employee. Often a company wants to be inclusive but does not know what it means in reality – that it requires additional resources and time.

We will once again conduct training for the target group, strengthening their acquired knowledge and skills and supplementing them. Within the framework of the project, it is planned to pilot a new way of integrating persons with functional disabilities into the labor market, which is essentially an “employee as a service”. It is important that the focus of the project is not only the inclusion of persons with functional disabilities in the labor market but also the labor market itself – so that more and more companies would like to create an inclusive workplace, ensuring the inclusion of persons with disabilities in the labor market and solving the problem of labor shortage.

Currently, it is planned to involve the companies of the Valmiera region and residents of the target group of the region in the project. Improving and adapting to the changing world order is constant work, and we believe that together we will succeed in making this region, this country, and the world more inclusive and prosperous.

Dagnija Kaklautiņa, 
Samaritan Association of Latvia
public relations specialist