Theme
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Who’ll replace Sweden’s powerful women?
Sweden is the only Nordic country which has never had a female prime minister or a female head of state in modern times. The Social Democrat Party leader Mona Sahlin could have become prime minister in the September 2010 elections, but her new red-green coalition lost.
3 minutes
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New tack sought in Danish equality debate
Norway uses quotas and a men’s panel to improve gender equality, but in Denmark there is disagreement on how to do it. Yet the Danes do agree there’s a need for a gender equality debate which focuses on both sexes.
5 minutes -
“Part-time is a result of lacking equality”
The high number of involuntary part-timers is a result of how we value women’s work, says Annelie Nordström, chairwoman at Kommunal, the Swedish Municipal Workers’ Union. The union has been fighting for the right to full-time employment for 30 years. It’s been an uphill battle, and since the economic crisis hit in 2009 it’s been…
7 minutes
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Work without boundaries can severely increase number of burnouts
The borderline between work and leisure time is becoming fuzzy. It’s getting increasingly difficult to achieve the old dream of eight hours’ work, eight hours’ off and eight hours’ sleep when the smartphone wants your attention, colleagues work in other timezones and you need to work a night shift to get through your inbox.
8 minutes
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Online culture’s effect on work-life balance
A working life without boundaries puts new demands on management, employers and unions. They all need to prevent workers slaving away until they drop.
5 minutes -
Rocketing Finnish IT business: less bureaucracy saves our spare time
Today’s software businesses face demands for a shorter journey from idea to product and expectations of higher returns of investments. Finnish company Houston Inc. claims this can still be achieved with a 7.5 hour working day and a work tempo which won’t lead to burnouts.
5 minutes
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Racing against nature
For two months every year John Johansen (45) works seven days a week, 14 hours a day. He’ll drive 2,600 kilometres and count some 120,000 soon-to-be-born sheep. “I start in Rogaland on 12 January, then I drive to East-Norway and then north from there. I finish in Vardø on 14 March. By then I’ll have…
3 minutes
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Soft skills needed for the new White and Green jobs
The EU Commission has presented a new agenda for new skills and jobs. During the economic crisis there are still two kinds of jobs that are in extra demand – the white and the green ones.
4 minutes
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Changes to IT affect systems as well as the social environment
Many businesses and organisations change their IT systems, yet in 70 percent of cases the change ends in failure with regard to time, budget or function. There have been many studies of what went wrong. Einar Iveroth chose to study what went right in the cases that succeeded.
4 minutes -
Coaches compete for the unemployed Swedes
The Swedish government has charged the Public Employment Service with procuring coaches worth 1.1bn Kronor (€12m) for the year 2009. This created a fast growing market for coaching. Today 900 businesses have a contract with the employment service. The contracts don’t guarantee any customers, however, and the businesses offering coaches must do their own marketing.
8 minutes