The story so far…

The TalentHub Joensuu pro­ject was star­ted in January 2018 to find solu­tions to the chal­lenges of inter­na­tion­al­iz­a­tion exper­i­enced by local enter­prises. The aim of the pro­ject was to build a sys­tem­atic and act­ive muni­cipal cooper­a­tion model for inter­na­tional tal­ents, enter­prises, and their sup­port and ser­vice organ­iz­a­tions in order to coordin­ate and bring together the regional enter­prises and inter­na­tional tal­ents in the area. The enter­prise-based activ­it­ies of the pro­ject pro­moted the growth, devel­op­ment and inter­na­tion­al­iz­a­tion of small and medium-sized enter­prises (SMEs), as well as swiftly con­nect­ing inter­na­tional tal­ents with such enter­prises. In addi­tion, entre­pren­eur­ial paths for inter­na­tional tal­ents were recog­nised and piloted in the pro­ject. Co-devel­op­ment activ­it­ies between enter­prises and inter­na­tional tal­ents were enhanced by new kinds of exper­i­ments such as joint work‑, internship‑, and/or devel­op­ment peri­ods in the enter­prises.

As a res­ult of the pro­ject, the enter­prises in the region were able to util­ize inter­na­tional tal­ents more effi­ciently in their own oper­a­tions relat­ing to inter­na­tion­al­iz­a­tion pro­cesses. During the pro­ject, 30 enter­prises under­took a cooper­a­tion period with inter­na­tional tal­ent and had access to tools for inter­na­tion­al­iz­a­tion and will­ing­ness to util­ize inter­na­tional tal­ents to sup­port inter­na­tion­al­iz­a­tion. With the help of the activ­it­ies, 20 inter­na­tional tal­ents were employed by SMEs. The amount of new start-ups foun­ded by inter­na­tional tal­ents dur­ing the pro­ject was 10.

The ori­ginal TalentHub Joensuu pro­ject, fun­ded by the EU and Uudenmaan Liitto, fin­ished on December 31st, 2019. The pro­ject had estab­lished a cooper­a­tion model in which regional SMEs are able to util­ize inter­na­tional tal­ents to sup­port their inter­na­tion­al­iz­a­tion and growth. In 2020 the own­er­ship of TalentHub Joensuu was trans­ferred to the city of Joensuu, and driven by Luotsi Joensuu, the TalentHub Joensuu web­site con­tin­ues to be developed with the aim to imple­ment it as a per­man­ent part of the employ­ment ser­vices offered by the city of Joensuu. In addi­tion to co-oper­a­tion with local insti­tu­tions and com­pan­ies, the pro­ject con­tin­ues to pro­mote the vital­ity of local com­pan­ies as well as the social and cul­tural resi­li­ence and equal­ity in busi­ness. Internationalization of enter­prises pro­motes sus­tain­able devel­op­ment of the regional eco­nomic struc­ture. Through employ­ment, inter­na­tional tal­ents are bet­ter integ­rated into the regional struc­ture, and they help to diver­sify busi­ness cul­ture and broaden know­ledge of for­eign cul­tures in the enter­prises.