Good Practice Criteria
Inclusivity & Participation
Does the practice ensure that its services are accessible and responsive to diverse groups?
Startup Refugees adjusts its service delivery according to the needs of participants, and actively builds up networks to ensure it is responding to diverse groups. Services are flexible and multilingual, further ensuring accessibility, and offered in a range of locations.
Inspiring tools:
Toolkit for pop-up restaurateurs.
Good practice checklist
✓ Adopt a participatory, gender mainstreaming, age sensitive, inclusive approach and secure equal opportunities for beneficiaries.
✓ Make sure to provide precise and accessible information on how to access services in different languages, formats and through different communication channels
✓ Ensure that equality and diversity are an essential part of how services are delivered, taking into consideration different needs and capacities.
✓ Make reasonable adjustments to service delivery in order to take into account particular needs of the target group.
Does the practice involve the active participation of the receiving society?
The practice has an extensive, active network of more than 1 500 members, including several actors able to promote participants’ access to the labour market in Finland. These actors offer asylum seekers, refugees and immigrants support with employment and entrepreneurship.
Good practice checklist
✓ Consider integration as a two-way process, and aim for change on the side of the receiving society.
✓ Foresee an active role for the receiving society in the design and implementation stages of the practice, and involve actions that encourage native communities and beneficiaries to work together.
Does the practice consult its beneficiaries and involve them in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the action?
The practice was built around the needs of participants, and regularly consults them as part of an ongoing feedback process.
Good practice checklist
✓ Organise consultation activities with migrant beneficiaries in order to co-create actions where possible and secure their feedback on the design and evaluation of the action.
✓ Provide appropriate feedback mechanisms by which beneficiaries can safely express their opinions on service quality.
✓ Use flexible and interculturally-adapted formats and compensate participants for their contribution.
Relevance & Complementarity
Are the objectives of the practice relevant to the needs of the migrants?
The main objective of Startup Refugees is to ensure the speedy integration of newcomers into the labour market. Staff actively identify and analyse migrants’ needs in all parts of the country in which activities are run, ensuring that services are relevant to the local context.
Inspiring tools:
Report on the employment of asylum seekers and refugees in Finland.
Good practice checklist
✓ Identify and analyse the needs of the relevant migrants and prioritise methods which directly ask them about their needs.
✓ Identify and analyse gaps in integration support and design actions to fill these gaps.
✓ Aim for systemic improvement, satisfying the needs of the majority of target groups in the target area.
Is the practice relevant to the empowerment of migrants, the strengthening of their autonomy and the support of their long-term integration?
Asylum seeker and refugee participants are empowered through the programme thanks to its promotion of their employment and speedy labour market integration in Finland. All activities are delivered in several languages, allowing for inclusivity, and based on active dialogue, thereby promoting participants’ agency.
Good practice checklist
✓ Devise actions with the overarching goal of providing positive feedback and making migrants more confident, autonomous and independent.
✓ Contribute to migrants’ engagement with the community for the common good.
✓ Contribute to migrants’ engagement with the community for the common good.
✓ Include (or create the preconditions for) actions that facilitate long-term integration.
✓ Address discrimination and information gaps as obstacles to long-term integration.
Does the practice align with the priorities, strategic goals and policies of other relevant stakeholders, and contribute to the wider integration framework?
Startup Refugees was founded in 2015 when a large number of asylum seekers arrived in Finland. The idea was to promote their speedy integration into the labour market, together with a network of actors from different fields. The organisation is regularly involved in public discussion on changing negative narratives around newcomers. Its approach is built on the belief that once one newcomer is hired by a company others will be too, and that other companies are then likely to follow suit. Further, it works to inspire participants themselves through promotion of examples of successful newcomer entrepreneurship.
Good practice checklist
✓ Ensure that all actions are in line with international and European human rights standards.
✓ Employ regional/local, national and EU/international level integration-related guidelines and tools.
✓ Make sure that the services offered contribute to the strengthening of the capacities of relevant institutions to support future development.
Effectiveness
Is the practice adequately planned and based on a comprehensive design?
Actions have clear and comprehensive plans, and their implementation is well-managed with regular assessment.
Good practice checklist
✓ Aim for actions that achieve observable outcomes among the target group or contribute to changes during the implementation of the action.
✓ Make sure that the objectives and planned results of the activity are feasible and clear.
✓ Develop a communications strategy during the design phase of the action and pay attention to communication with host communities and local authorities.
✓ Develop a staff management plan to identify team members with the right skills to work with beneficiaries, and their needs for training and further qualification.
Does the practice regularly monitor implementation and evaluate its results?
Activities are monitored on an ongoing basis, and regularly evaluated according to participant feedback.
Inspiring tools:
The project developed a toolkit on developing the future prospects of participants.
Good practice checklist
✓ Ensure regular monitoring of action implementation and compare actual performance to goals set during the design phase.
✓ Anticipate obstacles that might occur and plan alternative scenarios during the design phase of the action.
✓ Ensure achievement of intended outputs / outcomes.
✓ Determine whether practice outcomes are considered successful by beneficiaries, the host and practitioner communities, funders, and policymakers.
✓ Assess whether interventions contribute to long-term sustainable change.
Sustainability
Is the practice prepared to sustain its positive effects after completion?
Startup Refugees is built around the active partnership of various actors. These include companies, communities and individuals that work together towards the common goal of ensuring the speedy integration of asylum seekers and refugees through employment and entrepreneurship. The large number of actors ensures the sustainability of the practice.
Good practice checklist
✓ During the design phase, anticipate opportunities to continue the intervention after completion.
✓ Prepare and apply a well-defined sustainability plan to ensure the continuation of positive effects / outcomes.
✓ Devote resources to building capacities during the implementation phase, in order to ensure that the necessary human resources, expertise and infrastructure are in place to sustain the services upon completion of the action.
Does the practice attract structural funding and support from new sponsors and individuals, or have the potential to develop a business model to generate its own resources?
Since the very beginning, its wide network of actors has been key to the running of Startup Refugees. Sponsorship is another key element, from a diverse range of funders – many of whom are secured via the network. The practice is also increasingly focusing on fundraising.
Good practice checklist
✓ Develop partnerships and relations with relevant stakeholders at the early stage of the action to ensure that the practice has strong support and potential partners for after the primary funding terminates.
✓ Identify new EU and national funding opportunities for long-term integration (e.g., shifting from project-based initiatives that are limited in time or dependent on one (external) donor to a comprehensive, multi-year strategy based on secured funding or diverse funding opportunities).
✓ Diversify funding opportunities and identify options for self-financing through business activities or social entrepreneurship.
Partnership & Collaboration
Does the practice establish communication and coordination with other relevant actors to foster the integration of migrants? (e.g., migrants, civil society, public authorities, businesses)
The practice’s wide, trans-sectoral network facilitates regular, active communication and coordination with relevant integration actors and stakeholders.
Good practice checklist
✓ Ensure the involvement and participation of key stakeholders in the development phase and create strategies to involve them in the action.
✓ Include multi-stakeholder consultation with professionals, institutions, and citizens, in order to promote the meaningful participation of refuges and migrants and support a joint sense of ownership of decisions and actions.
Does the practice contribute to discussion on the improvement of integration support policies?
The main aim of the practice is to contribute to the improvement and development of comprehensive integration strategies at local, regional and national level in Finland.
Good practice checklist
✓ Seize opportunities to contribute to the development of comprehensive integration strategies involving EU-level/national/regional/local authorities, service providers and civil society.
✓ Work with relevant partners to jointly review operations, practices, services, and integration outcomes.