How can health and social care employers help experienced staff stay healthy, motivated and engaged in their work? On 28 April 2026, an online SAFE meeting explored what makes a workplace age-friendly and introduced practical tools to help organisations improve working conditions for employees aged 55 and over.

The meeting, “Retaining those who care: Age-friendly workplaces for a sustainable healthcare workforce,” was jointly organised by Policy Area Health and Policy Area Education of the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region (EUSBSR).

The programme combined an introduction to SAFE, a policy overview covering Estonia, Finland and Sweden, and small-group discussions about how employers can support longer and healthier working lives.

Why retaining experienced staff matters

Opening contributions came from Ülla-Karin Nurm, Director of the NDPHS Secretariat and EUSBSR Policy Area Health Coordinator, and Aslı Tepecik Dis, Process Leader at the Norden Association, representing Policy Area Education.

An ageing workforce and staff shortages are putting pressure on health and social care services. The figures presented at the meeting illustrated the scale of this challenge:

• Finland: more than 30% of the public health and social care workforce is expected to retire within the next ten years.
• Sweden: in 2021, over 13,000 trained nurses were not working in healthcare. The presentation linked this to an estimated societal cost of SEK 5.5 billion.

The presentation also highlighted pressures in Estonia, where increasing numbers of healthcare workers are moving from the public to the private sector. It pointed to overtime and workload pressures as important factors, alongside pay considerations.

These examples underline why retaining experienced employees deserves attention. Supporting staff to remain in work helps preserve skills and knowledge, maintain continuity of care and strengthen health services’ ability to respond to future challenges.

What makes a workplace age-friendly?

The meeting introduced age-friendly workplaces as environments that enable people of all ages to participate, perform and develop throughout their working lives on fair and inclusive terms.

For employees aged 55 and over, this can mean access to learning opportunities, working arrangements that respond to changing needs, support for health and well-being, and recognition of their experience. Employers also need to consider how recruitment, career development and the transition to retirement can support employees at different stages of life.

In the first breakout session, participants were invited to discuss a shared question: “What does an age-friendly workplace mean to you in practice?”

The session provided space to exchange experiences, challenges and examples of successful approaches. It encouraged participants to consider how age-friendliness can become part of everyday management and workplace culture.

Connecting workplace practice with policy

The policy overview showed how age-friendly working conditions connect with wider priorities in Estonia, Finland and Sweden.

Estonia’s Welfare Development Plan 2023–2030 supports long and high-quality working lives, equal opportunities and labour market participation. Finland’s National Programme on Ageing 2030 includes extending working careers and improving older people’s well-being among its objectives.

Examples from Sweden’s Västra Götaland region and Region Stockholm highlighted skills development, sustainable working lives, leadership and health-promoting workplaces.

Together, these examples placed the SAFE approach within a broader effort to support an ageing workforce and sustain essential services.

A practical tool for identifying improvements

A central part of the meeting was the introduction of the SAFE organisational self-assessment tool. It helps employers examine seven areas that influence age-friendliness:

• Management processes
• Work community
• Retirement, re-employment and career advancement
• Equality and fairness
• Health and well-being
• Training and learning
• Flexibility

The SAFE approach combines self-assessment with employee involvement to identify areas for improvement and guide employers towards relevant recommendations and resources.

Practical examples presented included ways to maintain contact with retired employees and recognise employees’ work milestones across departments. Such approaches can help organisations value experience and maintain connections throughout different stages of working life.

Moving from assessment to action

The second breakout session focused on how the self-assessment tool could be used in practice. Participants were invited to consider how it could support employees’ health and well-being, which parts were most relevant to their own organisations, and what would be needed to make it useful.

The meeting connected the wider challenge of workforce sustainability with concrete areas employers can address: working conditions, opportunities to learn, fair treatment, flexibility and supportive management.

By helping employers examine these areas, SAFE aims to create workplaces where experienced employees can continue contributing and where cooperation between generations supports the whole work community.

About SAFE

SAFE – Solutions for Age-Friendly Employer supports age-friendly working conditions for employees aged 55 and over in health and social care. Running from April 2024 to March 2027, the project brings together Haapsalu College, Metropolia University of Applied Sciences, Kuldne Liiga and NDPHS.

Visit project website

The project is financed by the European Regional Development Fund through Interreg Central Baltic 2021-2027