BMAs: Run your own business
After graduation you must decide: be an employee or start your own business. This is not really the situation for BMAs today, but a collaborative project between Swedish public actors and some companies aims to change that and make entrepreneurs of BMAs.
Two years ago, the Swedish government gave SEK million to finance the project, Power of Change (Förändringskraft), with the objective of increasing the number of actors in the healthcare sector in Sweden. So far they have incorporated about 100 nurses and midwives and only a few BMAs in the program.
“We hope to reach out to the BMAs at Scanlab. The possibilities for becoming self-employed are growing and we do have examples of such businesses,” says Elisabet Nachman.
Three-step program
In Power of Change, the participants go through a three-step program. The first step deals with basic information about how the system works and what needs a company should fill. In the second part, participants receive education from bank representatives, the public sector and company advisers such as Nachman.
In step two, they learn about differences between being an employee and being self-employed, as well as the personal and economic consequences of having their own business. In the third part, the participants are offered personal advice for their specific idea and almost everyone in the program takes part in the third step as well.
Here, the focus is on business intelligence, making a business plan, some strategies and discussing networks, assets and how to set a budget. “This service is provided without any cost and I really hope that many BMAs at the fair will see the opportunity,” she says.
A women’s project
Most of those who have gone through the program are women.
“It’s not explicitly a women’s program but the collaboration with the Swedish union for nurses, midwives, BMAs and caregivers in general (Vårdförbundet) automatically gives it a focus on women,” Nachman says.
She sees the program as an opportunity for many women and also for society to gain from the unexploited resource that female entrepreneurs constitute.
“It’s still mainly medical doctors who start their own business in the healthcare sector and the female nurses working for them are still not self-employed.”
Inspiration needed
“Many of the publicly employed BMAs are frustrated by the system and the regulations limiting them in their everyday working situation. They are typical academics and they often have ideas about new routines and are attracted by the more dynamic working situation that having your own company offers,” says Nachman.
But there is no culture of BMAs being self-employed, and to many of them the idea might not even appear. “Our most important task is to inspire and let them know that the possibility exists. This might be a way to make a different type of career as a BMA and I think that may be appealing to many of them,” says Nachman.
