The global financial crisis has negatively affected national and international labor markets, resulting in extensive layoffs and hiring freezes. Norway forms an anomaly to this global trend, as various Norwegian companies are actively recruiting workers from abroad to fill labor shortages. The Norwegian economy experienced a downturn in 2009, but quickly recovered in 2010 thanks to a sustained international demand for its oil and gas services. Norwegian oil and gas companies are currently trying to recruit engineers, while a report by NES Global Talent predicts that a “global oil and gas talent war” will intensify this year. A lack of domestic engineers with the required skills pushes Norwegian companies to recruit workers from abroad. This paper investigates the ways in which oil and gas companies recruit foreign-born engineers to Norway. It incorporates the perspectives of human resource managers on engineering shortages, and the ways in which the financial crisis has affected their recruitment and hiring practices. The paper also includes the experiences of foreign-born engineers in Oslo, Kongsberg and Stavanger, investigating their employment and location decisions. The findings are based on in-depth interviews and an online survey for foreign-born employees in Norwegian oil- and gas companies. The paper draws on literatures on global engineering shortages and international skilled migration under crisis to place talent recruitment in Norway in a larger political, social and economic context. The findings indicate that Norwegian oil- and gas companies experience hiring difficulties despite the global financial crisis. They use recruitment incentives, (re)branding campaigns, and domestic training programs to try to meet their talent needs, but it is increasingly difficult to find the right people with the right skills. Finally, this paper investigates recent initiatives to reform Norway’s skilled migration policies and to make Norway more attractive to foreign talent.
