The 2nd Stakeholder Forum: Advancing Solutions for a Stronger Healthcare Workforce
The 2nd Stakeholder Forum of the Joint Action HEROES, held on March 17, 2025, brought together healthcare policymakers, experts, and representatives from across Europe to continue the critical conversation on workforce planning and sustainability.
This event followed the 1st Stakeholder Forum, which took place in October 2023, where stakeholders identified major challenges such as healthcare workforce shortages, retention difficulties, education reforms, and intersectoral collaboration.
Since the first forum, significant progress has been made in understanding the current (“as is”) and desired (“to be”) state of healthcare workforce planning across Europe.
The second forum built upon these discussions by evaluating what has changed, identifying remaining gaps, and exploring potential cross-country collaborations to address data fragmentation, workforce mobility, and long-term workforce planning strategies.
This year’s forum provided an interactive space for knowledge exchange, real-time feedback, and collaborative problem-solving, ensuring that a diverse range of voices contributed to shaping actionable solutions for a more resilient and sustainable healthcare workforce.
The forum fostered a highly interactive environment, incorporating real-time insights through Mentimeter. Stakeholders shared their perspectives on critical questions related to the sustainability and resilience of the healthcare workforce. The main areas of focus included:
Why are healthcare workforce challenges so widespread?
Participants identified factors such as ageing populations, budget constraints, and slow adaptation to evolving workforce needs as major obstacles. Workforce shortages, retention difficulties, and data fragmentation remain persistent issues across Member States. Additionally, the growing demand for healthcare professionals, coupled with an increasing competition for students entering healthcare fields, has made workforce planning more complex.
What are the biggest barriers to implementing solutions?
Challenges such as limited funding, administrative complexity, and resistance to change were frequently cited. Additionally, participants highlighted difficulties in standardizing education and training, as well as aligning digital tools with workforce planning systems. Many Member States also struggle with insufficient focus on health workforce capacity building and development, which limits long-term sustainability.
What role should the EU play in supporting solutions?
Stakeholders strongly supported greater EU coordination and funding mechanisms, particularly in areas such as harmonizing workforce data collection, improving mobility policies for healthcare workers, and standardizing education frameworks to align qualifications across borders. Many participants also emphasized the need for stronger collaboration between the healthcare and education sectors to ensure workforce training programs are aligned with healthcare system needs.
How can countries collaborate to address these challenges?
A key takeaway from the forum was the importance of mutual learning and cross-country collaboration. Proposed solutions included joint workforce planning strategies, regional training programs, and structured knowledge-sharing platforms to help countries learn from best practices and implement successful policies. Some Member States also suggested coordinated task-shifting strategies and better incentives to encourage professionals to work in underserved areas.
The insights from this forum will directly inform HEROES Policy Dialogues and contribute to shaping future workforce planning strategies at both national and EU levels. The discussions underscored the need for long-term investment, improved data-driven decision-making, and stronger partnerships to ensure a sustainable and resilient healthcare workforce.
As HEROES continues to advance its mission, the ongoing engagement of stakeholders remains crucial. By working together, sharing knowledge, and implementing innovative workforce solutions, Europe can take significant strides toward a more robust and future-ready healthcare system.