Pilvi’s first experience working with people experiencing homelessness was in Scotland year 2005 where she worked as an assertive outreach worker for over two years, learning first-hand about people experiencing homelessness without Housing First support.

After returning to Finland, Pilvi went to work with Helsinki Deaconess Institute in one of their newly opened Housing First units, providing supported living for long-term homeless people. There she learned the basic skills of the Housing First approach and community care and how people with similar backgrounds can empower each other with the support of skilled Housing First workers.

In 2014, Pilvi had the opportunity to be part of establishing a new Housing First community-based supported housing unit for long- term homeless people. Her main job was to ensure that the workers working in the unit were familiar with Housing First principles and that the support work they did was in line with the Housing First principles. It was very important to ensure that community-based methods were followed, involving residents and workers in the decision making process and everyday life in the unit.

Pilvi is currently working as a project coordinator for the NEA project, which aims to stop women´s homelessness by securing their housing pathways. The project consists of eight multidisciplinary sub-projects and my main target with my colleague is to enable these sub-projects to work together and create woman-spesific work methods in the homelessness work field.