Hon borde ha fått en befordran.

It follows this pattern:

subject + modal verb + infinitive + supine + object

So here:

• Hon = subject
• borde = modal verb
• ha = infinitive of ha
• fått = supine of få
• en befordran = object

A very natural English grammar label for this is a modal + perfect infinitive construction, like should have received.

Because borde is the form used in this kind of should have ... statement.

Compare:

• Hon bör få en befordran = she should get a promotion
• Hon borde ha fått en befordran = she should have gotten / should have received a promotion

So bör is more about the present or future, while borde ha fått looks back at something that did not happen, or that the speaker thinks ought to have happened.

Also, in Swedish, borde often sounds more natural and less direct than bör.

Because modal verbs in Swedish normally take the bare infinitive, without att.

So you say:

• hon borde ha fått
• hon kan få
• hon måste gå

not:

• hon borde att ha fått

This is similar to English, where we say she should have received, not she should to have received.

Because after borde, Swedish uses ha + supine to express should have done something.

So:

• borde ha fått = should have received

You cannot say:

• hon borde fick en befordran

That is ungrammatical.

And if you say:

• Hon borde få en befordran

that means she should get a promotion, not she should have gotten one.

So ha fått is necessary to show that the statement refers to an earlier situation.

Fått is the supine form of the verb få.

In Swedish, the supine is used together with ha to make perfect-type constructions:

• har fått
• hade fått
• borde ha fått

So in this sentence, fått is not a normal past tense form like fick. It is the form required after ha.

This is one of the most important verb patterns in Swedish.

Yes, få often means get or receive, and Swedish commonly uses it in expressions like this.

So få en befordran means get / receive a promotion.

That is completely normal Swedish. English can use both ideas too:

• get a promotion
• receive a promotion

So even though the verb is få, the whole phrase is best understood as a standard way to talk about being given a promotion.

Because befordran is a common-gender noun, so its indefinite singular form takes en:

• en befordran = a promotion

The definite singular form is:

• befordranen = the promotion

In this sentence, the indefinite form is used because it means a promotion, not a specific already-identified promotion.

Yes. That is also natural Swedish.

Compare:

• Hon borde ha fått en befordran
• Hon borde ha blivit befordrad

They are very close in meaning.

The difference is mainly in structure:

• få en befordran = get/receive a promotion
• bli befordrad = be promoted

The first uses a noun phrase, the second uses a passive-style adjective/participle construction. Both are common.

It can suggest several related ideas, depending on context:

• it would have been right/fair
• it was expected
• she deserved it
• it should have happened

In this sentence, many English speakers would hear something close to She should have gotten a promotion or She deserved a promotion.

So it is not always a strict rule-based obligation. It often expresses the speaker’s judgment about what would have been appropriate.

In informal spoken Swedish, some speakers do leave out ha in this kind of sentence.

So you may hear:

• Hon borde fått en befordran

But in standard written Swedish, Hon borde ha fått en befordran is the safer and more correct form.

For learners, it is best to use the full form with ha.

For a negative sentence, inte usually comes after the finite verb:

• Hon borde inte ha fått en befordran = She should not have received a promotion

For a yes/no question, Swedish puts the finite verb first:

• Borde hon ha fått en befordran? = Should she have received a promotion?

This is a good example of normal Swedish word order:

• statement: Hon borde ...
• question: Borde hon ...