It was in March 2019 when I stepped on my Ensto path. Before joining the company, I worked for 22 years at Finnair in various managerial and management positions in HR, communication, development, and quality management. Thereafter, I worked six years at Enersene (earlier Empower) which is one of Ensto’s customers, and hence, gained a good understanding on power distribution business.
I live in Helsinki and feel that I am primarily a mother even though my children are adults. I´m a true lover of all animals, and vet was my first dream job; that changed during the years at high school. My dog Zorro and my horse Elton evidence this love and keep me happily busy in my free time and during holidays. What comes to education I have a degree of MSc in Social Science; I graduated from the Helsinki University majoring in communication and social psychology. Later, I did an eMBA in strategy management, too. I believe in lifelong learning and am happy that at Ensto I can develop myself continually − especially the area of sustainability requires constant learning.
Ensto and I have common values, and that is why I am happy and proud to work here: in a truly value-lead company, whose values have existed a long time. One of them, trust capital, was established by our founder Ensio Miettinen more than 60 years ago and it still is an important cornerstone today. People refer to values quite a lot, so they are really steering our daily work. I cannot emphasize too much the fact that there are super talented, professional, passionate, and great people working at Ensto.
As a leader equality is the most important thing for me. It means that our people can genuinely be who they are and express themselves without fear or insecurity. At Ensto we have a gender balance in the big picture but when you look at solely senior positions there are a lot less women, just to mention one example. We naturally need to see diversity in a wider scope than just the gender: diversity covers sex, race, religion, health etc.
We need diversity and inclusion in our personal and work lives – it is a great asset! Still, there is a lot to be done in enhancing diversity and not least because we all have unconscious preconceptions. It is human but can be changed only by open communication, sensitizing and training. There is a strong diversity foundation at Ensto, and we need to make sure it abides and develops in the changing world we live in. Diversity is a priority at Ensto, and the development work is ongoing.
The change is never-ending, and the past few years have been like a tsunami of external changes. There are things we just must accept and act upon, but there also are changes we want to carry out. And change is not possible if the culture does not change. Growth is crucial for Ensto, and we need to keep all the good things within our strong culture but also be able to bring new items to it. We still need a bit more growth spirit and hunger to grow, a true Can-Do attitude. We have all the possibilities to achieve our targets in the coming years and need each and every one onboard to commit to the new culture. That happens through leading the change – and must be the role of every single leader. From the past I have experience of successful change projects, for instance related to a total turnaround in work safety, the importance of which can never be underestimated. I am happy that in Human Resources we soon have a full set of new modern systems for HR, recruitment, training, and work satisfaction to support the everyday and change processes.
I love working at a family company as it is great to have faces for the owners who have a long-term commitment to the company development. For me Ensto’s strong legacy is an inspiration. In addition, our business has a true purpose as the electricity distribution products play a major role in reducing climate change. This is not rhetoric but of great importance for all of us, both as company representatives and in our private lives. We have a tradition that when we decide to do something we truly put it in practice and make it happen! I am very proud that we for instance were able to reduce our CO2 emissions by 64 percent and have moved to using renewable electricity even though the times are challenging for both changes.
Kirsi-Marja Ura
The writer of the blog works as Senior Vice President, HR, Brand & Communications, Marketing, Sustainability and is a member of Ensto Management Team.