Business Finland generates prosperity and well-being for Finland by accelerating sustainable growth for companies. Through its services, Business Finland assists companies in global growth, developing future solutions, and boldly transforming their business. Additionally, Business Finland aims to create the world’s most attractive and competitive innovation environment in Finland while attracting investments and tourism. The mission is truly as big as Finland.
Hanna-Mari Parkkinen, Chief Customer Officer at Business Finland, was a guest at the Customer Value Builders Club on June 4th, 2021. Hanna-Mari has a front-row seat to Finnish companies’ success in international markets and how that success is measured by various indicators.
Business Finland faced an unprecedented challenge last year when the government’s decision on COVID disruption financing was made, and the organization had only three days to prepare for the influx of tens of thousands of new applications. How did they manage?
It all started with meeting customer needs.
It was known that there would be a high volume of applications, and support-seeking customers would be in a hurry. A new service was created on the website, new service advisors were trained quickly, and people were moved within the organization – some who had already retired even called and asked to help. Everything happened swiftly and agilely because the systems were in place, and the employees had a passion for their work, for serving Finland, Hanna-Mari explains.
Endurance, or ‘sisu’ as we say in Finnish, is even part of our values. Our work includes a ‘can do’ attitude – we roll up our sleeves when needed, whether it’s a fantastic business opportunity in Latin America, leading a large delegation to China, or providing assistance to Finnish companies when the pandemic disrupts everything. We succeeded, and so did the companies. Our customers’ exports grew during the COVID year!
Does the pandemic change our thinking?
Successful companies are agile and customer-oriented when it comes to sales, exports, and innovations. From my experience, customer value is the starting point. Finnish companies are generally behind in this compared to other Nordic countries – Denmark, Sweden – or Central Europe. While we understand the significance of customer value and customer-centricity, there’s still too much talk and not enough action.
I believe there has been a shift. I’ve thought that perhaps the pandemic year requires a change in mindset, leading us to develop genuine customer-centricity as a nation. Companies are slowly realizing that the world is truly open. If there’s a need anywhere in the world, we can sell there. I hope and believe that this attitude will stay with us Finns after the pandemic era.
Swedes invest in customer value.
Let’s return to the previously mentioned Swedes, as I’m asked about this constantly. Why do the Swedes always win? This has been extensively researched, and I usually respond with these counter-questions:
Who on your company’s board represents marketing? Who in your executive team has the ability to lead customer value? How much do you invest in marketing financially? Swedes often have more zeroes in their marketing project budgets.
I don’t mean to say that customer value is solely marketing’s responsibility, but an understanding of marketing is necessary to comprehend the target audience and provide added value to customers.
Customer value must be embedded in the strategy, and the entire executive team must measure the realization of customer value. Every company must genuinely listen and understand what in their activities generates customer value, which services and products contribute to it across the organization.
Measuring customer value and impact
Creating customer value is integrated into Business Finland’s strategy, and the entire staff is measured on producing customer value. Metrics include customer feedback and our mutual love letter: CRM, which I also refer to as our love package. We have succeeded when our customers succeed, and we create value for them by helping them. This is very clear, and there are clear metrics for it.
At Business Finland, we discuss challenges at various levels:
Systematically creating opportunities and ecosystems where companies can find each other and collaboratively innovate.
Assisting in investment and productization.
Actively supporting exports. We have passionate exporters in 41 countries who make connections, bring companies together, and organize virtual business meetings during the pandemic.
We have a performance agreement similar to athletes; our impact metrics are growth in exports, employment, and research and development investments by companies. We measure encounters because personal interaction plays a significant role in our work.
