Imatran Seudun Sähkö Ensures People’s Success
- Digileaper
- Aug 26, 2024
- 4 min read
When ISS (Imatran Seudun Sähkö) was founded nearly a hundred years ago and the power of Imatra Rapids began to be harnessed for the needs of Finnish society, the world was very different from what it is today. Over the various phases of the company’s history, the world has seen many ups and downs, but the roots of the company, which grew up on the banks of the Vuoksi River, have held firm and strengthened year after year.
Behind the ISS Group’s turnover of around €30 million are about sixty people who take care of the company and its customers perhaps better than ever before.
Heikki Lappalainen took the helm of the company a couple of years ago, and if the world had been full of turbulence before, the new CEO has not been offered a calm environment either. Despite the global upheavals, under Lappalainen’s leadership, the company has strongly embarked on development. Traditional strengths have been clarified, and in the renewed strategy, bold steps are being taken towards the possibilities of digitalization.
"I care. The company’s slogan reflects not only the core business and customer care but also the company’s management."
Digitalization is a central part of the modern company’s strategy. "We recognized the development needs related to this. If you want to be part of the market, you have to invest in digitalization development."
Lappalainen is a doer, but over the years, he has learned to understand people and human behavior better and better. "People are fundamentally eager to develop and want to change things that don’t work. Usually, the things that need attention are identified, but if they are not gathered and processed, their development doesn’t get started, or it remains incomplete."
"It is often thought that a CEO only needs to assign tasks, but if the staff remains only at the execution level and doesn’t commit to development, it’s hard to achieve a good end result. Shared decisions are easier to move forward."
Lappalainen trusts in development with Business Director Petri Valtonen. After clarifying the strategic process, digitalization was brought to the development table, with many development ideas and thoughts, but at the same time, there was concern about whether the big picture was being understood correctly and whether the organization’s units were siloed.
The company set out to gain an external perspective on the situation and roadmap project, and after a competitive tendering process, Digileaper was chosen as the partner.
"The human-centric approach and emphasis on the role of people in work appealed to us. Systems themselves are of no use if they don’t meet people’s needs. The Twin digital twin tool for business and development modeling set Digileaper apart from competitors," Valtonen reflects.
"We saw that we could get more out of the work in a different way, and the architectural modeling would remain usable afterward. The difference compared to a consultant leaving only Word documents behind is huge. Heikki and I thought that if there isn’t much difference in prices, we should choose the best."
Valtonen is pleased with the contribution and success of Imatra Region Electricity’s people in the project, although, as usual, there was a lot of pressure and urgency with many other things at the same time. The group of participants was large, which allowed for broad opportunities to influence and ensure that the thoughts of key individuals were taken into account. Some people even got excited about modeling things. Such things can happen in human-centered digitalization development.
Digileaper’s project manager Jaana Rantaniemi kept the whole project well under control. "With busy people, an active and brisk approach is important," Valtonen thinks and continues: "The results were good. We got an overall picture and many ideas for the future. There is a lot to do in the development pipeline, and prioritization is important. The results also brought up things we didn’t expect. In addition to the situation analysis and roadmap, we also got the overall architecture modeled extensively as expected."
The coming years will be busy on the digitalization development front. Heikki Lappalainen wants to further strengthen the employee-centered and engaging corporate culture. After taking the helm, he has set one goal to bring a strong data-driven management culture into the organization, and this is also visible in the roadmap.
”"People need to manage data and utilize it in business operations. These are key to sustainable growth, productivity, managing their own work, and reducing personal risks."
"The integrity of systems is crucial. We know the data, we know the numbers, and we know how to use them in decision-making. More open information sharing is one of the cornerstones of data-driven management."
On the banks of the Vuoksi River, technology and data development are done for the success of people. It’s a good foundation for the next hundred years as well.
Want to understand your organization’s current situation and plan the next steps in development? Explore our Situation Analysis and Roadmap service and contact us – let’s build a development plan together.
