Job rotation offers an opportunity to broaden your perspective

In February 2022, development manager Maria Röykkä got the oppor­tunity to step into the shoes of the head of the Hankinta-Suomi (Procurement Finland) operational programme, and she spent the whole of 2023 in that posi­tion at the Minis­try of Finance. The job rota­tion gave Maria the opportunity to experience a very broad scale of new work duties – including the management of networks and projects.

As the head of the programme, Maria worked in the core Hankinta-­Suomi team, which planned the implementation of the programme to achieve the objec­tives of the Government Programme and the National Procure­ment Strategy. The destination was reached by successfully implementing several measures.

Maria was responsible for projects related to the strategic management of procurement and the develop­ment of procurement expertise. For example, she was responsible for the Vaikut­tavat hankinnat (Effective procurement) and Hankinta­tutkijat (Procurement research) networks and was involved in the establishment of the network responsible for the procurement of wellbeing services counties. In her regu­lar job, Maria works on procure­ment develop­ment projects with individual contracting entities. This is very different from the work on program­mes and the management of thema­tic groups.

“I feel that I gained signi­ficantly more understanding of the customers over the two years, as I was able to engage in constant discussions and spar­ring with such a wide variety of contracting entities,” says a delighted Maria.

During her years at Hankinta-Suomi, Maria also had the opportunity to meet future procurement specialists at the Studia career event, and she was involved in the develop­ment of procure­ment marketing materials.

New dimensions to work

At Hankinta-Suomi, the working days inclu­ded a lot of meetings and events of different types. In addition to contrac­ting entities, Maria met representatives of companies bidding for public contracts and procurement researchers. She found the opportunity to broaden her views on procure­ment extremely rewarding despite the fact that she already had around a decade of expe­rience in the field.

Maria’s role was bringing practical procure­ment experience from Hansel to the Hankinta-­Suomi core team. She feels that the job rota­tion developed her expertise, the strategic management of projects and procurement in particular.

“I got to see up close and personal how many contracting enti­ties end up wrestling with the same is­sues. This means that colla­boration across organi­sational borders and dia­logue really pays off: you get to share best solutions and practices,” Maria says.

Maria says that the job rota­tion gave her an interesting opportunity to do a comple­tely different job for a while, to broaden her perspec­tives and to deepen her under­standing of the operating environment. She warmly recommends the experience to anyone who gets the chance. In future, the customers of Hansel’s procurement development services will benefit from Maria’s new in­sights and develop­ment spirit.

 

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