Here at Valamis, we slowly began to see each other in-person again in 2021. The year brought back collaborating with co-workers in the office again, in-person industry events, travelling and fun celebrations. The Valamis team continued to grow this year and we learned to overcome challenges together. Without further ado, let’s take a look back at what 2021 looked like for Valamis.
Valamis’ Continuous Growth and Performance Recognized by the 2021 Fosway 9-Grids™:
“I’ve gotten to know Valamis and I’ve been really impressed with the company’s strategic focus on the entire solution, its ability to provide consulting and the end-to-end platform that Valamis has built.”
– Josh Bersin in the webinar “How to Build an End-to-End Learning Ecosystem for Today’s Workforce”
This was an exciting year for our growing team as Valamis announced the acquisition of The Working Manager (TWM), a leader in organisational performance and career mobility technology. Valamis and TWM joined together and unified technologies and in-house consulting services to offer businesses an end-to-end employee experience that helps employees develop and find career opportunities.
“The Working Manager’s technology, proven record of customer satisfaction, and most importantly their people, are a complete fit with Valamis’ longstanding values. With TWM’s internal career development platform, LMS, and LXP, we will enhance our current learning solutions for our customers and future customers. Together, our technology, partnership approach, and authenticity will give the market a solution that puts people first and helps customers every step of the way succeed with their business initiatives.”
– Jussi Hurskainen, CEO, Valamis.
The Working Manager Team
“The LPI and, in particular, Gary Cookson has been very clear on the gaps that existed in TWM’s (Valamis UK’s) performance to achieve the Gold Standard 2 years ago. By making changes and improving key areas across the company enabled the Gold level to be achieved. Our customers and partners know that we work to the highest standards in the industry and to reach this level again for the second year in succession is a testament to the whole team.”
– Phil Purver, Valamis Country Manager for UK & Ireland (former CEO of TWM)
Valamis announced this year an integration with Udemy Business, a curated enterprise learning platform powered by Udemy, a leading destination for learning and teaching online. The partnership has been able to provide Valamis’ customers with over 6,000 courses in English and an extensive collection of courses across eleven other languages. Organisations can now curate learning paths composed of Udemy Business courses, custom courses, and web links within Valamis’ end-to-end learning solution.
1000 bottles of Valamis beer “Time” were brewed. Time is a citrusy, hoppy Indian Pale Lager, and is the 8th Valamis beer ever produced.
The beer label was designed by our Marketing Specialist (Benelux) Kulvinder Singh.
When you take care of your mental health, you feel good about what’s happening in your life, and you feel a sense of connection to others around you. During Mental Health Awareness month, Valamisians had the opportunity to participate in our wellbeing challenge where they completed small tasks for three weeks, from taking meditation breaks to getting outside for a nature walk.
Every month, we celebrate our Nestors – the Valamisians who have been at the company for 3 or more years. They are the walking databases that know the company inside out! In 2021 we celebrated 38 Nestors who had 3, 5 or 10 years of working history with Valamis:
The Valamis team has traditionally participated in the Finnish bicycling challenge Kilometrikisa, which helps collect money for charity. This year, Valamisians did a fantastic job and bicycled more kilometers than any previous year!
The Valamis team had 35 members and during the time period of May 1st to September 22nd, and they:
Valamis CHRO Maria Vihtkari summarised the year 2021 for us:
“2021 was (again) a year of changes. We focused our leadership on change and empathy, while in the middle of ongoing changes in the business environment with the pandemic and unprecedented risks. We learned to transform and overcome challenges with a focus on resilience, wellbeing, and leadership.
During the year 2021, we focused to strengthen employees´ wellbeing with different actions. According to the 2021 Employee Wellbeing Survey, 88% of our employees agree some level to the statement “Employee wellbeing is fully supported in our company”. We were able to bring face-to-face meetings back and strengthen our sense of community. During the year, we also made learning easier and more available for every employee with a LinkedIn Learning integration to our own Valamis LXP. We believe that when employees are financially invested, they want to work. When employees are emotionally invested, they want to contribute.”
– Maria Vihtkari, Chief Human Resources Officer
“We have a really exciting roadmap set for 2022. What is most interesting for me personally is that we are going to further increase the intelligence of our platform and utilize machine learning more broadly in our end-to-end capabilities. We have also set up ambitious goals for growth, which we are going to be busy fulfilling throughout the year. “
– Jari Järvelä, Chief Visionary Officer
*It is with deep regret that, since publication, Valamis has now closed the Petrozavodsk office due to the ongoing war in Ukraine.