Retain expertise even if experts retire

Knowledge and skills are critical resources for the competitiveness of any expert organisation. When an experienced expert retires, the organisation loses something more significant than one person’s contribution. They take with them decades of experience working on and managing projects. How do you transfer skills and tacit knowledge to younger people in time?

Econet solved the challenge with facilitated mentoring

Olli Saruaho, a long-standing design manager, has been with Econet since 2002 when the company was founded. For the last five years, he has also been a pensioner. In theory, as he says. In practice, Saruaho is still actively involved in projects.

The decades of Saruaho’s and other experts Antero Kärki‘s, Eero Meskus‘, and Eero Laakso‘s expertise in water treatment are invaluable to Econet. So the company decided to preserve each bit of it carefully.

Econet enlisted Talement Oy’s help, which had knowledge transfer experience through mentoring. The six-month mentoring process aimed to transform the experience and tacit knowledge of experts into the actors’ understanding through discussion and listening.

– Despite appropriate education, experience plays an essential role in developing a professional in the project sector. Therefore, we felt that mentoring is an excellent method for powering the career path of our young professionals,” says Heikki Viitanen, CEO of Econet.

The actors included project engineer Severi Lintula, engineering trainee Alexander Romanov, project manager Ilkka Niskanen and design engineer Otto Kankaanpää.

Mentors and actors at the joint meeting

A series of ah-ha experiences

Talement’s Harri Lammi acted as “a midwife” of the knowledge transfer, setting up a systematic, planned and goal-oriented approach. At the outset, the parties created a shared vision of the strategic competencies they wanted to remain Econet’s capital. That was followed by decomposing each participant’s strengths and competencies into sub-areas. The actual transfer of competencies took place in mentoring sessions in small groups led by experts, videotaped and carefully recorded.

– For me, the mentoring provided a series of “ah-ha” experiences. There are not many places where you can get such a thorough introduction to your role,” says Severi Lintula, who started at Econet in spring 2021.

Lintula, who has a background in chemistry, has a problem-solving and brainstorming learning style, so it was natural for him to work through new information in his group under Saruaho’s guidance by reviewing previous projects.

– We also worked through issues that were not contemporary at the time. Olli and the other experts knew they would come up sooner or later. And they did. For example, the ion exchange processes became topical in the spring, and we built many tenders directly with new insights,” says Lintula. 

In addition to visible knowledge, the process also took tacit knowledge into account, including personal perceptions, insights, hunches and intuition that the experts have accumulated through experience.

– For example, we talked about how clients react to different situations. This kind of knowledge makes it easier to get things done and helps us respond to problems,” says Lintula.

From left to right: Alexander Romanov, Olli Saruaho and Severi Lintula

There is great wisdom in the master-apprentice setup

At their best, the mentoring sessions allowed younger people’s ideas, perspectives and expertise to emerge and be mutually beneficial. In Saruaho’s experience, both parties learn and gain insights in a mentoring relationship.

– The younger experts asked questions that I had thought were obvious or hadn’t even thought of. So, yes, it was learning both ways and a remarkable experience for all of us, he says.

Alexander Romanov, an engineering trainee who started at Econet in the summer of 2021, finds it helpful that the mentoring process paid attention to each individual’s learning style. He approaches knowledge holistically, and the mentoring allowed him to see projects, clients and operating models from a much broader perspective.

– Now I also know where to find all the information I need. As a result, my confidence has improved, and I’m closer to the point where I can solve challenges that arise in projects without help,” says Romanov.

Saruaho, Romanov, Lintula and all the other participants celebrated the end of the facilitated mentoring process in May. For the time being, the “old beards” will continue to work on projects when needed, and knowledge transfer will continue as a natural process. Hence, the younger experts are fueling themselves with knowledge not found in textbooks.

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