Recent studies say that a well-managed diverse workforce has been suggested as being more productive, innovative and flexible than a homogeneous one and that I agree, I have noticed this in past few years. In the old days when we had only Finnish men in our firm we did okay but nowadays when we have people all over the world working with us, different genders, different cultures and nationalities I can honestly say we have more productive, innovative and flexible workforce and the keys yet to improve are in our hands. I believe that we can make the second leap now because we can see the difference and those impacts.
Disability is part of the human condition, almost all humans will suffer some disability either temporarily or permanently at some point in their lives. It got me thinking that why disabilities have been so difficult subject in working life. We are already taking steps to be better in our business. We have had meetings with our human resources and we have been discussing new kind of ways to do recruiting. Example there are people with disabilities who don’t even know that they could be top employees. We need a big change in Finnish recruiting culture that more people would come out from the shadows and apply for jobs.
We have people from Gambia, Romania, Sweden, Afganistan, Iran, Irak and Finland working in Jot-Rent and it is a wonderful mess. We need to use our heads every day to manage this wonderful family and to get the most of it and to make sure that every single one enjoys their work. We use a lot of time and effort to make everyone feel that they are all equal members in this working life family and we make sure that they understand that everyone has the same rights and opportunities.
FYI I don’t care if my English is good or bad, if you understand what I am saying it is enough. See what I did there.
Jari Riihijärvi
CEO, Jot-Rent
Oulu Chamber of Commerce, Chairman, Raahe region
