Back

Introduction to The Finnish Workplace Development Programme (1996-2003) An Insider’s View - Paper prepared for Peer Review Workshop, Helsinki, 24-25 September, 2001

Tuomo Alasoini

Labour Market Counsellor
Finnish Ministry of Labour
tuomo.alasoini@mol.fi
www.mol.fi/tyke
September 2001

This is an introductory paper to the Finnish Workplace Development Programme (1996-2003). The purpose of this paper is to provide some basic facts of the programme and to raise selectively some key policy issues concerning the programme to discussion for the Peer Review. The two especially relevant themes throughout this paper are (1) why work organization and workplace innovation are important and (2) why programmatic approach is needed. This paper reflects personal views of the author, who has been working for the programme since 1995 as project manager, and should not be treated as an official policy statement by the programme.

1 The Origin of the Programme and its Framework Conditions

The Finnish Workplace Development Programme (FINWDP) is first of its kind in Finland by its conceptual foundation and scale (i.e. a national initiative in which the focus is on research-supported development of work organization), though there are a lot of examples of other tripartite development activities in working-life issues in this country (for example, in 1993 the Government together with the labour market organizations launched a tripartite National Productivity Programme, which is still running). Launching a programme to develop working life was incorporated in the programme of Prime Minister Lipponen’s Government in 1995, and the proposal for implementing the programme was drawn up by a tripartite working group in autumn 1995. The Economic Council appointed Management Group for the programme in March 1996. The first programme period terminated at the end of 1999, but the new Government of Prime Minister Lipponen which took office in April 1999 made a decision to continue the programme for another four years with increased financial resources.

All the most important stakeholders in Finland seem have a positive view on publicly supported programmes to develop working life. The programme carried out a survey on stakeholders’ views of public support to workplace development in autumn 1998. 211 experts representing management and staff of the workplaces involved in the programme, employer associations, trade unions, R&D institutes, Employment and Economic Development Centres, Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) Inspectorates, and the Committee of Labour and Equality of the Finnish Parliament were questioned. Following issues, among others, were inquired: the most important contemporary focus areas of workplace development, the role played by public support to workplace development in Finland, satisfaction with the current level of public support to workplace development, the need for and the way of implementation of FINWDP, and the need for publicly supported workplace development programmes in the future. 177 answers (84% of the original sample) were received. According to the survey, 92% of the respondents considered that there was a good case for the current programme and 95% that publicly supported programmes are needed also in the future. 75% regarded that the way of implementation of the current programme was ‘very good’ or ‘fairly good’.

The widespread consensus on the need for programmatic development of working life found in Finland seems quite exceptional in international comparison. This can be seen, for example, in an analysis of responses to the European Commission’s Green Paper ‘Partnership for a New Organization of Work’, issued in 1997. In Finland, unlike in many of the other EU Member States, there was hardly any criticism towards its main policy recommendations. In fact, the Finnish evaluations were fairly unanimous and it was difficult to find any fundamental disagreement in them. Most comments pointed out that many of the reforms proposed in the Green Paper had already been in place for some time in Finland and in the other Nordic countries.

There are many possible explanations to the widespread consensus in Finland on this issue:

• In Finnish public policy there prevails a strong emphasis on the role of R&D as a booster of economic growth and as a means to solve social problems. The share of R&D of GNP in Finland increased extensively in the 1990s as a result of conscious governmental policy and reached the level of three per cent in 1999. Finland has also adopted the development of a national innovation system and the concomitant reinforcement of knowledge-intensive growth as one key political objective more seriously than perhaps any other industrial nation. In the proposal for implementing FINWDP by the tripartite working group in 1995 (see above), the programme was conceptually linked to the development of Finnish national innovation system, making it thus easier for policy makers and other stakeholder groups to find rationale for the new programme.

• Tripartite cooperation is a deeply-rooted practice in major issues of social and economic policy in Finland. Even though the main initiative in the case of FINWDP came from the Ministry of Labour, the labour market organizations are involved in all key activities of the programme. Being involved in planning and implementation of government-led initiatives of this kind is the usual practice in Finland for the central labour market organizations.

• There are problems connected with the skewing age structure of the Finnish population, which threatens to become an obstacle to economic development in a few years. These problems include, among all, rapid ageing of the workforce, low average age of retiring (which partly reflects poor work ability, low level of skills and problems with job satisfaction among the ageing workforce as well as a fairly permissive system of retiring), decreasing age groups entering the labour market in the next 10 years with different orientation to work and employment, and increased experience of fatigue at work in many occupational groups. These are problems, of which both the Government and the labour market organizations are very well aware. Programmatic development of working life is viewed by them as one of the means to respond to these problems.

2 Aims, Activities and Strategic Context

The guiding principle of the programme approved by the Management Group is that "FINWDP encourages and supports workplaces to develop into effective work communities, which operate in a network-like way and in which working has a meaning. The foundation for activities of the programme is utilization of research in development and improving knowledge on workplace development".

The key principles of programme design and of the planning and implementation of the activities of the programme can be summarized as follows:

• The programme promotes workplace-initiated projects, which aim at a comprehensive and holistic change in the mode of operation. At best, the focus is on simultaneous development of technologies, leadership, work organization, vocational and professional skills among staff, working conditions and occupational health. The theoretical basis for this is the assumption that successful workplace development calls for approaches aiming at holistic and systematic transformation, which advances simultaneously on a broad front, and ‘internal fit’ between different work, organizational and human resource management (HRM) practices.

• The programme aims at balanced development between effectiveness and the quality of working life (QWL) in workplaces.

• Successful workplace development calls for broad participation on the part of employees. The programme requires that also employees are involved in the planning and implementation of projects carried out within the programme.

• The programme starts out with the assumption that there prevails a close link between organizational innovation and job creation, especially in the case where a workplace follows a strategy of balanced product and process (technological and organizational) innovation (Table 1). Traditional consultancy is often a sufficient means to find solutions to problems, which do not require questioning of the basic norms and assumptions of a workplace, whereas linking research to development shows its power especially in cases where the aim is not to provide solutions to given problems, but where the problems themselves calls for defining. Innovations often call for posing new questions or redefining old ones, i.e. linking research to development creates more favourable conditions for organizational innovation than pure consultancy alone.

• To boost learning on experiences of other workplaces and dissemination of ’good practices’, it makes sense to get a sufficient number (‘critical mass’) of workplaces and researchers involved in the programme and to organize forums for interaction and dialogue between them with a view to creating learning networks. Learning networks encourage workplaces to try out new practices, pave the way for finding innovative solutions and improve possibilities of carrying out projects successfully.

Table 1. Innovation Strategy of an Enterprise and Employment Development.

The main forms of activity during both programme periods have been as follows:

• Supporting project activity in workplaces: FINWDP funds development projects, which meet certain criteria (for more details, see section 5).

• Disseminating knowledge on workplace development: This includes, for example, publications (reports, working papers, bulletins and brochures), seminars and workshops, and information registers (e.g. own Internet homepage with information of funded projects, application instructions, statistics, publications, seminars and seminar papers, outcomes of assessments on projects, ‘good practice’ case studies and a comprehensive register of working-life R&D institutes in Finland). The most important focus groups are workplaces, R&D institutes, consultants, labour market organizations and policy makers.

• Strengthening workplace development infrastructure in Finland: This involves measures that strengthen cooperation between different stakeholders in workplace development. FINWDP supports networking between workplaces by its project activity and by organizing seminars where people (researchers, consultants and practioners) from different projects meet each other. In addition, FINWDP aims at close cooperation especially with other R&D funding institutes and programmes, R&D institutes, labour market organizations, other ministries and their regional organizations (Employment and Economic Development Centres and OHS Inspectorates) and international expert organizations. As to international cooperation, FINWDP represents Finland in the European Work Organization Network EWON, which is an expert network established and coordinated by European Commission’s DG for Employment and Social Affairs. A new form of activity for FINWDP is submitting grants to experts who work for projects funded by the programme and who utilize project material in their Licentiate or Doctoral thesis.

Development of the programme concept can be distinguished as a separate form of activity within the programme. The main instruments for this are assessment studies carried out by the programme.

From a public policy point of view, the basic premises of the programme are in line with an approach, which can be called as conditions-enabling innovation policy. In this approach the legitimacy of public policy intervention is not so much market failure, but weak performance of the market mechanism in terms of innovation in a much broader sense. This point of departure implies that there is a need to adopt a holistic and systemic view on innovation in public policy, which focuses on positive interaction between technological and organizational (and other social) innovations in all sectors of the economy, instead of seeing ‘modernization’ of the economy primarily as the development of new cutting-edge technologies. In this policy framework, work organization development should constitute an integrated and well-established aspect of this new, broadly defined innovation policy.

In more concrete terms, FINWDP aims to contribute to at least three strategically important public policy goals in Finland:

• To enhance workplace performance by developing employees’ skills and competencies and by promoting readiness in the workplaces to adopt new, high-performance work practices (strategic goal: improvement of companies’ competitiveness and employment).

• To promote employees’ opportunities for professional and personal development at work and, thus, to support their work ability and maintenance of their labour market capacity (strategic goal: raising the average age to leave the labour market and preventing exclusion from the labour market).

• To improve the quality of work and working life, with a view to increasing attractiveness of work in the society in general and in ‘bottleneck’ sectors and professions in particular (strategic goal: averting bottlenecks in labour supply and preventing shortage of labour).

3 Organization

The programme has a tripartite Management Group, which is chaired by a representative of the Ministry of Labour. The group consists of 17 members, representing different ministries (5 members), employers’ and entrepreneurs’ associations (5 members), trade unions (3 members) and R&D funding institutes (4 members). The Group meets from four to six times a year.

The Management Group has appointed a tripartite Expert Group, which gives statements of all project applications and prepares agendas for the meetings of the Management Group. The Group is headed by a representative of the Ministry of Labour, and it consists of 10 other members. The group meets from six to eight times a year.

Daily operations are run by a 8-member Project Team in the Ministry of Labour. The Team negotiates with the workplaces, R&D institutes and consultants (and in some cases also with other R&D funding institutes) about applications, gives advice to the applicants concerning contents and practical details of their applications, prepares agendas for the meetings of the Expert and Management Groups, monitors ongoing projects, holds information registers, arranges seminars, takes care of publication activity, keeps contact to all relevant stakeholders, etc.

FINWDP has also a network of regional contact persons in all 15 Employment and Economic Development Centres and 11 OHS Inspectorates. The aim is that they give statements of applications to the programme from their own region, provide technical help to workplaces in issues related to applications and disseminate information of the programme to workplaces in their own region. The Project Team invites the regional contact persons to joint meetings once or twice a year, and meets them occasionally during project visits to workplaces. In practice, most Economic and Employment Development and about one half of the OHS Inspectorates work actively for the programme in terms of giving statements of applications on a regular basis.

4 Financing

Total budget of the programme in the first period from 1996 to 1999 was FIM 94.9 million (EUR 16 million), of which FIM 30 million (EUR 5 million) was earmarked for special network projects. In line with the programme of the second Government of Prime Minister Lipponen, the budget of FINWDP increased for the year of 2000 to FIM 36 million (EUR 6 million) and for the year of 2001 to FIM 46 million (nearly EUR 8 million). The budget for the year of 2002 will probably stay at the same level. The programme has an own line item in the State budget. The share of project grants of the total budget is some 80-85%. The remaining 15-20% includes salaries, equipment, rents, seminars, publications, evaluation studies, etc.

Programme funding covers only part of the costs of individual projects, in normal cases half of the computed costs of the project at most. In the case of SMEs and small local authorities, the maximum covered by the programme is 70 %. On average, programme funding covers about one third of computed costs of the project.

5 Modes of Project Activity

The programme’s main form of activity is to provide expert support to workplaces based on their applications submitted to the programme. Expert support is used mainly for funding the use of experts (researchers, consultants and in some cases also internal coaches) in the projects. Expert support can be granted for three kinds of project (the information on them below refers to the new programme period):

• Basic analyses are brief analyses, which workplaces can use in specifying their development needs with an eye to a larger project. Expert support can be given to basic analyses on three alternative premises: (a) the basic analyses focuses on an SME (or a small local authority or third sector organization), (b) the forthcoming larger project has high innovation potential, or (c) preliminary work is needed for creating a network of workplaces for a joint project. The maximum level of expert support is FIM 50,000 (EUR 8,000).

• Development projects are intended to promote changes in modes of operation in workplaces with a view to bringing about improvements in effectiveness and QWL. Development projects must concentrate on one of the following focus areas: (a) promoting learning-supporting forms of work organization (especially work based on teams, networks and innovative use of ICT), (b) developing human resource management (especially with a view to employee/management cooperation and local negotiation and bargaining systems), (c) improving functioning of work communities (especially from the point of view of ageing workforce) and (d) promoting equal opportunities work communities. The maximum level of expert support is FIM 600,000 (EUR 100,000).

• Network projects are joint undertakings by several companies committed to mutual development effort with a view to creating and testing organizational innovations and having a high potential for job creation. No formal upper limit is placed on the absolute figure for expert support. Many of the network projects receive funding from other external sources as well (e.g. Technology Development Agency Tekes, Work Environment Fund, European Social Fund, other ministries)

6 Project Applications

From January 1996 to September 2001, the programme received nearly 900 applications for projects (i.e. basic analyses, development projects and network projects in total), of which 436 are approved. Applications can be submitted to the programme on a continuous basis. At the end of the first programme period there was, however, a temporary 18-month long phase when the programme did not take any new applications.

7 Projects by Economic Sector

The approved projects are allocated so far a total of FIM 132 million (EUR 22 million). In terms of funding allocations, the largest sectoral groupings are industry and construction, followed by the local authorities. The leading individual sectors are metal and engineering, and welfare and health care (Table 2).

Table 2. Projects by Economic Sector, 1996-2001.

8 Workplaces Involved by Region

The projects involve about 1,000 workplaces. By far the largest regional concentration is in the area of Uusimaa Employment and Economic Development Centre (nearly 30%), followed by Pirkanmaa, Häme and North Ostrobothnia (8-9% each). The distribution corresponds quite well with the regional distribution of workforce by region.

9 Workforce Involved

During the first programme period, an estimated 45,000 people took part in the projects. The goal set in the State budget is that the number of workforce during the second programme period will be 80,000 in total. So far, about 45,000 people have been involved in projects launched in 2000 and 2001. It is quite possible that the programme will reach the budget target by the end of 2003. The total number of 90,000 people involved in the projects from 1996 to September 2001 is about 2% of the Finnish workforce.

The share of women among the participants is about 50%. In projects in the municipal sector, women constitute a great majority of all participants (about 80%), whereas in industry and construction their share is rather low (about 20%). This reflects the clear-cut, gender-based division of labour in Finnish working life at large.

10 Projects by Targets

During the first programme period the most common targets of development projects included learning at work (97%), organization of work (96%), social relations (84%), internal networking (80%), customer service (62%) and personnel management (60%).

For the second programme period the system of grouping the targets was changed in many ways, so that these two periods can not be compared as such. In the new system of grouping the targets, the seven most common goals in projects which started in 2000 (N=77) were as follows (Table 3).

Table 3. Projects by Targets, Year 2000 

11 Evaluation Studies Launched by the Programme

With the exception of the survey on stakeholders’ views of public support to workplace development (see section 1 above), the programme has not so far carried out any programme-level evaluation studies. In spring 2001 Management Group made a decision to carry out such a study the following year. Several evaluation studies where the focus is on the effects, the success and the way of implementation of the projects, however, have been completed. The following gives a brief overview on the main aspects of these studies:

1. Self-assessment by project representatives

• When a development project ends, management, staff and project experts submit independently their opinions on the effects of the project, the way of implementation of the project, the success of the project and the added value of programme support for project implementation.

• Project Team sends the questionnaires to the projects and gathers the answers.

• Distributions of self-assessments are monitored and reported to stakeholders by the Project Team on a real-time basis (i.e. they are available for the public in the Internet homepage of the programme).

• A Finnish report, which consisted of an analysis of 502 responses from 204 projects (response rate 82%) carried out during the first programme period, was published in 2001.

2. Analysis of team projects

   • Research group of the Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership at the Helsinki University of Technology gathered data on changes in effectiveness and QWL, effects of different ways of implementation to effectiveness and QWL, and innovations and ‘good practices’ found in development projects which included introduction or further development of temworking as one of their major goals.

   • The sample comprised 59 completed projects from the first programme period, and the main research methods included questionnaires, interviews, and an analysis of final reports, implementation plans and self-assessments of the projects.

   • A Finnish report with statistical data on 59 projects, six case studies and comparisons with data on the EPOC project by the European Foundation for Living and Working Conditions was published in 2000.

3. Analysis of critical success factors in development projects

   • Research group of the TAI Research Centre at the Helsinki University of Technology examined 19 FINWDP-funded development projects of the first programme period, which were carried out in companies. The goal of the study was to determine how the projects concerned success, what were the strong and weak areas of the projects, and what factors made some projects more successful than others.

   • The main methods used were questionnaires and interviews

   • Results of the study were published as an article in the Programme Yearbook of 1999.

4. Quality Group’s assessment of network projects

   • Four experts with different scientific background monitored and assessed network projects launched during the first programme period (N=13) with an eye to approaches and development methods adopted in the projects, the quality of work of the experts involved and the project results in terms of their scientific value and social significance. The original idea was to have six experts, but two of them had to withdraw during the monitoring and evaluation process.

   • The main methods used were analysis of project documents, workshops, visits to workplaces and participation in project steering group meetings.

   • The main conclusions of the Quality Group on the projects are included in their final report in Finnish in 2000. Most projects continued to the second programme period, so that the Quality Group could not draw firm conclusions on the outcomes.

5. Assessment study on network projects (I)

• FINWDP together with the Ministry of Trade Industry launched an assessment study on network projects, which supplemented the work done by the Quality Group. The idea was to examine establishment of enterprise networks from the point of view of technology policy.

• The study was carried out by researchers from the Work Research Centre at the University of Tampere and the Technical Research Centre of Finland, and it included case studies of all 13 network projects with assessment of their background, aims and ideas, implementation, and outcomes and experiences.

• The main methods used were analysis of project documents, visits to workplaces, questionnaires and interviews.

• Results of the study were published in a Finnish report in 2001.

6. Assessment study of network projects (II)

   • In another assessment study based on preliminary work done by the Quality Group, researchers of the University of Vaasa examined the goals, expectations and experienced outcomes of the network projects from the point of view of different stakeholders of the projects (i.e. company representatives involved, external experts in the projects, representatives of the programme and the Quality Group).

   • The goals, expectations and experienced outcomes were divided into four categories: learning in the network, learning as a network, development of the enterprises and direct effects on enterprise performance.

   • The main methods used were analysis of project documents and questionnaires.

   • The study has produced a manuscript, which includes the main results.

7. Middle-range outcomes of development projects

   • FNWDP will carry out an assessment study on middle-range outcomes of development projects carried out during the first programme period. ‘Middle range’ here means a time period from two to four years.

   • The study will focus on the effects of projects on effectiveness, QWL, modes of operation and employment, on the one hand, and on their effects on further development activity launched in the workplaces involved.

   • The study, which will be carried out in 2002, uses questionnaires and/or interviews as the main methods, and it will focus on from 50 to 100 biggest development projects completed during the first programme period.

12 The Role of Research in the Programme

According to the proposal of a tripartite expert group to the Ministry of Labour (1995), FINWDP is a research-supported programme, but linking research to development is not an absolute criterion for an individual project. The proposal stated that a crucial challenge for the programme is to encourage development activities also in such workplaces which neither have enough resources themselves nor previous experience in research-supported development. Particularly many SMEs and small local authorities were considered to be like this, and, therefore, it was decided that there should be room also for projects applying pure process consulting. The programme also made a decision that the entry of SMEs and small local authorities should be promoted by having the size of the company and the local authority as a criterion of the share of the programme support contributed for the project.

The decision to accept both research-supported and pure process-consulting projects reflects an important strategic choice by the programme, namely that the value added by programmatic approach is not so much in bringing theory (research) and practice (development) closer to each other as such, but to boost building of learning networks between all relevant stakeholders. A similar argument is put neatly by Gustavsen who states that "The impact of each specific programme on the level of each participating enterprise seldom exceeds impacts that could have been achieved in several other ways, such as by the use purely of consultants or by internal improvement projects. The point about working together in a development programme with a broader range of actors has to do with many other things, such as creating new lines of connectedness, learning to work together across organizational boundaries – particularly public-private ones – and the creation of legitimacy. From a short term efficiency point of view we hardly need programmes; from a long term development perspective we can not do without them (or similar social arrangements, whatever we like to call them)."

The projects during the first programme period (N=284) can be roughly distributed by the role of external experts as follows:

• 20 % basic analyses of development needs and potential of workplaces involved

• 55 % process consulting, including development activities

• 25 % research-supported workplace development

During the second programme period (N=152) the distribution has been roughly as follows:

• 10 % basic analyses of development needs and potential of workplaces involved

• 55 % process consulting, including development activities

• 35 % research-supported workplace development

The share of basic analyses has declined, and the share of research-supported projects has risen, accordingly. Research-supported development in this case is defined so that a project must come up to at least one of the following three criteria:

• The goal of a project is explicitly also to create models, methods or tools which have application in a broader range of workplaces.

• A project regards itself as action research.

• A project is supported by scientific assessment during its implementation.

The three main approaches of research-supported development applied in the projects are as follows:

• Developmental work research, an approach developed in Finland since the 1980s, has its theoretical foundations in cultural-historical activity theory, and the leading institute is the Center for Activity Theory and Developmental Work Research at the University of Helsinki. FINWDP has funded several projects, which have applied and further developed models of ‘change laboratory’ (e.g. Finnish Post), ‘boundary crossing laboratory’ (e.g. Helsinki University Central Hospital) and ‘competence laboratory’ (e.g. telecom corporation Elisa Communications). Another theoretically interesting conceptual innovation developed by this approach with the help of FINWDP-funded projects is the idea of ‘knotworking’, i.e. a new form of flexible teamworking in rapidly changing, networked organizational structures (e.g. two small metalworking companies).

• Experimental development research is an approach, influenced by action research, developmental work research and the grounded theory approach. Industrial Automation Unit at the Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT), which is the leading institute in this area, has applied this approach in several projects, mainly in the manufacturing industries (and in SMEs in the metalworking industry, in particular). Conceptual innovations created or further developed in FINWDP-funded projects include the models of a ‘network cell’, a ‘network factory’, ‘workpairs’ and ‘multilateral network cooperation between industrial SMEs’. The main emphasis in this approach is now on partnership structures between companies and strategic enterprise networks.

• Participatory action research is a general term, which covers many approaches with somewhat different theoretical premises. The most influental of them in Finland has been Scandinavian, process-oriented approach based on the idea of ‘democratic dialogue’ and ‘work conferences’ Finnish applications have put more emphasis than the original approach, which was developed in the Swedish LOM programme in the late 1980s, on active role of the researcher or consultant, not purely in supporting the process, but also in providing actual design solutions. Most FINWDP-funded projects have been carried out in the municipal sector. Researchers and consultants working in this field have established a ‘Quality Network’, which consists of members from universities (e.g. Work Research Centre at the University of Tampere and the Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership at the Helsinki University of Technology) as well as from the labour market organizations in the municipal sector.

13 The Programme in a National R&D Context

The Ministry of Labour has a small R&D budget compared with many other ministries. In 2001, appropriations for R&D in the Ministry’s budget are FIM 65 million (EUR 11 million), of which FINWDP accounts for FIM 46 million, i.e. 70%. The remaining 30% is targeted to the ‘Well-Being at Work’ Programme (2000-03), the National Productivity Programme (1993-2003) and labour policy research. The real change of appropriations, however, has been more favourable in the case of the Ministry of Labour than in any other ministry in Finland (the Ministry of Labour is the only ministry where real change has been positive in every year since 1994).

Decision-making over R&D appropriations is in the Ministry, and in labour administration on the whole there are no separate research insitutes. So, the Ministry both funds R&D and runs programmes, such as FINWDP. Research and research-supported development of work organizations is mainly carried out in universities (governed by the Ministry of Education) and separate research institutes, such as the Technical Research Institute of Finland or VTT (governed by the Ministry of Trade and Industry), the Institute of Occupational Health (governed by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health) and the National Research and Development Centre of Welfare and Health or Stakes (ditto).

14 Network and Infrastructure Building in the Programme

Network building is a major goal in the programme from two angles, in particular: it adds value to a project itself and it helps disseminate project results and experiences (see section 2 above).

Firstly, (workplace) innovations must not be examined as completed, physical products but as dynamic processes. The effectiveness of such a process is vitally dependent on how well it generates dialogue between different viewpoints and areas of competence. Therefore, the programme encourages network building at project level. The network projects, for example, must involve a network of companies. In addition, networking is a supplementary criterion for ‘ordinary’ development projects as well. There are dozens of examples of different kinds of networks at project level.

Secondly, network building is important for the sake of disseminating information on project results and experiences. The programme encourages network building by arranging seminars and workshops for the projects. Some of these seminars focus on specific themes, some on specific branches and some on specific regions. For example, at the beginning of 2001 the programme launched a new series of seminars under a title of ‘Let’s Learn Together’. The two-year long process consists of eight seminars, each with a specific theme and with ongoing case studies and development methods applied in them under discussion. The idea is to split participants into small groups with a view to boosting interaction and dialogue between them. Most participants are researchers, consultants and other people working actively in the projects.

Regional networks as such have not been a major target of the programme. This may partly be seen as a shortcoming of the programme concept itself (this is the first national workplace development programme of this kind in Finland), partly as a shortcoming of the Finnish workplace development infrastructure in general. Working-life R&D units are very unevenly located in Finland. FINWDP carried out a survey, which consists of basic data on 123 working-life R&D units in Finland (consultancy companies were excluded from this material). According to the survey, about 1,700 experts in these units are involved in R&D in working life. 40% of the experts are located in the Uusimaa region (around the Helsinki metropolitan area), and there is very few R&D staff in the east and north of the country, in particular. Finland lacks both expertise and institutional coordination of workplace development at regional level.

An interesting new development is the setting of 15 Employment and Economic Development Centres, which started operating in September 1997. They brought together the former Labour Districts, the Regional Business Service Offices of the Ministry of Trade and Industry, the regional units of Technology Development Agency Tekes, and the regional districts of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. Their task, among others, is to support development of regions based on their own strengths and competencies by promoting entrepreneurship and business activity, and development of workforce and labour market. The programme has a contact person in every Centre (see section 3 above). The aim during the second programme period is to strengthen the role of the Centres in the programme so that they encourage workplaces to start development efforts and create better links between workplaces and different support institutes in workplace development.

Under the umbrella of the programme there are also examples of projects, which have a potential to build up development infrastructure at local and regional level as well. As follows, there are short descriptions of four of such projects:

1) The Lohja Environmental Cluster (1999-2002): This cluster is a local consortium of some 20 companies, the Lohja Hospital Area and the City of Lohja (located in Western Uusimaa in southern Finland), which aims at creating cooperative culture in environmental issues between the companies, the local authorities and the inhabitants. The cluster focuses on finding joint solutions and operating models to reduce industrial waste, for example, in materials acquisition, the use of energy, and the manufacture, transport, distribution, use and recycling of products. Many of the companies involved represent cutting-edge Finnish know-how in different branches of industry. Exchange of information within the cluster and environmental audits in companies open up improved opportunities for the participants to manage environmental issues in a more systematic way. Close cooperation in environmental issues between the companies may pave the way for closer cooperation between them also in other issues.

The trigger for the establishment of the cluster was a local competitive ability analysis, which showed that good management of environmental issues is an increasingly important factor for the companies and the municipalities. The cluster was founded in 1998, originally as a joint initiative by 12 companies and local authorities, but it has expanded ever since. The idea has been to build an open and expansive learning network. Today, the cluster has firmly established rules for decision-making, financing, implementation of sub-projects and information, and a formal organization with dedicated ‘clubs’. The ‘clubs’ consist of people from different companies working in corresponding tasks, such as logistics, materials acquisition, information, etc. The project is coordinated by the Länsi-Uusimaa Institute for Continuing Education at the University of Helsinki. Several other expert organizations are involved in the project through sub-projects. The idea is that the cluster would continue as a permanent learning network after 2002 when the project funding by FINWDP and the City of Lohja ends.

2) Service Network for Wood-Processing Industry in Varkaus (1998-2000): Varenso is a subsidiary of a big Finnish-Swedish manufacturer of paper and wood products, the Stora Enso Group. Varenso provides services in energy production, industrial maintenance, logistics, protection and administration to the Group’s mills in Varkaus (a middle-sized industrial town in Northern Savo), which employ 1,500 people (indirectly even 3,000 people in the region). The vision of Varenso is to provide a service concept, which is superior in competitiveness and quality to the clients’ production plants in Varkaus, and in the longer-term also in a broader geographical area. The company launched a Network E project with a view to improving its competitiveness in the production of services by switching over to a new model in which the company focuses on its core competence and acquires all other activities from other local service producers (most of them are local SMEs) on partnership basis. The aim was that in the longer term 60 new jobs would be created and 250 already existing jobs would be secured.

Building of the local partner network started by selecting, out of 100 candidates, 22 local companies, all of which went through an extensive training and development process. 150 persons from the partner companies took part in training that focused on networking, processes, occupational safety, environmental systems, equipment, and customer service and quality. Four development groups, which consisted of representatives of Varenso, the partner companies and the clients (paper mill, sawmill, etc.), focused on creating rules for the network, joint time scheduling, and systems of reporting and information. In February 2000, Varenso, its partners and the coordinator of the project, the Mid-Savo Development Company, solemnly signed the ‘Rules for Continuous Development’, a kind of a ‘constitution’ for steering the operation and development of the network for the future. The development project was managed by utilizing the ‘development cycle method’ of the Industrial Automation Unit of the Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT), in which a development project is viewed as a phased cycle, which proceeds from analysis, to planning and experimenting of the model and finally to its consolidation. It was quite obvious that carrying out a large-scale development project in a complex network calls for a systematic way to proceed, developed development methods and a separate development organization.

3) The VAVE Network (1998-2001): The VAVE Network is a consortium consisting of the Tampere Works of Sandvik Tamrock, which is a globally-operating manufacturer of rock drilling equipment, and its eight suppliers (two system suppliers, two part-suppliers and three service companies). The aim of the network is to improve the competitiveness of the network on the whole by increasing cost efficiency, by shortening product throughput times and by improving delivery accuracy. VAVE is an acronym for ‘Value Analysis – Value Engineering’, a method developed originally in the automobile industry for continuous improvement and cost-efficient product development. The method is based on building of continuous improvement programmes for each of the suppliers and providing them a comprehensive training programme. The VAVE Network has applied this method by enlarging the original idea of bilateral cooperation between the principal and its supplier to multilateral cooperation between several companies of the network.

As such, the VAVE Network is a unique means for the smaller supplier companies to achieve knowledge on world-class methods and tools. The actual development activities take place in groups of companies, focusing on determined development issues, such as purchasing of paints, cost calculations, electronic transmission of information between the companies, cooperation in product development, etc. Development projects have been backed by a training programme in the supplier companies, based on skills mapping and skills improvement plans of the staff. The companies in the VAVE Network have agreed on a vision, strategy and organization for the network. For instance, Sandvik Tamrock has established an own VAVE team and there is a full-time VAVE coordinator in every supplier company. The aim is that the development method created in this project could be applied to development of other supplier networks as well.

4) Tel Lapland (1998-2002): Lapland is the northermost part of Finland with a sparse population and long distances. The Ministry of Health and Social Affairs together with FINWDP, regional research, development and educational institutes (Work Science Laboratory at the University of Oulu and Telemedicine Development Centre of Oulutech), and health care officials launched in 1998 a project to build up the first comprehensive telemedicine system in Finland between the Oulu University Central Hospital, the Lapland Central Hospital and the Sodankylä Health Care Centre (in Mid-Lapland). Telemedicine means examining, monitoring and caring a patient with the help of advanced information and telecommunications technology. Telemedicine helps improve the quality of health care, utilize medical expertise more effectively and bring about reductions of costs especially in sparsely-populated areas. The system in question consists of seven subsystems: video training and consulting, radiology, first care, oftalmology, ultrasound and transmission of digital EKG.

It was obvious from the very beginning that focusing on solving technical problems alone would not make the system work in an optimal way. Therefore, an analysis of the introduction and the usability of the subsystems and equipment was attached to the project. The development and training parts of the project were supplemented by research, which provided feedback information from patients and employees on impacts of alternative solutions on the quality of care, the effectiveness of work, work environment, ergonomics and employee well-being. This information was intended to serve also the manufacturers of systems and equipment. Building the telemedicine system was implemented system by system. Staff training and analysis of the introduction and usability was implented system-wise, accordingly. Based on the information gained in the pilot project in Sodankylä Health Care Centre, a further research-supported project was launched in 2000 to expand the system to cover all 16 health care centres in Lapland by the end of 2002. The project also produces a support method for building a telemedicine system, which can be utilized as a consulting tool for new projects.

15 Some Concluding Observations of Finnish Programme Strategy

• The Government (Ministry of Labour) has played the role of initiator and coordinator of programmatic workplace development. The prominent role by the Ministry means that FINWDP enjoys high-level political support. This serves to reinforce its legitimacy and visibility and to safeguard its resources for the entire programme period. The problem is that funding is highly dependent on political trends, that the duration of the programme is short (it is tied to the Government’s term of office, which in Finland is four years in maximum) and that long-term strategic planning is therefore difficult. The prominent role of central government may also reduce the drive for innovation in formulating programme concepts.

• The social partners are closely involved and there has been no major disagreement on the need, aims or content of the programme. There is a lot of both formal and informal interaction between the Ministry and the social partners daily on all issues concerning labour policy (probably more than in most EU countries).

• R&D institutes have not been active in making proposals concerning the programme strategy. There is, however, close interaction between the programme and some of the leading R&D institutes (Center for Activity Theory and Developmental Work Research of the University of Helsinki, Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership of the Helsinki University of Technology, Industrial Automation Unit of the Technical Research Centre of Finland, Work Research Centre of the University of Tampere, etc.) at project level. For example, the programme supports method development and qualification development of the R&D staff through projects in close cooperation with the institutes. Strengthening knowledge in workplace development issues in R&D institutes is one of the major challenges for the future. Finding skilled experts to help workplaces in their developmental problems may become a bottleneck in increasing the volume of workplace development.

• Cooperation both at programme and project level between technology and workplace development policy does not yet have a solid basis in Finland. This is partly due to institutional separation of decision-making in these two domains of public policy, and partly due to lack of programmatic approach to workplace development and its scarce financial resources before the mid-1990s. Generally speaking, there are no big institutional or other hindrances for strengthening cooperation between technology and workplace development policy for the future.

• Workplace development lacks institutional base at regional level in Finland. It is located in a ‘grey’ area between the spheres of action of different regional institutions, such as business support, technology development, labour market policy, OHS, educational, research and general regional development agencies. This is a major challenge with a view to creating ‘critical masses’ and to mainstreaming ‘good practices’.

• There is a deeply-rooted practice of close employee/management cooperation in work organization development issues in many workplaces, but there is also great variation between single workplaces and branches of industry. The general atmosphere for cooperative action seems to be favourable especially in the metal and engineering industry and in some parts of the municipal sector, in terms of applications to the programme. The share of companies in the new, dynamic, rapidly expanding sectors of the economy (the ‘new economy’), on the other, has been rather poor in the programme so far. There is the danger that in focusing on traditional sectors the programme may see the main problems of workplace development too much from the perspective of the old structures of workplaces and jobs, leaving them little to contribute to the new, emerging structures.

• The Finnish programme leaves a lot of leeway for workplaces to determine the goals and methods applied in the projects (within the limits of project criteria, of course). Though the projects should be planned and implemented in close cooperation between management and staff, the applications in many cases reflect more the interest of management than that of the staff (the reason for is that there are different groups of employees which may have divergent interests or the staff does not have explicit aims concerning ‘production issues’). It seems that compared to Sweden there is less employee initiative in the development of work organizations in Finland.

• The goals and approach of the programme are still poorly understood and the programme itself is poorly known among the general public. It is quite clear that three is a lot of work to be done to raise awareness on the importance of workplace development in Finland.