Vaasan would not be Vaasan without the people who develop the products, procure the ingredients, bake them into breads and sell the breads to customers. Everyone is important. A well-being and diverse personnel is a prerequisite for our success, which is why we invest in the well-being and safety of our personnel, the nurturing of our culture and the development of competence.
Occupational safety and well-being
In terms of health and well-being, our goal is clear: we want every Vaasan resident to leave work at the end of the day at least as fit as when they arrived at work and feel good overall. Our starting point is to provide employees with a safe working environment, which aims to prevent the occurrence of occupational accidents and diseases and to ensure a good working day. In our Health and Safety program, the goal is zero accidents at work.
Prevention is the basis of occupational safety
In Vaasan, we are implementing Lantmännen Unibake's strategic Health and Safety programme, in which we develop a health and safety culture and raise the processes that support them to an excellent level by 2030. The program includes training and many tools for creating a safe working environment. One example of the tools is the 7 safety rules, the implementation of which we are constantly strengthening in the everyday life of bakeries. The people of Vaasan also actively take care of the safety of their colleagues by making safety observations and near miss reports of various risks and dangerous situations.
Vaasan utilizes an early support model that promotes coping at work and helps to detect signs of a decline in work ability as early as possible. In early support discussions, operating models are sought together with the employee to secure work ability.
Vaasan is a place to enjoy
On average, our careers are long and diverse, which indicates that people enjoy themselves and work is meaningful. Vaasan has a straightforward and open work culture, which we are particularly proud of. The results of the latest employee survey also support the experience of good everyday work: the job satisfaction and motivation index was 75/100 – the result is in the best quarter compared to the industry's peers.
Supporting comprehensive well-being
Keeping pace with changes in society and work is a challenge, which is why supporting comprehensive well-being is more important than ever. At Vaasan, we proactively strive to improve ergonomics and physical conditions and encourage our employees to take care of their well-being by offering well-being and exercise benefits. In addition, employees have the opportunity to use mental well-being support services as part of occupational health care and to undergo personal health check-ups.
Promoting equality and inclusion
We want to offer our employees a work community where everyone has the same opportunities and where every employee receives support to succeed in their work, regardless of their background.
In a changing, internationalizing world, where both employees and customers are becoming more diverse, we want to pay special attention to how we encounter each other and how we can take people's different backgrounds and life situations into account so that no one feels like an outsider in the work community. We are all equal regardless of age, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, religion, disability or other personal circumstances. There is zero tolerance for discrimination and harassment, and the experience of equality is charted in personnel surveys.
To promote a diverse and equal work community, we strive to ensure equal gender representation and equal pay for the same tasks, as well as to form diverse teams. In addition, we encourage the sharing of knowledge between different generations.
Multi-generational experts
To ensure the long-term success of our business, we ensure that we have experts at different stages of their careers. Attracting and retaining future talent is just as important to us as retaining more experienced employees.
We want Vaasan to be an interesting and competitive workplace for both current employees and future generations. We actively build and maintain partnerships with educational institutions and offer young people thesis and internship opportunities. In addition, Lantmännen and Lantmännen Unibake have their own Graduate programmes for recent graduates.
We are looking for ways to engage our employees who are approaching retirement age to get them to stay with us a little longer. We offer flexibility and different working time and task models where possible. Personal discussions between the employee and the supervisor are important in order to agree on suitable engagement models.
Competence development
We believe that as our employees grow and develop, our business also grows and becomes stronger.
The development of our personnel's competence is a strategically important area for us, and development needs are mapped out in regular supervisor-subordinate discussions. We encourage our employees to learn new things and share their knowledge and learnings with each other. We train our employees for new tasks and encourage job rotation both in Vaasan and in the different divisions of the Lantmännen Group.
All employees regularly undergo training for Lantmännen and Lantmännen Unibake in accordance with their role, for example in occupational safety, ethical principles, information security, responsibility and compliance with law and regulations. Depending on their role, employees also have the opportunity to participate in many of the Group's internal trainings, for example, on project management, the use of artificial intelligence or baking technology.
Good managerial skills play a key role in the performance of the personnel and in ensuring well-being and well-being. That is why we train and support supervisors and team leaders. In the latest personnel survey, the leadership index, which measures managerial work, was at a good level (81/100). Our employees are also offered training to support self-management.