A few years ago, we decided to find a leadership development model that would suit the entire company. We have a strong Meconet culture, but everything is also influenced by the culture and history of each individual unit and person. We started the trainings in our Finnish units in 2023, and after the training held in the Tallinn unit in autumn 2024, all managers in our company have now completed the same training program. It has been a pleasure to see that each of us has gained new insights, and the training has been very well received, regardless of nationality or length of leadership experience.
We have recognized that the right kind of leadership is one of the most important prerequisites for employees to succeed in their work. Leadership has a major impact on supporting work ability, which has also come up in our employee satisfaction surveys. In
Blanchard’s SLII model, offered by Educo, we found a leadership model that suits our company, supports leadership both at the daily and strategic level, and strengthens the good leadership practices that already exist within our organization. To support our leadership development, we gained highly professional trainers who have supported our strengths while also challenging us to learn something new in just the right way. Educo’s trainers have helped us develop leadership with a long-term perspective, and I believe we will continue our successful cooperation.
Scalable Tools for All Levels of Leadership
In leadership, continuous dialogue with employees, understanding differences, and adapting one’s leadership style to the situation are essential. The SLII model provides excellent capabilities for this. We learned to understand that each of us needs different kinds of leadership in different situations. We also want employees to learn to express what kind of leadership they hope for, so that managers know how to support each person in exactly the right way. Leadership tools support both the manager’s success and their wellbeing at work.
The training taught us in a practical way how to lead by example and how to build the elements of trust. With the help of the DISC tool, we learned to recognize our own natural ways of working and how different people should be approached. We noticed that the leaders in our company have different strengths, and that all of these strengths are needed. Clear goal setting, or SMART, is something we are constantly reminded of, starting from our strategy work: how to make goals clear, motivating, achievable, relevant, and trackable. SMART also helps clarify goal setting in daily conversations. One of the greatest strengths we saw in Educo’s training was precisely the scalability of the tools across different levels of leadership.
By training the managers of the entire Meconet Group in the same model, we can clarify what we expect from leadership and continue developing leadership systematically. At the same time, we learn more about the culture and strengths of each individual unit. We learn from one another and continue the ongoing improvement of leadership together across managers from different units. Together with Educo, we are aiming for world-class leadership, while remembering that every one of us, including leaders, is human.
Hanna Starck
Competence Director
HR Director
Meconet is a Northern European manufacturer of springs, wire products, stamped products, and deep-drawn products, with roots dating back more than 100 years. Meconet’s manufacturing takes place in four factories, each focused on its own area of expertise. The company’s locations are in Vantaa, Äänekoski, Pihtipudas, and Tallinn.
