Reetta Kaila, Bluefors
“The career of an engineer, doctor, lawyer, or handicraftsman is not a gender issue, what counts and drives is your own motivation and curiosity for continuous learning.”
What have you studied and what influenced this choice back in the day?
I have studied Industrial Chemistry at Aalto, with minors in Bioprocess Engineering and Plant Design - and Energy & Environmental Protection which was my minor during the post-graduate studies.
After high school I had planned on becoming a doctor, but my intuition was pushing me towards Aalto - that time TKK, to become an engineer. In chemical and bioprocess engineering I saw the chance to combine my engineering mindset with my curiosity towards natural science. Yet, I didn't have any vision of my dream job.
How did you become a director?
Currently I'm in between two jobs, starting in a new company, Bluefors, in the beginning of August as Director in Global Technical Sales and New Products. Having worked with decarbonization for 20+ years, I've been turning ideas into green technology and bringing new technology to the markets in various industrial sectors from oil & gas to transportation, energy production and heavy industry. In these fields I've been working in various business functions and roles from innovation and research, technology, and business development to global sales. With such experience I have gained a strong understanding of market drivers and a systematic approach for new product introduction, where market needs are converted to technology road maps. Summarizing it up, the new position allows me to combine my gained knowhow, lessons learned and best practices with my passion to innovations in technology.
What is the best thing about your job?
When seeking for my next job, I was making sure that the company values and working culture resonated strongly in me. Therefore, I studied the company web pages, financial position and Code of Conduct carefully. This prioritization must have come from my experience: having worked 12 years in an international corporation and the last two years in a start-up, my aim was to find something in between, global - stable but dynamic. This time I also found myself valuing the ease of commuting over the fancy location of the office.
What have been the highlights and most important lessons of your career?
For me highlights at work have been moments when I have felt proudness for the team, when achieving some big milestones together. One of these was a pilot project where new technology had to be demonstrated to customers. The project was not easy and had hiccups and surprises on the run, as pilots often do, but at the end the results matched perfectly with the simulations. Still, most highlights I think are recognized only afterwards, when seeing that a specific strategic decision, for instance on a modular product portfolio paid off, turned into peaked sales a few years later or even defined the industrial standards and customer requirements.
Lessons learned are key and are my most important take away from every project, task, role, or responsibility that I have worked on. Work life is continuous improvement on all fronts from technological and performance development to a more efficient way of working, communication, and even better team spirit.
What do you expect from the future?
At the very moment I’m in a turning point of my career. As said, my first 20+ years I have promoted solutions to decarbonize our consumption of goods and energy and developed technologies to reduce CO2 emissions on all major industrial sectors through sustainable, recycled fuels or electrification - to mention a few. However, there is still 20+ years of career ahead and “having seen it all”, it felt refreshing to take a new perspective to business. I have always had curiosity towards innovation in technology and came across this cutting-edge technology by Bluefors that allows to go down to millikelvins in a reliable way. This serves the R&D world and for instance the development of Quantum technology, which again enables faster modelling, that along with others accelerates the development of decarbonization technologies. Time will tell where my curiosity and passion will lead me, but in the coming years I will undoubtedly find myself busy with this fancy cryogenic technology.
For whom is this a suitable career option?
In my recent leadership roles, which have been rather technical, and business focused, it has been of importance to understand the details, value chains and causality in the big picture, which helps in faster strategic thinking and scenario planning. People skills and teamwork are also important as in this transformation of work life a wide set of competences and know-how is needed, which no one can do alone. To work in a team or to be a team leader one needs to find the right ways to communicate and share information, listen to others, respect diversity, trust and be trustworthy.
What message would you like to send to a young person pondering their career?
The career of an engineer, doctor, lawyer or handicraftsman is not a gender issue, what counts and drives is your own motivation and curiosity for continuous learning. You don’t need to have the full skillset when applying for a new position, if you would, you would get bored after the first summer. More importantly, you should believe in your ability to learn by doing and grow with the responsibilities given. Enjoy the ride, it will come with ups and downs and turning points where conscious decisions are made!