Sustainable work in partnership with UPM.

practices need smart adoption: one size does not fit all, ‘Customer of choice’ is the focus. It is important to share experiences between different teams and BAs.

External insights and successful tactics will enrich UPM’s Innovation journey by; growing the innovation network beyond the organisation, create a learning culture to increase comfort with change, identifying strengths to build on and weaknesses that slow down the progress, building a supportive innovation network within UPM and developing competences of the future, introducing modular approach in framework implementation to ensure scalable processes and agility.

Whilst many aspects of your supplier base can be described as mature, for a business that is keen to stay on the front foot and also explore new sectors there is a big opportunity for new vendors (large, SME, niche) to partner with UPM. How exciting is this as a procurement professional and what opportunities would you say exist for any potential new vendors?

We want to be a reliable, future-oriented business partner with high expectations and clear requirements for our suppliers. Globally, we have roughly 20,000 b2b material and service suppliers and we collaborate with a diverse group of partners: customers, inventors, universities, start-ups, research institutes, manufacturers and technology suppliers

Next level Supplier Relationship

Management: becoming customer of choice “re-defined” is exciting for any sourcing professional. We have an objective: secure the most innovative ideas for the business. Gain access to game-changing ideas, strengthen supplier relationships by close, mutually beneficial innovative collaboration, align strategic plans to create opportunities to deliver further innovations, turn ideas into business value. Category managers need the right skills and capabilities to deliver this. You need a clear distinction about the types of innovation they go after. We need to have an open communication

Sustainability, a part of our daily operations

ISS is a global business employing hundreds of thousands of people. In Finland we have almost 8000 employees. We are driven by our purpose: connecting people and places to make the world

We are committed to delivering our services and carrying out our operations in sustainable way. ISS helps to protect and maintain places –buildings and the assets inside them. We also help our customers minimize their impact on the planet by reducing the carbon footprint of

Top Ratings In Assessments

Our stakeholders expect transparency, engagement and evidence of environmental initiatives. ISS is highly rated in both Ecovadis and HSEQ- supplier assessments. The latest Ecovadis evaluation highlighted ISS as the top 1% companies in Environmental sustainability.

In 2023 Kiwa Inspecta HSEQ-supplier assessment, we are the highest rated company in our segment.

CHEMICAL-FREE AND WATER SAVING CLEANING

In 2019 we started to calculate the carbon footprint of our services and since then we have been able to provide data for our customers. We started to provide chemical-free cleaning already in 2018 and this method is also used in UPM. With resource efficient cleaning machines, we have saved more than 13 million liters of water. Every year, our professionals in energy center make around 20,000 observations to develop the energy efficiency of our customers’ buildings.

We are committed to continue the hard work together with our customers and our supply chain: We make places that are sustainable – now and in the future.

with suppliers and treat them as an extension of the business offering new exciting opportunities.

Given what we have discussed, what would you point to as your personal aims and aspirations for procurement over the next 18-24 months?

Changes in business environment are setting increasing challenges for inbound supply, impacting value chains and in turn sets new expectations for sourcing. Mastering the business environment more cleverly and executing better than the competition is the key success factor for business profit. The vision for the 2025+ is for sourcing to become more forward looking contributing to business profit, support innovation and growth beyond fossils, become proactive and collaborative in supplier management, and automate procurement operations. We want to place UPM as the customer of choice position in the strategic supplier base.

In the era of the digital revolution, sourcing will also have to prepare for the future. Data and analytics are one of the main levers that will allow sourcing to develop its strategic vision. To master this new environment, the purchasing department will have to acquire new skills. A combination of technical knowledge and soft skills will become the main strength of the sourcing professional of tomorrow, along with agility and resilience.