[A Sip of a Book] Popping Champagne When You Fail?... ‘Happy Monday Work Life in Finland’

What if there was a company that celebrated failure by actually popping champagne instead of blaming someone when a project fails? Many people might question whether such a company really exists, but it does. It is in Finland, which has ranked first in the World Happiness Index for five consecutive years. The company that truly pops champagne when they fail is Supercell, the game company famous for ‘Clash of Clans,’ and this story reflects the common organizational culture of Finnish companies. The author, Shania Shin, worked for over ten years at well-known global companies in Korea before moving to Finland, where she experienced graduate school, entrepreneurship, and working life. She was the first foreigner to join the Finnish Chamber of Commerce and even represented it at international symposiums. Having worked with various companies in Finland and experienced the ‘unconventional’ Finnish organizational culture, the author explains how this culture, different from the typical workplace experience we imagine, connects to employee happiness.

p.34 Why do Finnish companies practice a ‘distancing’ organizational culture that respects and considers the horizontal relationships and the space between each person’s area of expertise? Because this distancing culture creates an environment where members can feel psychological safety. This psychological safety is like fertile soil for each member to move from their current ‘immediate capability’ to future potential and to continuously grow.

p.75 There needs to be a minimum safe distance between people, between words, and between tasks. Maintaining this margin of safety opens up space for trying, choosing, and growing.

p.96 When attempts accumulate, they become experience, and when experience accumulates, it becomes routine. Attempts that respect members’ expertise and autonomy must accumulate, and positive experiences built on trust must be accumulated for a culture of trust to become a solid infrastructure within the company.

p.127 Although Finland values punctuality and strictly adheres to it, companies have been implementing agile working for over ten years. In Finnish workplaces, there is no concept of being late or leaving exactly on time; everyone flexibly chooses the most efficient time to work on their own. The foundation of flexible working is a culture where companies and leaders respect and trust each member’s autonomy and expertise instead of supervising and controlling.

p.251 After the lecture, I asked Ilka what the ‘Supercell corporate culture they want to boast about’ was, and without hesitation, Ilka’s answer was ‘a culture that celebrates failure.’ Ilka proudly said that whenever a newly launched game fails, they hold a party celebrating the failure with real Champagne, not just sparkling wine. “Failure is not a pleasant experience, but the lessons learned from failure led to successful games and became the greatest driving force pointing the way forward,” she added. Ilka’s belief that ‘not failing means not truly taking risks, and a game that fears adventure can never succeed’ is not limited to the gaming industry.

Happy Mondays at Finnish Workplaces | Written by Shania Shin | Real Learning | 292 pages | 18,000 KRW

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.