Learning by doing
I started in Sampo Bank’s Junior Management Team programme for future managers about one and a half year ago. We all have our personal development plan and follow the training as part of our job. We meet with the team every two months for face-to-face training but we do a great part of the learning through exercises and project work. The latest project my group worked on was about MiFID. The final report has been useful for Sampo Bank, which makes the learning process interesting, relevant and more fun.
 |
Anu Blomster, 32 years |
Education: Master of Science in Economics
Title: Member of Junior Management Team
Department: Business Development, Products and Service Solutions
Years of service: Since November 2006 |
Good and dynamic brand
There are many reasons why I decided to apply for a job in Sampo Bank. First of all, it was due to good timing: I was actively looking for a change and new challenges within Business Development when I saw Sampo Bank’s advertisement for the Junior Management Team programme. But it was also Sampo Bank’s image that raised my interest. Sampo Bank has a good brand in Finland and comes across as a dynamic working place. In addition, I have been Sampo Bank’s customer all my life so there was also something familiar with it from the customer point of view.
Danske Bank brings new opportunities
I knew very little about Danske Bank before its acquisition of Sampo Bank. As it happened only a week after I joined the bank, it is hard to say how much it has affected my job. Probably quite a lot, because my main responsibilities were intended to be developing innovation processes and new solutions. At least Sampo Bank has become more international. Personally, I think that it has been a great opportunity to be involved in the integration process since such processes do not take place that often. Now I mainly work for customer output workstream. All the different documents and templates have to be aligned with Danske Bank’s products and design before the migration that will take place in the spring of 2008. In addition, I am working on different analyses, new websites introducing new products and updating sales material.
Combining two banking cultures
The integration to the Danske Bank Group keeps us busy. Danske’s position as market leader is different from that of Sampo Bank's, which is seen as a challenger in the Finnish market. Combining these two banking cultures and finding out how to do business together brings challenges and provides new opportunities. For example, there are some products and practises we feel very strongly about here in Sampo Bank and we are working on finding a way to incorporate them into the Danske Banking Concept. It is all about finding a good balance to achieve the best results.
International and inspiring
Working in a big international company is inspiring. First of all, it is great to know that you don’t always need to reinvent the wheel since there are experiences and existing concepts from other countries and branches you can use in your own work. It makes everybody's work easier to share best practices and lessons learned. It also gives us an opportunity to share our own experience with our new colleagues and thereby have an influence on the way the Danske Bank Group does business.