From Hanken EMBA peers to the same leadership table

Joni Alasaari learnt business by building one. Ville Hanski came to leadership from a background in science and engineering. Their paths were different, but through the Hanken Executive MBA, both gained new perspectives, a trusted network and, eventually, a common language for leadership at Janneniska.

Joni Alasaari, owner of Janneniska, was just 21 when he started the company together with its founder in 1996. “I more or less learned everything by doing,” he says.

Ville Hanski, now Managing Director of Janneniska Rent Oy, took a different route. With a background in science and engineering, and a career spanning sales and international business, he saw formal business education as a valuable complement to his practical experience.

Their paths into the Hanken EMBA were different but would eventually cross in an unexpected way.

Returning to learning at the right time

Ville first started his MBA studies in his late twenties but put them on hold when a career opportunity took him to China. Around 15 years later, during the COVID-19 pandemic, he decided it was time to return.

“I wanted to complete it, to be honest. It had been nagging at me, that I didn’t finalise it when I was younger,” Ville says. He believes the timing also made an impact on his experience. “When I started, I was 27 years old, so I was a bit too young for that. When I continued my journey with the EMBA, I was 45, so a bit more mature. It made more sense that time,” he explains.

For Joni, formal studies had taken a back seat when he started building a business at a young age. When he eventually began looking into executive education, the timing of the Hanken EMBA felt right.

Returning to the classroom was not without its challenges, however. Studying in English and getting back into academic work initially made him question whether he could do it.

“I was afraid if I can do it,” Joni recalls. “But it was really rewarding to pass.”

Putting experience into perspective

With decades of business experience between them, the EMBA offered Joni and Ville an opportunity to examine familiar challenges from new angles.

For Joni, it was particularly interesting to connect what he had learnt through entrepreneurship with the theory behind it. “It’s always about people, and about managing issues and people,” he says.

The programme also encouraged him to bring what he was learning directly into his own busines. “You learn more by doing the actual task and thinking about your business,” he explains.

For Ville, some of the most valuable insight came from the people around him. Experienced leaders may face similar challenges, he says, but encounter them in very different industries, organisations and circumstances. That makes comparing approaches particularly valuable.

You want to learn: how are you doing it? The same challenges in a different environment. That’s something that you cannot even buy from the market.

When leadership gets lonely, perspective matters

The peer network has remained an important part of the experience long after the studies themselves.

For Ville, it provides something that can be difficult to find when you are leading an organisation: an informed perspective from outside it. “When you are managing director, basically you are very, very alone all the time,” Ville says. Even with a management team and board around him, there are moments when an outside view makes a difference.

Sometimes you need to have a view outside of your box.

Joni’s EMBA group also continues to stay in touch. “It’s a network where you can lift up your phone and call, or ask somebody to join a beer, and maybe tell or ask anything,” he explains.

For Joni, some of the insights gained during the programme have travelled into his personal life as well. With his wife also an entrepreneur, the studies sparked new conversations about their respective businesses and ways of working. “You bring it alive in your everyday life,” he says.

From EMBA peers to the same leadership table

Joni and Ville’s time in the Hanken EMBA overlapped, with around half of their modules taking place together. Like many EMBA participants, both value the perspectives and relationships they gained through the programme.

In their case, one of those relationships eventually led them back to the same company.

Today, with Joni as owner and Ville as Managing Director, their shared EMBA experience has become part of how they work together. Their roles and perspectives may be different, but Ville says that they have a shared frame of reference when it comes to discussing business and leadership.