Interview with Jaakko Linnolahti

Kok­kola Sports Park Alliance began its work at the end of March 2022. The first phase will see the design of the con­tent and imple­men­ta­tion of the sports park complex. The target cost and imple­men­ta­tion plan, inclu­ding sche­dule, will also be deter­mined. Based on this work, the deci­sion will be taken to proceed to the imple­men­ta­tion phase. Jaakko Lin­no­lahti, head of procu­re­ment, comes from YIT, Vaasa.

What is your role in the Kok­kola Sports Park Alliance?

I’m head of procu­re­ment in the team and also sup­port pro­ject mana­ge­ment, especially in tasks related to infor­ma­tion mana­ge­ment and plan­ning control. On top of this, I’m also a member of the pro­ject team.

What makes up your wor­king days?

At this stage of the pro­ject, there are rela­ti­vely few procu­re­ments and so I par­tici­pate with the rest of the team in pro­ject deve­lop­ment, veri­fying pre­li­mi­nary data and com­men­ting on the various alter­na­tives. I’ve also been active in deve­lo­ping the pro­ject infor­ma­tion mana­ge­ment process, which lar­gely guides how we act in the pro­ject and how we process infor­ma­tion and various docu­ments. In phase 1 begin­ning in the autumn, we will put the finis­hing touches to the pro­ject procu­re­ment stra­tegy and draw up a procu­re­ment plan, which in turn will drive the plan­ning sche­dule among other things.

How do you like wor­king in the alliance?

I like the alliance way of wor­king, it’s a very col­la­bo­ra­tive form of cont­rac­ting. We all sit around the same table and we share the same goals. I like a model where desig­ners and buil­ders are ten­dered as one team and this means we also get to deter­mine the way of wor­king from the very first day – partly already at the ten­de­ring stage. Because we do many things together, it’s impor­tant to spend time on slightly softer things such as the team spirit in order to foster teamwork.

How does the alliance model differ from your ear­lier pro­jects?

We ope­rate in the Big Room, where all key per­sons are pre­sent at least weekly. We spend a bit more time on work in the deve­lop­ment phase of the pro­ject and aim to ensure that the rest of the pro­ject reaches the goal wit­hout any hitches. In a tra­di­tional con­struc­tion pro­ject, each cont­ractor focuses more on their own role and their own inte­rests are moni­tored more. In the alliance model, eve­ryone is on the same page and the focus is on taking the pro­ject forward. In alliance pro­jects, plans are also deve­loped in stages – we make plans accor­ding to the situa­tion at the time, which in turn sig­ni­ficantly shor­tens the entire pro­ject. In other pro­jects, where for example the exact price has to be quoted, the cus­tomer has to order all the plans from desig­ners before put­ting the entire cont­ract out to tender. 

Have there been any chal­lenges?

Of course, but in the big pic­ture, work has got off to a great start and it has to be said that in the Big Room, we’ve had an amazing sense of get­ting things done. Deve­lop­ment phase 0 has now been ongoing, which means that we have had to catch up with the pro­ject goals set by the client in a rela­ti­vely short time. This involves the various requi­re­ments of dif­fe­rent users such as sports clubs and event orga­ni­sers, which means there has been quite a lot of infor­ma­tion and needs to con­sider. We’ve had to put together various alter­na­tives to a tight sche­dule, after which we’ve con­si­dered which of them we want to submit to deci­sion-makers. Of course, the budget in the background also drives what we do. Sig­ni­ficant recent rises in buil­ding costs also pose their own chal­lenge.

How do you recover from long wor­king weeks?

I recover by doing all kinds of exercise and this is very impor­tant to me. I often go and exercise before the wor­king day, with a wor­kout in the gym or some golf. I’ve also played bas­ket­ball my whole life. In addi­tion, doing things at home with the children and eve­ryday family life nicely help me to relax from the stresses of work.

And finally, tell us somet­hing about the com­pany you repre­sent

I repre­sent YIT, which is the lar­gest con­struc­tion com­pany in Fin­land and can in many ways be said to also be a leader. At the moment our stra­tegy is very much about deve­lo­ping cities and living envi­ron­ments, and the envi­ron­ment and res­pon­si­bi­lity are also impor­tant parts of our stra­tegy. I like wor­king for YIT and have been given much res­pon­si­bi­lity during my career. I want to con­tinue at YIT because it means I get to be involved in inte­res­ting and sig­ni­ficant con­struc­tion pro­jects with the best pro­fes­sio­nals in the busi­ness. That’s what drives me and makes me happy to go to work each mor­ning.