Recording and photo highlights from the Public Administration Reputation&Trust event

“Hopefully, the importance of openness and dialogue will be better understood”

At our Reputation&Trust " seminar on public administration held on Tuesday morning, we discussed the importance of security and interaction in building social trust. A recording of the event is now available for viewing.

The results of the Public Administration Reputation&Trust survey highlight the importance of safety: nearly all of the public administration organizations ranked among the top ten in terms of reputation work to ensure the safety of citizens.

The Ministry of Defense saw the biggest rise in reputation in the survey.

“The Ministry of Defense has always played a strong role as a guarantor of security in our society. In recent years, we have undergone a rapid transformation, during which the importance of defense and security in society has become increasingly evident. Through its own actions and cool-headed analysis, the Ministry of Defense has earned its position in this situation,” said Stefan Wallin, Senior Advisor at Reputation and Trust Analytics and former Minister of Defense, during a panel at the Public Administration Reputation&Trust seminar.

A reputable organization can weather crises

Reputation&Trust on public administration also highlighted the importance of interaction for public support in general, and for trust and crisis support in particular.

“I hope that the importance of transparency and dialogue will be better understood within public administration organizations. Clear language is the most underrated tool in public administration. I feel that we need to work on speaking in a way that is easy to understand,” said Susanna Niinivaara , Director of Communications at the Digital and Population Data Services Agency, during the panel discussion .

“There is a sense of unease about what will remain for us as artificial intelligence automates certain tasks on the one hand and serves as a support system on the other. Human interaction will always remain, and this only underscores the importance of interpersonal skills.”

Saska Saarikoski, editorial writer for Helsingin Sanomat and a panelist, emphasized the importance of communication even in times of crisis.

“Every organization faces crises at some point. It’s about what you do when a mistake has been made,” Saarikoski summarized.

“We’ve seen all kinds of crisis communication recently. I’d give Kela credit for its proactive communication during the crisis. The University of Helsinki, on the other hand, remained silent and didn’t answer questions, while the Finnish Institute of International Affairs provided false information—which is the worst thing you can do in a crisis.”

Saarikoski also pointed out that an organization with a good reputation is better equipped to weather crises.

“It’s a bad sign if someone first hears about an organization after they’ve, so to speak, hit a snag.”

The centralization of government communications is a cause for concern

The panel discussion also touched on the recently reported proposal to centralize government communications within the Prime Minister’s Office. Stefan Wallin expressed caution regarding the idea.

“In my view, every ministry has the right to set its own news threshold. This is a ministry-specific matter: the ministry’s communications department and leadership know best what they want to communicate to the outside world. I myself would not have set out to fix something that isn’t broken,” Wallin said.

Riitta Väkeväinen, a communications entrepreneur and former communications director at the National Emergency Supply Agency, who participated in the panel, agreed with Wallin.

“I’m concerned that substantive expertise is becoming too remote. The ministries are full of experts with whom communications professionals need to be able to liaise,” Väkeväinen said.

“There have also been concerns that communication will become politically controlled if it is centralized in the Prime Minister’s Office. We have been assured that this will not happen, and that is a good thing. However, the fact that this issue is causing concern among the public is in itself a cause for concern.”

A low tolerance for disagreement makes one susceptible to hybrid influence

Following the panel discussion, Jarno Forssell , Executive Director of ProCom, continued to speak about the importance of interaction in his remarks.

“Public sector organizations have won over and reached out to citizens through their own actions. It is not enough, for example, to perform well at the border; we must also be able to communicate that, and this requires everyone—both communicators and leadership,” Forsell said.

During the seminar discussions, concerns were also raised about the fact that the Parliament’s scores in the study were low. Saarikoski and Wallin discussed in the panel how this reflects the fact that we Finns have some difficulty tolerating disagreements.

“We would do well to keep in mind that a low tolerance for disagreement and the resulting division leave us vulnerable to hybrid influence,” Harri Leinikka, CEO of Reputation and Trust Analytics, noted at the conclusion of the event.

The FinnHEMS medical helicopter service was named the public administration organization with the best reputation in 2025, followed by the Border Guard in second place and the Rescue Services in third. The research results were presented and analyzed at the seminar by Reputation and Trust Analytics experts Nina Laakso, Antti Pennala, Petteri Puska, and Andrei Sergejeff.

Watch the recording: