The impact of corporate social responsibility is growing – Ponsse remains Finland’s most reputable company
For the fourth consecutive year, forestry machinery manufacturer Ponsse claimed the title of Finland’s most reputable company. KONE returned to the top three, joining Ponsse and Supercell. Nokia climbed out of the list of companies with poor reputations, improving its leadership rating more than any other company this year.
T-Media has surveyed the reputation of companies operating in Finland among the general public for the ninth time. The survey was conducted Reputation&Trust, and more than 9,000 Finns responded.
In this year's survey, Finns ranked the forestry machinery company Ponsse as Finland's most prestigious company. Second place went to the elevator and escalator company KONE, and third place to the mobile gaming company Supercell.
Fiskars has returned to the ranks of reputable companies – competition among the top ten is fiercer than ever
The consumer goods company Fiskars managed to make a comeback to the top ten list of Finland’s most reputable companies. It was even harder to make the top ten this year: the minimum reputation score for the list was 3.78, whereas in 2020 it was 3.71 on a scale of 1–5.
“There has been demand for Fiskars’ products during the pandemic, although the company has also undergone a transformation. Fiskars CEO Nathalie Ahlström has received excellent media coverage for her efforts; she has effectively articulated the Fiskars Group’s development story. Fiskars saw the biggest improvement in its ratings in the areas of renewal and interaction,” says Harri Leinikka, CEO of T-Media.
There were also clear changes in the list of companies with a poor reputation. Nokia, which had been on this list the previous year, dropped off the list, but it did not yet make it onto the list of companies with a good reputation, even though its improvement in reputation was significant.
“Nokia performed particularly well in the leadership category, where it rose by 0.42 points. That is the largest single change in this category this year,” says Leinikka.
Esperi Care and Attendo, both companies in the care and health services sector, also saw significant improvements in their reputations. The overall reputations of these companies rose more than those of any other companies surveyed. In addition, perceptions of Attendo’s administrative openness and transparency improved more than those of any other company over the past nine years.
Corporate governance, openness, transparency, and employer reputation have grown in importance
The annual trend in the average scores of the 60 companies tracked Reputation&Trust T-Media’s Reputation&Trust reveals significant differences in the various dimensions of reputation and their relative importance. Among the reputation categories, perceptions related to financial performance have improved the most: the Finnish business sector is now seen as more profitable and financially stable than before.
Source: The figures are based on an organizational basket created by T-Media, consisting of 60 different organizations. The organizational basket includes both well-regarded and poorly regarded organizations from a wide range of industries.
While perceptions of companies’ financial standing have improved overall, their impact on the trust and stakeholder support expressed by Finns has nevertheless declined.
“The world is changing, and it seems we are entering a new era of ethics. Our research findings show that the importance of equal treatment of employees, business ethics, and good leadership has grown. People interpret companies’ business practices through the lens of their own moral and ethical views. Over the past year, the importance of these values as a source of stakeholder support and trust has risen significantly among Finns,” says Riku Ruokolahti, Development Director at T-Media.
Among the factors supporting Finnish companies, only the willingness to invest has increased compared to last year. Confidence in companies has not increased.
“For public trust in companies to improve among Finns, companies would need to be better able to meet the moral and ethical expectations of the public,” Ruokolahti says.
This is how we conducted the study
The results are based on Reputation&Trust conducted in June 2021, which examined the reputation of companies operating in Finland among the Finnish public.
The companies were evaluated Reputation&Trust T-Media’s Reputation&Trust, in which a company’s reputation score is calculated as the average of eight different categories. These areas are corporate governance, finance, leadership, innovation, interaction, products and services, workplace, and corporate responsibility. The study used a five-point rating scale (1–5).
A total of 9,265 Finns participated in the survey, providing 19,792 organizational evaluations. The survey targeted Finns aged 15–65 nationwide (excluding the Åland Islands). The sample was weighted to be representative of the population by gender, age, and region of residence.
The companies with the best and worst reputations were selected for the study based on a preliminary survey conducted in the spring of 2021. In the preliminary survey, over a thousand Finns spontaneously named two companies they considered to have a particularly good reputation and two with a particularly poor reputation. T-Media does not influence the selection of companies. The thirty companies that received the most mentions were examined in greater detail Reputation&Trust. The list now being published includes the ten companies with the highest ratings and the ten with the lowest ratings.
For more information:
Harri Leinikka, CEO
harri.leinikka@reptrust-staging.fi-p.seravo.com, 040 505 5001
Riku Ruokolahti, Director of Development
riku.ruokolahti@reptrust-staging.fi-p.seravo.com, 0400 512 200
Photo: Hanna Rutanen, Head of Communications at Kone, and Juha Vidgrén, member of Ponsse’s Board of Directors.
Photographer: Vesa Koivunen
