Responsibility informs all activities at Tiketti

Tiketti, founded on May Day 1975, employs more than 50 event industry professionals. Investing in the well-being of employees is considered a company priority.

"Instead of talking about well-being at work, I prefer to talk about well-being in general. At Tiketti, we strive to ensure that our staff experience overall wellness," says Mirva Merimaa. Wholistic well-being is promoted in the company through various measures related to health, equality, accessibility and financial sustainability, among others.

Tiketti's full staff comes together once a week for an online meeting. This ensures that everyone stays in the loop about activities across other departments – and at the same time, gets the chance to see each other on a regular basis.

"In addition, we have introduced monthly one-on-one discussions between supervisors and their team members. These comprehensive discussions can range from general catchups to touching base on the team member's next goals. With the help of specific matrix questions, we can also get an idea of employees’ experiences of their supervisors’ management style and their colleagues’ work commitment, or how our strategic priorities have been reflected in their work tasks," Sanna Reko explains. "For me, at least, this is a really nice way to share a moment together with a team member. And usually something great happens after the meetings!"

"The traditional once-yearly performance review can be quite a loaded model, and the situation can feel tense on both sides. Instead, I feel that our practice brings the employees closer to their supervisors and provides better opportunities to support them at their work," Merimaa continues.

Tiketti has secured a strong and approachable partner to deliver their occupational health services, and the extensive health insurance offered to all employees even covers therapy sessions when needed. In addition, staff well-being and motivation are monitored through a weekly mood survey, to which employees respond anonymously.

At Tiketti, every employee can allocate one of their weekly work hours to exercise. A massage therapist visits the office once a week and employees can take advantage of various exercise and cultural benefits. In summer, each employee gets a free ticket to an event of their choice, and 10% of the company’s annual profit is distributed amongst staff members according to the hours worked. The Tiketti team also cultivates the importance of small gestures and acknowledgements: every staff birthday is celebrated, which means that each team member receives special attention at least once a year.

Every Wednesday, a shared training session is available for all employees through Teams. The sessions are tailored according to the specific needs of the employees and training may include, for example, visits from experts or presentations from different departments of the company. The sessions are recorded and saved into the company’s training library, where they are available to view anytime.

Tiketti's office is located in an easily accessible venue in the heart of Helsinki. In addition to the office space, the work itself – including management and tools – has been designed to be as accessible as possible. Remote work is an option, currently taken up by several employees living in other parts of the country.

Tiketti has been a certified WWF Green Office since 2019, and the company has its own Green Office working group. "Even prior to the certification, environmental values ​​were always strongly present in our work, but the Green Office program has prompted us to start messaging about these values externally," says Merimaa. "The certificate provides even clearer guidance to our operations and it is widely in use, starting from the orientation of new employees," adds Reko. "The Green Office team is very committed to our goals and, in turn, actively encourages all departments and staff to commit to the work. Through concrete goals, everyday activities become systematically more sustainable".

"In addition to the basic framework set by the certificate, our personnel can get involved through activities such as a walking challenge designed to get people to enjoy the great outdoors, or a bird watching competition between different departments," says Olli Kataikko, a member of the Green Office team.

Alongside the Green Office working group, Tiketti has an equality working group which was formed in 2018 and whose task is to ensure equality across all company activities.

"Every three months, we measure how our equality goals have been reached in the workplace. The results have been consistently good, but it is still important to keep monitoring these issues, so that our equality plan is not just a piece of paper," Merimaa emphasises. "At Tiketti, everyone is allowed to be themselves, there is room for all types of people here".

Tiketti wishes to promote sustainable development not only through the company's internal actions, but also through its stakeholder collaborations.

Shared values are important at Tiketti when choosing collaborators, and these values also guide the company’s own purchase decisions. A new initiative suggested by the Green Office team this spring, for example, is to ask our stakeholders and partners to provide details about their environmental labels or other certificates. In addition, handy hints are provided for all event organiser customers on how they can use Tiketti to communicate about responsibility issues to their audiences, both in the lead-up and after the event.

One of Tiketti’s concrete environmental actions is related to the company’s use of equipment. "Our ticket readers are very durable and can be used for up to eight years, which is quite an impressive lifespan for electronic devices. In addition, we have found a partner who can provide additional ticket readers for hire during the peak summer season", says Kataikko.

Tiketti’s collaboration partners include the Finnish Natural Heritage Foundation and the John Nurminen Foundation. "We strive to make it possible for customers to engage in charitable actions, for example through environmental tickets or donations", says Merimaa.

Together with their event organiser customers, Tiketti also promotes equality and accessibility.

"We wish to keep improving our messaging to our audience customers about the physical and social accessibility of each event, and we have prepared a questionnaire for event organisers in collaboration with the Culture for All Service", Reko says. "Although people are generally quite well-informed about accessibility issues, there are still some areas which may not always come to mind. For example, we make a point of asking event organisers whether they have appointed a dedicated harassment contact person at the event, whether they adhere to the principles of safer spaces, whether a toilet card is used (a card whose purpose is to make it easier for people with various medical conditions to access the toilet in public places) or whether a personal assistant can participate for free".

"Nowadays, wheelchair access to events has largely become the norm, but accessibility also applies to many other areas. An event attendee may need assistance for a range of reasons – and we strive to increase our customers' knowledge of these issues," Merimaa continues.

Ease of use is one of Tiketti's strategic priorities and the company’s ticket purchase processes have been developed to be as easy and accessible as possible. This includes enabling multiple different payment methods and the possibility of paying in installments. At Tiketti, all customer service operations take place in-house, and the goal is a smooth, one-stop service. In addition to phone queries from ticket buyers, Tiketti also responds to emails – not everyone has the opportunity to call the service numbers provided.

Tiketti collaborates with the digital mail service Kivra. The two companies share a vision of a paperless world. The more environmentally friendly electronic ticket delivery method is provided free of charge, and the number of paper tickets issued has been steadily declining year by year. Today, many event organisers, especially for sporting events, no longer sell tickets at the door. Instead, the audiences are offered the opportunity to purchase a mobile ticket using a QR code on their way to the event.

"Many ticket sellers still provide instructions on how to print and fold the ticket, whereas we advise ticket holders to show their ticket on the screen of their smartphone", says Merimaa.

The Tiketti team feels that the Elma project and the related collaborations play a significant role in development work across the industry. The information and tools produced through the project guide the entire industry in a more responsible direction. An individual company's own responsibility efforts feel more meaningful – and it is easy to commit to shared goals together with other operators.