Petri Salminen elected new chair of the board of Suomen Yrittäjät

The Suomen Yrittäjät general assembly elected Petri Salminen, who runs a corporate management consultancy in Central Finland, to the top position in the organization.

Petri Salminen (39) received 973 votes in the second round of the chairperson election.

In his victory speech, Salminen said, “We’re now going to start building an organization along new administrative lines. We’re going to build it together. The organization has to change, but at the same time it has to honour the extremely strong base that we’ve been able to build over the years.”

Salminen does not think that this change needs to be revolutionary.

“My thoughts about renewal are grounded in respect for traditions, because even though we always have things we can develop, most things in Suomen Yrittäjät are without a doubt going very well.”

Salminen says that the strength of Suomen Yrittäjät comes from the voluntary work entrepreneurs do for each other’s benefit.

“The dedicated specialists in our organization are a lifeline for our entrepreneur members. It’s an honour to advocate Finnish enterprise with this community.”

Petri Salminen is the CEO of the corporate management consultancy Salminen & Tikka and involved in the engineering company AJ-Tools. He lives in Jyväskylä.

Salminen previously served as deputy chair of the board of Suomen Yrittäjät. He will begin his duties as chair immediately. The term of office of chair is two years.

Nina Rasola takes second place

Nina Rasola, from South Savo, came second in the second round of the election, receiving 867 votes.

Antti Rantalainen from Uusimaa was also a candidate. In the first round, Salminen got 733 votes, Rasola 588 and Rantalainen 495 votes.

Anne Niemi and Jyrki Hakkarainen elected deputy chairs of Suomen Yrittäjät

The Suomen Yrittäjät general assembly elected Anne Niemi from South Ostrobothnia and Jyrki Hakkarainen from Southwest Finland as deputy chairs of the board.

Anne Niemi, from Vimpeli, who owns the Idanne fashion business and has business interests in metal engineering and capital investment, received 1,624 votes. Jyrki Hakkarainen runs the law firm Kiskon Laki in Kisko, Salo. He runs the business alone. Hakkarainen received 991 votes in the deputy chair election.

Antti Rantalainen from Uusimaa (663 votes) and Jukka Hurrila from Satakunta (406 votes) also stood for election to deputy chair.

Jyrki Mäkynen and Mari Laaksonen elected to chair the council

For the first time, a representative council was elected in Suomen Yrittäjät. The general assembly elected Jyrki Mäkynen of Seinäjoki as chair of the council. He owns the interior design company Oy HM Profiili Ab. Mäkynen was the chair of the board of Suomen Yrittäjät for the past six years. He was the only candidate for chair of the council.

The general assembly elected Mari Laaksonen of Helsinki as deputy chair of the council. Her company is called CleanMarin Oy. Laaksonen received 728 votes in the election.

Also standing for election were Janne Vuorinen from Pirkanmaa (596 votes) and Stina Siikonen from Southwest Finland (505 votes).

The term for all the newly elected officials is two years and begins at once.

Photo credit: Tero Takalo-Eskola

toimitus (at) yrittajat.fi