Manuela Mareva-Forsell

I was always interested in business topics in an international context, and I cautiously pursued a career in this space.

I started my professional life in marketing in the consumer industry, and after my MBA I transitioned to strategic procurement topics with Whirlpool – this was a great opportunity to build commercial, analytical and stakeholder management skills. My next step was ATKearney, where I worked on several procurement optimization programs, driving cost impact at speed. Most of my professional life was with McKinsey & Co, where over 14 years I worked on many different topics – from operational transformations to organizational excellence and technology innovation. In my last role I led the business building practice, helping organizations to drive growth with digitalization. This was a great leadership school and over the years I acquired many valuable skills that have enabled me to be successful.

I am currently leading the Digital Strategy and Transformation for Metso’s minerals segment – driving our digital strategy, shaping our portfolio and leading the commercialization of our solutions, as well as the transformation needed to enable our ambitious aspirations.

I am passionate to drive impact, and I believe digital is an important success enabler for Metso and our clients. I am excited to see our digital solutions helping our clients to improve throughput and recoveries, while enhancing equipment uptime, availability and performance. It is energizing to witness how our new data-driven solutions are also enabling to codify and scale knowledge, and in combination with remote services are helping to enhance safety and helping to solve the mining labor shortages. Last, but not least, considering that minerals processing consumes a significant amount of power, I am super excited to drive tangible improvements through our energy-efficient Metso Plus digital offerings enabling all of us to have a more sustainable life.

On a personal side, my biggest reward comes from developing talent – I feel really proud, happy and excited when I can see that I have helped colleagues to develop and grow professionally. I love coaching younger professionals – challenging them to shape ambitious aspirations and enabling them to realize their full potential and supporting with opportunities.

Last, but not least, I feel at my best in dynamic, fast-paced environments where I can solve challenging problems working with diverse cross-cultural teams. I had the chance to live across many countries and I am happy that on daily basis I can interact with colleagues from all over the globe – I find very inspiring the opportunity to understand and learn from new cultures.

My work happens on a very interesting intersection: on one side, our clients are the mining companies who are continuously looking for productivity improvements. Metso at its core is an equipment company with many proud engineers, excited to drive innovation with technology. In our team there are many young digital professionals who are keen to develop and pioneer digital solutions. And what I love is bringing the business perspective – engaging and challenging all these stakeholders to drive sustainable impact with speed.

While many companies have been focusing on D&I and made significant progress, we are still far from where we should be overall in the business world, and in the mining industry. However, I believe Metso has made a huge progress in recruiting and developing diverse talent and creating an inclusive culture and environment where people from all backgrounds can feel supported and valued for their contribution. And to get even better, we have several initiatives that help us to improve every day.

Given the talent challenges in the industry, I believe D&I will be a critical enabler for future success for all companies in the mining space.

I strongly believe that role models and mentors play a crucial role for career development.

When I was younger in my career, I struggled to find a role model – I expected to encounter a superwoman, perfect in every dimension of life… As I became more mature, I realized that superpeople only exist in our imagination, however many people around me have ‘’superpowers’’ that I could learn from. And I continuously discover new role models from whom I try to learn specific skills and behaviors that I admire.

I have also been lucky to have many mentors during my education and professional life, who I turn to when I need advice, and / or help to look at a situation from a different perspective. They have supported me with wisdom, encouragement and constructive feedback, and often empowered me with confidence to navigate challenges.

Over time, I also realized that my most important role model and mentor is actually my mother – she was a successful entrepreneur, a dedicated parent and passionate philanthropist. And even though she is not among us today, often when I need to make a difficult decision, I reflect what would she have said and done.

Here are my recommendations for every woman who decides to pursue a professional career:

1) Proactively shape your path: understand what your distinctive strengths are and when you perform at your best; build clarity for yourself for where you aspire to be, what excites and energizes you. Invest time to reflect on these topics, but also seek feedback from others around you. Those are important inputs to identify and prioritize the areas where you need to focus your development.

2) Have a plan and be ready to change it: while having a clear career plan and pursuing it is important, one needs to be open-minded and grab opportunities when they appear, even if they are not a perfect match to what you are aiming for

3) Carefully choose your partner: the support of my husband has been a crucial enabler for my professional growth, allowing me to effectively combine professional responsibilities with a dynamic family life. I am proud and happy that we have been able to create a dual career family and role model this for our children.

There are many studies that highlight the importance of gender diversity and prove that it brings numerous benefits for companies: from better decision making – considering a wider range of perspectives, to innovation – embracing creative solutions and ideas. Gender diverse workplaces also benefit from stronger employee engagement – higher satisfaction and lower turnover and better talent attraction and employer reputation. There is also a proven direct correlation to Financial Performance – higher profitability and ROE for companies with women in senior positions.

And while there is no doubt that a more gender diverse operating team leads to better decisions and performance, I believe that we should not solely focus on the gender aspect of it. If we focus our efforts on objectively building high-performing teams with diverse skills and capabilities, gender diversity will be a natural consequence.

I am a strong believer that diversity and inclusion is not only a strategic imperative for companies – as a woman and mother of two daughters, I also think that it is also a moral imperative for a prosperous society.

I am constantly looking for opportunities to grow, learn new things and develop my skills. I am not sure if I have an ‘’ultimate’’ career goal – while I am happy with my carer progress to date, I am one of those people who love to discover new horizons and continuously sets new goals.

One day, in addition to professional life, I would love to engage more actively in philanthropic work. And while I am still deliberating which field to focus on, I am certain that I feel strong social responsibility and would like to be able to focus my skills and energy on create impact beyond business.

I have three young children and a dog, and I try to spend most of my spare time with my family. I love traveling and exploring new parts of the world together. I also enjoy skiing, dancing and yoga. As an extroverted person I enjoy social activities and a fun time with friends. Living in Finland, I have also embraced the sauna rituals and time in nature as a fantastic way to recover and recharge my batteries.