What is it like to work as HYY’s chief financial and service officer, Aino Pekkarinen?

HYY works for a better student life by, for instance, producing services, benefits and events. The main responsibility for all of this as well as the Student Union’s daily financial matters lies with HYY’s chief financial and service officer, and for the past five months, the position was held by Aino Pekkarinen. What did she gain from the experience?

For the past five months, Aino Pekkarinen worked as the substitute of HYY’s chief financial and service officer, Laura Ylitalo, who returned to HYY’s Central Office at the beginning of March. During this time, Aino got to oversee matters including the preparation of HYY’s budget and the return of student activities to the New Student House.

‘I am proud for managing to get down to work right away’, Aino describes her action-packed stint at HYY.

The position of the chief financial and service officer combines financial administration and HR duties with developing HYY’s service activities. For instance, the chief financial and service officer has the main responsibility for dealing with the Student Union’s daily financial matters. In addition to this, the chief financial and service officer serves as the supervisor for specialists on different sectors at HYY, guiding them in their work.

‘At first, I was surprised by HYY’s size and the scope of its activities. We have specialists from many different fields working for us’, Aino states.

Aino’s road to HYY’s Central Office has passed through some organisations close to us: she has previously worked for the University of Helsinki, the National Union of University Students in Finland and Ylva, the company HYY owns. Despite this, Aino still feels that she has learned new things at HYY. Her overall understanding of the organisation’s finances, for instance, has increased through handling HYY’s daily financial matters. Working as the chief financial and service officer, Aino has also worked on developing processes related to wellbeing at work, something she is proud of. Successes in supervisory work have also stuck in her mind.

‘Leaving HYY feels surprisingly bittersweet! I was welcomed warmly, and it feels like I have known many colleagues for a longer time than I do. The five months I spent as the chief financial and service officer have gone by very quickly’, Aino sums up her feelings about leaving HYY.