In 2025, Sanoma Media Finland launched a completely new leadership development programme designed to strengthen leadership of its digital growth strategy. A key element of the programme was ensuring its impact—both in learning outcomes and in day-to-day behavioural change.
“Last autumn, we put customer centricity into practice across the entire company based on an initiative that emerged from the programme: every Sanoma employee was encouraged to meet a customer and gather feedback. The programme also prompted us to update our shared, wellfunctioning leadership promises,” says Hanna Johde, Director of Communications and Learning at Sanoma Media Finland.
A new kind of leadership programme driving strategy and everyday change: Three themes, 10 podcasts, 50 growth group sessions, 150 everyday changes
Sanoma Media Finland began designing the new leadership programme by examining its strategy: what capabilities and qualities does digital growth and transformation leadership require from leaders? In collaboration with Aalto University Executive Education and Professional Development (Aalto EE) and Skillcode, this led to the creation of the Leaders of Digital Growth programme, built to deliver impact on multiple levels.
More than 50 leaders with a clear role in driving digital growth were selected to participate. The programme content was shaped not only by the company’s strategy and leadership competencies, but also by the specific needs of participants. The first season focused on customer centricity, the second one on leading together, and the third one moved closer to the core of personal leadership—interaction and performance.
Each season included a training day, podcasts, shared frameworks and tools, and growth group sessions where learnings were applied to everyday work. Participants also committed to concrete behavioural changes aligned with each season’s theme. In addition, every leader received a personalised development report based on a digital growth leadership profile.
“The programme was naturally designed to strengthen leadership skills, but nothing truly changes unless learning is reflected in everyday actions. That’s why, in addition to participant experience and learning outcomes, we also set metrics for behavioural change and how well the strategy was carried out in the business,” Hanna Johde says.
Bringing the themes to life every day
The results of the programme are great: capabilities increased across all nine areas monitored throughout the programme. For example, skills in leading a culture of agile learning and piloting grew by 21%, while abilities related to customer value and digital transformation leadership increased by 11%.
Participant experience was measured using indicators such as willingness to recommend. The programme’s NPS was an excellent 55.
Behavioural change was monitored through the number of commitments made—nearly 150 in total. These commitments covered themes such as more customer-centric leadership, the use of shared frameworks and tools, improved leadership practices, enhanced interaction, and the use of AI in leadership. Most commitments have already been brought into everyday practice. The programme’s impact is visible more broadly as well.
“Last autumn, the entire organisation practised customer centricity based on an initiative that emerged from the programme: everyone at Sanoma was encouraged to meet a customer and collect feedback. We also updated our shared leadership promises to better support the strategy in a constantly evolving operating environment and a new leadership context,” Hanna Johde concludes.
