With 15,300 coworkers, someone working solo is never really alone in their field. Because in a company the size and make of Visma, there’s always someone facing similar challenges and experiencing similar wins. That’s why our peer-to-peer communities – overlapping companies, countries, and time zones – are essential to our success. And those peer-to-peer communities would not be possible without our Champions: colleagues with knowledge of and experience with a specific competence, who dedicate time to help their peers with questions and challenges.
In this series, we interview Champions of our different communities and discuss what sparked their interest in becoming a Champion and helping others. Today, Hana Burianova, UX Lead at Visma Aquila Oy, and Andreas Stensson, Domain Expert at Visma SPCS, tell their stories.
How and why did you become a Champion?
Hana: “When I started working at Visma, I browsed our intranet and the information on peer-to-peer communities piqued my interest. I had connected with Amanda, a UX community lead, a few times and she proposed the idea of becoming a Champion. After a chat with a colleague who’s also a Champion for the community, I decided that I like the idea of offering help on a bigger scale within Visma. I mainly offer advice and help on the topics of continuous discovery and strategy.“
Andreas: “I heard about the Champion role through a colleague, who inspired me to reach out to the former UX community lead. I’ve worked with UX in several roles within my company. What if someone who’s working one floor below me is going through the same challenges I went through 10 years ago, but has no one to spar with? I can help them gain a new perspective, or just share what I think makes sense. That was, and still is, my main motivation to be a Champion.”
How have you helped your community so far?
Hana: “I’m catering to my strength by hosting presentations on UX strategy and a more in-depth session about the strategy in our company. I’ve also done more hands-on sessions with a few designers to help them implement new UX strategies. I know that sometimes the first steps can be the hardest, so I sit down with them and share advice and templates. It’s only been a handful of people that have reached out so far, but even if I have helped one colleague, I’m satisfied.”
Andreas: “Funnily enough, I had someone reach out to me three days after becoming a Champion. In SPCS we work with something called Visma Value Loop, an efficient way of working for UX teams. I sat down with two Business Analysts who were interested in the Value Loop and recognised a lot of their struggles because I went through the exact same before implementing this way of working. I really felt like I could offer some useful insights, which was very rewarding.”
What do you get out of being a Champion?
Hana: “I’m good at what I do and I enjoy sharing my knowledge with others. Also, whenever I talk to another designer who might ask questions, it engages me to think more deeply and expand my knowledge. I’m already sharing my knowledge with designers in our company – why not expand that to designers across Visma?”
Andreas: “On one hand, I enjoy the constant learning cycle. I like to deep dive into topics and share my findings with the community, so that I’m also learning as I teach. On the other hand, I love the connections I’ve built through being a Champion. I’ve met people that I didn’t know before, even ones working in the same office building. Plus, Visma keeps growing, so I believe that it’s really important to stay in touch with your peers.”
Would you recommend being a Champion?
Hana: “Yes, especially if you feel confident in your field! You’re lowering the barrier for learning and sharing knowledge. You get to help others and learn new things at the same time.”
Andreas: “Definitely. You don’t need to be a specialist, or have all the knowledge in the world. I myself know a little bit about a lot of things, and yet I am a Champion and really enjoying it!”