Niklas Bruun, professor at Hanken, new external board member at the University of Helsinki

The other newly elected external members are Ilona Herlin, Sanni Lehtinen, Mari Pantsar and Ilona Riipinen.

Bruun looks forward to the new role with great enthusiasm.

"It is an honour to receive such trust from the University of Helsinki".  

Bruun will among other things work towards less competition and contradictions between universities in Finland.

"For example, the point counting systems have for a long time been inflexible. If someone from Hanken supervises a student at the University of Helsinki or vice versa, the points go to the university where the doctoral student is defending the dissertation."

The most important thing should accordingn to Bruun be that the doctoral students receive good supervision and find their place in society. Thus, it should be possible to share the points between two institutions.

Bruun also speaks for more co-financing between the small and large universities in Finland. He has many years of experience of such cooperation in the context of  IPR University Center that is administered by Hanken. In addition, he wants to work towards less centralization.  

"Here it may be time to take a few steps back. Large units are difficult to administer. I don’t think that the University of Helsinki has too many faculties."

Bruun is also very pleased that the University of Helsinki, as a bilingual university, strives to live up to its ideals - something that the election of a Swedish-speaking, external member of the board shows.