In 2024, Wärtsilä launched its Employee Value Proposition (EVP), "Fuel Your Power," aimed at fostering a sustainable, people-centric work environment that aligns individual growth with organisational success. With over 3,000 employees hired annually in a highly competitive talent market, standing out is crucial to establishing Wärtsilä as an employer of choice.
The EVP serves as a holistic messaging framework, integrating key areas such as performance management, professional growth, and wellbeing into a clear commitment to both current employees and future talent. It is designed to attract, engage, and retain top talent, ensuring the long-term success of the organisation. The two main elements of the EVP, Growth and Impact, are reinforced by fact-based proof points, highlighting the opportunities for personal development and making a meaningful contribution — critical factors in convincing talent to join and stay with Wärtsilä.
The MyVoice employee engagement survey results indicate that 81% of all employees wish to stay at Wärtsilä for longer than three years. This is 14.8 pp above global benchmark, and as such is our top scoring item against the global benchmark.
'Creating an inclusive culture that drives engagement and performance' is one of the priorities in our People Strategy.
Inclusion is a state of being valued, respected, and supported for what you are. It is about focusing on people’s needs and ensuring that the right conditions are in place for each person to achieve their full potential. At Wärtsilä we value, respect, and embrace diversity and inclusion (D&I). We are proud of having a diverse representation of nationalities and cultures at all levels, departments, and functions of the organisation. Currently, our workforce comprises some 130 nationalities.
Diversity and inclusion are not merely derived from words of encouragement – they need to be supported by actions. Wärtsilä has created a variety of actions and methods, ranging from recognising unconscious bias and prejudice, learning from the diverse cultures of our people, to building cross-functional teams that increase our cognitive diversity and strengthen our ability to innovate.
Wellbeing is a core driver of human sustainability, helping people grow resilient, healthier, and more skilled. With us, you can be your authentic self, find meaning in your work, and maintain balance through smart prioritization and healthy boundaries. Our global wellbeing framework focuses on six elements: organisation & work, leadership, sense of belonging, learn & grow, safety and healthy lifestyle. The goal is to enhance employees' mental, social, and physical wellbeing by embedding wellbeing into our culture, ensuring a safe and caring workplace.
Wärtsilä's Performance Management drives business success by setting performance goals that are aligned to the strategic goals of the organisation reviewing and assessing progress, removing obstacles, and taking action when required ensuring continuous dialogue and feedback and developing the knowledge, skills, and abilities of employees. The Performance and Development Dialogue Process links The Wärtsilä Way and our purpose with the strategic business priorities to team and individual performance and development. The process starts at the beginning of the year when the performance and development goals are set. Through dialogue, the Line Manager and employee build a common understanding of how the employee's work and individual goals contribute to team and business success.
Everyone deserves to have clarity on what is expected of them in their roles i.e., what good performance looks like. The goal setting dialogue is followed by discussions and feedback throughout the year and ends with a Performance and Development Review. Well-defined development goals with clear action plans, also referred to as Individual Development Plans, support all employees in knowing how they can develop their competences and skills.
At Wärtsilä, we develop leaders that are engaged in the strategy and equipped to drive team and individual performance. We promote continuous improvement where everyone is empowered and understands their contribution to The Wärtsilä Way. ‘Build leadership for impact’ is one of the priorities in our People Strategy.
The Wärtsilä Leadership Model supports strategic growth by outlining the desired leadership behaviours. The model consists of three areas with 15 descriptive leadership qualities. The model provides Wärtsilä leaders with direction and guidance on how to collaborate, communicate, and lead in different situations.
In 2023, an eLearning on the Leadership Model was developed, it is available in 12 languages and available for all Wärtsilä employees. All Line Managers are requested to complete it and at the end of 2024, 89% of all Line Managers had completed it. The expected outcome of this eLearning is to strengthen the leadership behaviours by building a thorough understanding of the model and knowing how to apply the behaviours.
The key leadership development programmes – Orchestrator, Accelerator, and Wärtsilä Leader, are essential for bringing the leadership behaviours to life, thereby supporting the leaders in acquiring the desired competences.
In 2024, a new interactive key leadership development programme ‘Driving High-Performance Culture Workshops’ was globally rolled out, the implementation continues in 2025-2026. The goal of the programme is to embed a performance-driven mindset across Wärtsilä by equipping Line Managers with the tools, mindset, and practices needed to lead with clarity, dialogue, and strategic alignment. In the workshops Line Managers learn more about Wärtsilä’s renewed Performance Management approach and its connection to The Wärtsilä Way. Through different exercises they get the opportunity to practice having impactful performance & development dialogues, to set performance and development goals linked to strategy, to give feedback, and all in all to get more confident in leading own team. Globally, 1494 out of 2606 (57%) Line Managers participated in the programme.
One of the expected long-term impacts of the programme ‘Driving High-Performance Culture Workshops’ is to achieve Wärtsilä’s new long-term sustainability target of 100% Individual Development Plan (IDP) coverage for the eligible population by 2027. This goal is critical for Wärtsilä’s Professional Growth approach. In 2024, the coverage percentage of the IDP was 57.8%, and through the ‘Driving High-Performance Culture Workshops’ programme, we believe it will increase greatly during the coming years. Thereto, the programme aims at reducing employee turnover and increasing internal career mobility. In 2024, the promotion rate at Wärtsilä was 7.4%, implying that employees can advance their careers and develop their competences internally. In addition to promotions, employees can move between businesses and functions to progress their careers. The organisational mobility rate was 1.2% in 2024. All in all, the programme is pivotal for Wärtsilä in achieving the strategic priority; ‘Developing high-performance teams that make a difference’.
In Wärtsilä’s employee engagement survey, the favourability score for the statement ‘I have good opportunities to learn and develop at this company’ is impressive. The score has steadily been improving, and from 2020 to 2024 it grew by 21.3 percentage points (pp). 80% of Wärtsilä employees say that they agree or strongly agree with the statement, this is 6.9 pp above the global external benchmark. Wärtsilä’s work on implementing a common leadership model gives tangible results.
A learning organisation is a state of being, where each of us commits to learning, unlearning, sharing, and improving. Wärtsilä is on a journey to become a learning organisation, to stay competitive and innovative, and to inspire our people to make a difference. Wärtsilä wants to empower its people to stay curious and develop their competences. Learning is a continuous process and not a single event. The 70-20-10 learning principle guide us in how to learn effectively, we learn by doing (70%), by sharing (20%) and by studying (10%). Learning is both personal and social. For social learning, we embrace coaching, mentoring, and networks as we believe they will drive continuous learning, development and knowledge exchange.
Wärtsilä continues to build its coaching and mentoring capabilities to foster an open culture where growth and development are valued. Coaching and mentoring provide several benefits to the organisation, such as supporting people to unlock their potential, building relationships and collaboration between colleagues, enabling cross-functional transfer of knowledge, fostering leadership and professional growth, as well as expanding professional networks and communities of expertise within the organisation.
Coaching has many touchpoints to the overall organisation’s development. It has been seen and is seen as an important underpinning leadership competence supporting the leadership model and strategy execution, but not only that. Coaching is crucial in the performance and talent management processes, where we require line managers to have meaningful coaching conversations about performance and development.
Wärtsilä follows the International Coaching Federation coaching competence requirements and practices, offers robust coaching competence development to internal coaches, leaders and line managers, and fosters a coaching community for over 50 internal coaches. Leadership coaching is offered for all employees, both with external and internal coaches. Coaching is also integral part of the key leadership programmes. Company follows the 70-20-10 learning principle, where 70% of learning is by doing, 20% by sharing (coaching & mentoring included here), and 10% by studying.
Since 2021, Wärtsilä has systematically built a mentoring culture through a series of strategic initiatives and programs encouraging Wärtsilians to start mentoring relationships, which are mentee-driven, with mentors offering their time, experience, and insights to help mentees explore new perspectives and strengthen their capabilities. This exchange is built on openness, appreciation, and confidentiality. The Wärtsilä Mentoring Playbook serves as a practical and motivational guide for both mentors and mentees. The Playbook democratizes access to mentoring by making it easier for employees to initiate and sustain mentoring relationships — both formal and informal.
In 2024, there were three formal mentoring programmes, with 139 mentor/mentee pairs. 21 mentees participated in the Catalyst group mentoring programme where Board of Management members act as mentors. Beyond formal structures, informal mentoring relationships are encouraged.
Networks, communities of practitioners, and cross-functional teams play an important role in building a learning organisation. Wärtsilä takes pride in the internally established networks of practitioners where people who have common expertise and goals come together to learn, solve problems, improve practices, and innovate. These communities are distinct from formal organizational structures and are often cross-functional, enabling knowledge flow across business lines and boundaries.
The Sustainable Technology Hub in the energy cluster of the Vaasa region, Finland is a true example of how Wärtsilä has been able to build a hub with a unique approach to collaboration and innovation, involving Wärtsilä experts, as well as customers, technology partners, academia, and the surrounding ecosystem.
There are several communities of practitioners at Wärtsilä. To mention a few, the Agile Community, with ~400 people, not only brings the agile practitioners together but also welcomes anyone who wants to learn more about the agile ways of working and initiate an agile transformation within own team or organisation. Agile is a development approach that helps teams deliver value to customers fast and continuously, as well as respond to change and succeed in an uncertain environment. Agile is not just a method or process, it is a mindset building a culture of continuous improvement.
In 2023, the Wärtsilä Continuous Improvement model was launched, it is built on values, principles, and methods that lead us to continuously improving how we serve our customers, meet their needs, and together create impactful results. The Continuous Improvement Sharing Network is an important element of the overall framework. The Sharing Network brings people together to learn about continuous improvement best practices and to share Wärtsilä’s own cases where we can see a direct impact on flow improvement and customer value creation. The sessions are arranged monthly and are open to all employees interested in learning more about continuous improvement in practice and tune in to reflect and share own experiences. Each session usually has ~200 participants.
Wärtsilä started its digitalisation journey many years ago. Today, our focus is on strengthening the foundation for digital technologies and data to accelerate digitalisation in line with our purpose: ‘Enabling sustainable societies through innovation in technology and services’.
The commitment to further enhance the digital, data, and AI capabilities in the Businesses and Group Functions is strong, several initiatives across Wärtsilä showcase the importance of supporting employees to adapt to new digital tools, processes, and technologies within the workplace.
The AI Adoption Program is part of Wärtsilä’s broader digital transformation strategy. The program aims at building both foundational and advanced skills in AI and Microsoft 365 Copilot. It is crucial to democratize knowledge on AI and its application. This is done by providing hands-on learning opportunities to grow AI fluency and enhance the overall digital competences within Wärtsilä.
The AI Champions Network and Hackathons foster a culture of innovation. The AI Champions Network consists of a group of selected employees acting as internal ambassadors to accelerate AI adoption, drive innovation and efficiency, as well as support colleagues in applying AI to their own projects and work.
Wärtsilä has for many years arranged hackathons. The hackathons are dynamic, cross-functional innovation events designed to tackle real-world challenges with creativity, collaboration, and cutting-edge technology. A prominent example of this, is the latest GenAI Hackathon that drew over 130 submissions. Seven teams were selected to brainstorm and elaborate on their ideas in the finale, and after a rigorous evaluation process, pitch for the win.
At Wärtsilä there is a wide learning offering on digital, data, AI, analytics, cyber security, data protection and privacy. The common aim for these is to build digital competences across Wärtsilä to increase efficiency, productivity, and support Wärtsilians on our digitalisation journey.
Wärtsilä employees attended a total of 16.3 formal learning hours per employee in 2024. The average amount spent on formal training and development per employee headcount was EUR 647 in 2024. However, it is important to recognise that a large part of learning takes place during the everyday flow of work, and not in formal training. Wärtsilä prides itself on offering numerous opportunities for its people to learn and develop in accordance with the 70-20-10 learning principle. Most learning takes place outside the classroom and cannot, therefore, be measured in terms of conventional training hours or learning days. As the programmes and activities described above have been created and are being run as a part of many employees’ working time, it is not possible to state their exact costs. The trainings and programmes available, also cover contractual or part time employees in Wärtsilä’s own workforce.
In the table below further learning data is found.
| Training hours / employee | 2024 |
| By gender | |
| All employees | 16.3 |
| Male | 17.0 |
| Female | 13.6 |
| By age group | |
| Under 30 years | 18.2 |
| 30-50 | 17.3 |
| Over 50 years | 13.3 |
| By management level | |
| Junior / low level | 16.5 |
| Middle level | 20.5 |
| Senior / top management level | 28.3 |
| By type of training, % | |
| Face-to-Face Session | 29.6% |
| Virtual Session | 16.3% |
| Self-Paced Online | 39.3% |
| On The Job, Assessment, Blended | 2.2% |
| Not known | 12.6% |
| Total | 100% |
Primary nationalities represented in Wärtsilä's workforce, 2024
Total workforce (as % of total workforce) | All management positions, including junior, middle and senior management (as % of total management workforce) | |
| Finnish | 23.7% | 39.3% |
| Indian | 5.6% | 5.0% |
| Italian | 5.2% | 6.4% |
| Chinese | 4.7% | 2.6% |
| Dutch | 4.7% | 5.7% |
| German | 4.6% | 3.6% |
Share of women in total workforce (as % of total workforce) | 18.8% |
Share of women in all management positions, including junior, middle and top management (as % of total management positions) | 18.3% |
Share of women in junior management positions, i.e. first level of management (as % of total junior management positions) | 17.8% |
Share of women in top management positions, i.e. maximum two levels away from the CEO or comparable positions (as % of total top management positions) | 23.1% |
Share of women in management positions in revenue-generating functions as % of all such managers (i.e. excluding support functions) | 14.3% |