Why STEM Needs Social Science for Tech Adoption

Please share a short biography

I am a researcher, lawyer and designer at VTT, the Technical Research Centre of Finland. I have two Master's level degrees, one in Law and the other in Industrial Design and New Media. In my current work, I combine legal and business expertise through design into technology development. This is not the most usual combination of skills, but very useful for tasks relating to technological research and development.

Please provide a short overview of your job and its relation to STEM. What is your current job? What is the field about?

My current work at VTT revolves around researching legal, business and governance issues for instance relating to the building of future economy based on data and other intellectual assets. I provide input for the STEM-focused technology development from SSH-perspectives (e.g. legal and business aspects) to ensure that new technology is adopted by organisations and transformed into new business and services, in other words ensuring that technology creates positive impact in the society.

Who or what inspired you to follow this career path / start this job?

I got inspired by all the colleagues and projects around me at VTT. The combinations of technological and societal aspects are immense in research organisations like VTT. I was amazed by the number of different combinations of STEM and SSH research opportunities present in VTT’s research environment.

What does your typical working day look like?

My typical working day involves generating frameworks and infographics for managing e.g. open assets and data sharing, building tools for technology transfer and knowledge valorisation; exploring multifaceted use cases, establishing building blocks for European data spaces; researching how data spaces, data marketplaces and trusted data exchange can evolve to fully functioning data markets – to name some. In projects, I work with people from different backgrounds and different disciplines and the work is highly iterative and often evolves to unexpected directions.

Please give an overview of your study path and how you got into this career. If you could start all over again, how you would change the career path? Has there been an educational experience (formal/informal/traineeship/...) that helped you? Did your colleagues follow similar study and career paths?

First, I studied Law and worked for several years as a technology lawyer. At some point, I decided to broaden my expertise to Design, and studied first Industrial Design and then New Media. And I have to say that I would not change anything in my study or career path. During my career at VTT, I have had the chance to develop my skills to multiple directions. This has provided me a path where I can follow my curiosity, where-ever it takes me.

What are the professional & personal key skills needed to do your job?

Some of the core skills that I use constantly are Curiosity, Creativity and Problem-solving. I work often with wicked problems where you never know what type of answer you will find. Solving the problem requires also a lot of Active listening and Collaboration and a lot of iteration as it involves a lot of stakeholders and the challenges are systemic. In addition, as resolving the problem at hand requires working in the intersection of technology, business or legal issues, the tasks require Translation, meaning for example that the language of the engineers need to be translated into the language of lawyers and vice versa.

What types of jobs & industry sectors can you work in, with your skills?

With my background and skills, I could work in any technical field or industry sector. And I often do, the sector can be health, transport or energy, you name it.

What are the main challenges in your job?

The main challenge in my work is the broad and deep nature of the work. At the same time, you need to delve into very different technological fields, establish a common understanding, learn to understand all sides of the case and produce something tangible and practical to help in driving the systemic change towards real-world application.

What is your advice to students?

Follow what interests you the most, and you will find unexpected paths.

How can teachers and parents support their students / children?

Encourage curiosity and multidisciplinary ways of working.