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Cooperation can be used to ensure the smooth flow of information and build functional digital solutions, such as for presenting the educational offering. Everything is founded upon a strong mutual trust.
Close national cooperation is needed to smoothly link the continuous learning solutions developed by Digivisio to the study information systems used by higher education institutions. Digivisio has joined forces with the Peppi consortium and Funidata, which is responsible for the development of the Sisu system. The trio shares a common goal: they all want to offer higher education institutions the best possible digital solutions.
“That’s why it’s important that we have a common vision. We avoid doing things that overlap or are on the wrong schedule,” explains Hanna Nordlund, Programme Director for Digivisio.
The cooperation got off to a good start a couple of years ago, when all 37 of the higher education institutions in Digivisio had formed a shared view of the project progress and it was time to start concrete work. At the same time, Mikko Myllys, CEO of Funidata, and Pasi Hotari, Executive Director of the Peppi consortium, began their duties. The benefits of forming closer relationships was quickly revealed.
“It makes complete sense to keep each other up to speed on what is happening,” says Myllys.
Strategic discussions and solving everyday problems
Initially, the three different organizations did not have much in the way of shared discussion forums, but the situation has changed rapidly. At the moment, representatives of Digivisio, the Peppi consortium and Funidata create a shared situational picture, such as in roundtable discussions and in the Digivisio coordination group.
“We’ve been heading in the right direction the whole time,” Hotari confirms.
There is also cooperation in dealing with the burning questions of the day. For example, it might be an exchange of messages between the developers and product owners of different organizations – joint Teams and Slack channels have been created for this purpose, and the solution has turned out to be a functional one.
“Whenever there is a question, the answers come in quite quickly,” explains Myllys.
The trio also synchronizes its roadmaps and cooperates in scheduling different interface projects. This ensures that the necessary Peppi and Sisu integrations are ready when Digivisio introduces new features, such as in the Opin.fi service.
Jonna Piiroinen, Programme Manager for Digivisio’s Technical Solutions and Information Security area of expertise, says that cooperation is constantly deepening.
“At the moment, we are working together to solve issues related to the provision of education: what information is mobile and in what form it should be. In the upcoming phases, we will start working together to examine the processes related to registration,” says Piiroinen.
Shared vision of the future serves higher education institutions
Although cooperation has so far focused on the near future, the trio is also interested in setting its sights a bit farther together. For example, information on what will happen in the development of Digivisio, Peppi and Sisu could be shared in three years’ time.
“It’s a good idea to go over these bigger reflections together,” says Hotari.
Nordlund believes that the trio should also build a broader, shared vision of the digitalization of higher education. For example, small learning modules and European higher education networks are currently generating a great deal of discussion.
“It’s important that we share the same idea of where higher education is going,” says Nordlund.
Trust is at the core of successful cooperation
For higher education institutions, cooperation between Digivisio, the Peppi consortium and Funidata can be seen in, for example, the improved flow of information. It will also be possible to more easily develop interoperable digital solutions. The need to join forces is not going anywhere.
“I see that we just need to deepen our cooperation,” says Hotari.
Of course, doing things together also involves daring to disagree at times. Misunderstandings can be corrected and, if necessary, a quick call can be made to a partner to investigate the matter.
“I think it shows just how good the trust is here,” states Myllys.
Everything works well from a Digivisio standpoint, as well. The discussion connection and situational picture have already developed a great deal, thus making it possible to serve higher education institutions better.
“I’m confident that we can bring our cooperation to the next level,” Nordlund sums up.