Finnish National Opera and Ballet

INTRODUCTION

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When Falcony was selected as a partner, Director of Security Services Samuli Nuutinen had clear expectations: “The most important thing in the decision making was that we won’t select a tool that we won’t use. I wanted to become convinced that the tool can be developed along the way since we couldn’t know all our eventual needs beforehand. Falcony stood out with their implementation and usage with mobile devices.”

The Finnish National Opera and Ballet has many kinds of workspaces and duties. The workers are the top of their branches, from ballerinas to set designers and from shoemakers to metal workers. The number of people and workers varies with the performed works.

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COMPANY

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The Finnish National Opera and Ballet offers opera and ballet performances as well as other events for audiences of all ages. There are usually four new opera premieres and three ballet premieres in a year.

‍As for number of workers, The Finnish National Opera and Ballet is a medium-sized company. They have about 550 salaried staff, a varying number of workers paid by the hour depending on the performances, and a lot of visiting artists from both Finland and abroad.

The Opera started to operate in 1911, and the Ballet was founded 11 years later in 1922.

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CHALLENGES BEFORE

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Before taking Falcony application into operation, critical observations and accidents were recorded in Excel, and the relevant people handled the results manually. Other observations were done by emailing or simply giving notes of paper to the manager or the person in charge. This created a lot of manual work for the people in charge of the operations.

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SOLUTION

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With about 200 users at the moment, The Finnish National Opera and Ballet now uses Falcony especially to take care of the safety of their workers. “Most of the accidents happen on stage, so we started from there,” Nuutinen said. “After that, we factored in the stage property room, and our goal is to extend it to other departments. As an example, we have thought of using the platform for the sound department’s fault reports.”

“When choosing a tool, our priority was user-friendliness. Nowadays, we don’t want to fill out any scraps of paper.”

With Falcony, it’s easy for workers to report different observations or accidents. One of the most important things is to select the deviation category, which enables organisations to recognise trends in their operations. “The time stamp and location will update automatically if the entry is made right after the deviation has happened,” Nuutinen said. All entries can be done with only a few clicks. “We also collect observations about good customs.”

When incy.io was put into operation, the instructions were sent to the personnel via email. “I had 10 minute briefings in the beginning of the shift. It’s easy to learn how to use Falcony even without training, but I wanted to motivate personnel to use it. The email included all the proper terms,” Nuutinen said.

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RESULTS

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According to Nuutinen, the setup was quick and easy. “The everyday usage and edits can be handled by us and we don’t need an external operator. This helps with onboarding, training and internal development. Also, the reaction times can be kept really short.”

“Of course, it hasn’t always been like a bed of roses. Some management changes were required during the onboarding process, so a few hiccups can be expected, but once it was set up, it was easy-to-use.”

‍“The most relevant thing to us is that the system is not just a bottomless pit of information, but the information is actually processed and used,” Nuutinen added. He is happy that the Falcony platform is constantly developing. “It’s not possible to know all of the needs beforehand, and on the other hand, the needs can also change. If there’s an accident or a near miss during a performance, it’s good to be able to easily check if there have been some similar events before.”

‍Falcony has increased the transparency in The Finnish National Opera and Ballet. “Safety is discussed through the line organisation. The system forces us to also report the ‘negative’ decisions,” Nuutinen described. “Now observations and development ideas won’t drown into endless email conversations.”

“When an observation is marked as closed, it’s clearly marked with what has been done and what the action has been. This is a good start, but we are still in the beginning, and our aims lie further in the future. In the end, it’s about a change in the safety culture, which takes time and demands commitment from the personnel. This user-friendly tool helps us achieve the goal, but doesn’t do the work for us.”