HUMANS board consist of 9 individuals from a variety of backgrounds. We share the passion and drive for human sciences and applied research.
Priyam Sharda
Chairperson of Humans
Priyam is a seasoned design and user researcher, and applies a fused lens of social science frameworks and design methods to her work. She has worked with participants and communities in 8+ countries, and within multiple research and product environments: an ethnographer and strategist on the consulting side, and as user researcher working on service design for health, mental health tech and music streaming.
Perttu Pöyhönen
Co-Chair of Humans
Perttu is a psychologist with management consulting background. An author and a co-founder of Asiakastutkimusakatemia, Perttu seeks to improve the absolute and perceived quality of experts working in customer research, as well as the general understanding of what can be achieved through taking human into account in business.
Laura Calderón Westö
Business Anthropologist & strategist
Laura is a business anthropologist with an academic background in social and cultural anthropology and a professional background in strategy consulting. She is endlessly curious about the human mind and behaviour in all its contexts. For her there is nothing more intriguing than balancing between the business problem and the human problem: to decipher and strive to understand the implicit meanings in people’s thoughts, attitudes and behaviour, learning what truly drives their actions and turning these insights into impactful business decisions and actions
Mirkka Helkkula
Mirkka is social anthropologist, designer, and former journalist with passion for driving sustainable and regenerative transitions. Mirkka holds two master’s degrees in social anthropology and service innovation and design.
She currently works as an executive producer and corporate communications consultant at Terraviestintä. Her professional experience includes working for private and public sector, as well as the Red Cross. Driven by curiosity of understanding cultures and people, Mirkka is enthusiastic about combining storytelling, qualitative research, and design to advocate for planetary and human wellbeing.
Juha Hemánus
Juha is a designer and design executive who has an extensive human-centered and narrative background – namely, he started his career as a journalist and theatre director. He later advanced to smartphone R&D and eventually moved to California to develop narrative formats for smartphone-based entertainment.
Focusing on UX/CX has given Juha very special edge vantage points in design deliveries and business missions. Juha has also run urban development projects from cultural premises – again, concentrating on resident experience. Juha strongly believes in understanding human needs as a starting point for a business value proposition.
Henriika Lindroos
Henriika is a seasoned strategic service designer and a sociologist. As an empathetic changemaker, she’s worked in all three major sectors: public, private, and NGO. She loves complicated problems which she has been privileged to tackle in different settings from the fast-moving world of genetic technology to scaling innovation culture in the poorest countries in the world. For her to be Humans is to foster the curiosity and sense of belonging.
Sakari Mesimäki
Sakari is a social anthropologist who believes that most problems can be solved with imagination and intellectual clarity – by first breaking things down and apart, and then putting them back together again in a way that reveals something new. He has worked in corporate communications in Tokyo, conducted strategic ethnography for Finnish private equity investors, and researched startup professionals, creatives, and hip hop dancers.
Chris Ryles
Chris is fascinated by the ways in which we try to make meaning in an increasingly chaotic world. Applying thinking from semiotics, design strategy, and speculative fiction, he has helped clients from beauty to consumer tech find novel solutions to their strategic problems. When not at his desk, Chris can often be found jogging through trails around Helsinki or demonstrating an impressive lack of rhythm at Lindy Hop classes.
.
Sohvi Silius
Sohvi is a social psychologist (M.Soc.Sc.) and user researcher, currently leading User Insights at Yousician, a music technology company. Non-profits and creating communities are close to her heart, which is why she joined the HUMANS board. Sohvi is a former youth circus performer, teacher, and administrator, and continues to draw on that background for many professional skills. She enjoys reading business books, running, rope skipping, dancing – and tends to pick up a new hobby every autumn.
HUMANS 