Meet the FinLeap-Team: Mari Saarmann, Head of BI

Mari Saarman is Head of Business Intelligence at FinLeap. She joined the company builder in September 2015.

Riding her bike to work every morning prepares Mari for a day full of charts, data, and insights. Her passionate and driven personality gives her the ability to perform complex statistical analysis to ensure every process in the company is optimized and aligned and set to measure the progress of FinLeap and its ventures. Through her excitement about Business Intelligence, she is able to connect to the right customers and marketing channels for our products.

Mari joined the FinLeap family in September 2015 after she heard about the job opportunity through a good friend of hers. Reluctant at first, because of her stable previous job, but still interested in the diversity the company builder has to offer, Mari decided to apply and join FinLeap. She believes FinLeap is unique, because it helps ventures grow and exemplifies how business intelligence can be applied to different companies with different business models. She accepts that the Fintech world is changing fast, so she accepts the challenge to stay up-to-date with the changing technologies and methodologies. She knows that in order to provide customers with successful and useful products, the companies need to know which data has to be tracked and analyzed from her collection. We spoke to Mari about her experiences at FinLeap over some of her favorite “good barista coffee”.

FinLeap.com: What is the most interesting part of your job?

Mari: I am excited when the data is driving new and sometimes unexpected insights which teach us much about our business and our customers. I consider Business Intelligence a creative work to find rational answers and support our decision-making processes. I very much like the quote by William E. Deming, “Without data you are just another person with an opinion” because although hearing others’ opinions can give inspiration for further analysis, data can disprove or prove something completely unexpected.

FinLeap.com: Have you seen any interesting developments in your job over the time you have been in FinLeap?

Mari: I have only recently joined FinLeap. Over the past few years, however, I have seen the growth in Business Intelligence both in the availability of tools and in the increased importance of BI departments inside companies. I expect to see an increase in insights the data can reveal in FinLeap and more importantly in our ventures.

FinLeap.com: What is the best part of working for FinLeap?

Mari: First, the people. The atmosphere in the company is great as I find colleagues that are ambitious, challenging, and supportive. For me, people recognizing the importance of my work is a great motivational factor. Second, I love the challenge of my position as I discover the best ways for us to grow and support ventures.

Mari specifically likes one current trend in business intelligence, which is to be making data more visual and giving the stakeholders the tools to ask the data their own questions. This allows everyone to benefit from the information and improve their work based on it. At the same time, privately, Mari leads an adventurous life as she travels across Europe every weekend, runs marathons, does yoga and even sings in a choir.