The Finnish Ombudsman for Children and other partners launched their yearly campaign for children’s rights known as Childrens Rights Week. The purpose of the campaign was to spread good practices for a more family-friendly working life and strengthen the understanding of a child- and family-friendly working life as a matter for society as a whole. The aim was to raise awareness among employers for a more family-friendly workplace. The ombudsman’s task is to act to strengthen the position and rights of children throughout society. The activities of the Ombudsman for Children are based on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Children. (Lapsiasiavaltuutettu/Ombudsman for Children 2022)

What did our day look like?

The day began with an Oivan Kids breakfast board meeting where we discussed the matters at hand aka. what their parents do for work at Oivan. The children came to the conclusion, that a lot of what their parents actually do for work was new to them. Most had thought that adults go to work to drink coffee and meet with friends. After some talks about what work that actually goes on at Oivan, all the children were eager to see their parents in action, working. The children first drew pictures of what they initially thought was ‘their parent working’, and then went to see if the pictures aligned with what they had drawn. Needless to say, some parents were very surprised with the perceived pictures of coffee cups and sunbeds.

The day went on with teaching the kids about design and engineering through building marshmallow-spaghetti towers, designing their own look for a logo and creating things with Legos. We set up a fun gaming corner for the kids where they were able to play some games through cutting edge VR goggles, this was the highlight of the day.

Throughout the day, we talked about general topics such as why parents need to work, how parents could share more about their job with their children and deeper into topics about rights and what it means to have rights as a child.

What do children’s rights mean to our employee’s kids? Here are their answers.

• Having a home
• Having food
• Having a jacket when it’s cold
• Having the right to say yes and no

Oivan was one of over 800 other companies taking part in Take Your Kids to Work Day to build a more family-friendly workplace! We wish to create an even more child- and family-friendly workplace together and nurture the caring culture and environment that we already have.