Naval architect Kalle Tuomaala has built a meaningful career at MacGregor

Sales Director Kalle Tuomaala, who studied naval engineering and ship building, joined MacGregor, a producer of hatch covers and ship cranes, in 2001. During the years, he has worked as a designer and naval architect and held various sales positions, rotating between different ship types.

“A large, global actor such as MacGregor offers many interesting, international career opportunities without having to change employers – not to mention Cargotec, which is a huge, global corporation,” Kalle says.

One of Cargotec’s strategic focus areas is customer centricity. From Kalle’s point of view, customer centricity is self-evident. “Being customer oriented is the only option as I’m in constant contact with shipyards, shipowners and internal customers around the world. It is my job to figure out what our customers need and together find the best possible solutions for them.”

At MacGregor, Kalle is responsible for the sales of hatch covers, deck cranes and related services. To help us better understand the scale of the solutions he’s talking about, he makes an example: “Hatch covers, for example, of which there are several onboard one ship, can be as big as a football pitch or even bigger. Our cranes lift cargoes of 25 to 45 tonnes from 40 metres away.“

Before joining MacGregor, Kalle was already somewhat familiar with the industry. His educational background led him to work at shipyards and at various industrial plants. “During my studies, I worked at ABB, Raisio and Meyer Turku, which was called Masa-Yards back then. I applied for a job at MacGregor and got a summer job first and then a permanent position after I graduated,” Kalle says. During his years at MacGregor, he has learned to know all three ship types: bulk, container and general cargo ships. Kalle appreciates the versatility of his job.

“I have been at one job for a couple of years before moving to a slightly different, but related position. It’s been great to be able to changes jobs internally without having to change employers, too. When you change employers, it takes a long time to adapt to a new culture and way of working, which leaves you less time to focus on the actual job itself.”

At MacGregor, Kalle says, career progression is one of the topics at each development discussion, and supervisors provide full support for people who wish to move forward in their careers.

“The most important thing, however, is one’s own attitude and wish to proceed. Of course, new opportunities don’t show up just like that – it’s important to make your wishes known and seize the moment when it comes. At our company, job rotation is not an exception, it’s something that is genuinely available for everyone,” Kalle sums up.