Veiko Valkiainen

Veiko Valkiainen serves as a Junior Research Fellow in Management at the University of Tartu's Faculty of Social Sciences, School of Economics and Business Administration. His current appointment runs from March 2024 to August 2026 at full-time capacity, following previous appointments at both full-time and half-time capacity since February 2022. Alongside his academic position, he operates Valkiainen Konsultatsioonid OÜ as a leadership coach and trainer.

Valkiainen is actively pursuing his PhD at the University of Tartu under the supervision of Krista Jaakson, having commenced his doctoral studies on August 30, 2021. His dissertation research examines Leadership under Holacracy: Investigating Holacracy through the Self-Determination Theory Framework. His educational background includes a Master of Arts with distinction in Cultural Studies from Central European University (1998-1999), a Bachelor's degree in Psychology from Tallinn Pedagogical University (1994-1998), and unfinished doctoral studies in Social Psychology at the University of Helsinki (1999-2000).

Dr. Valkiainen's research centers on Holacracy as an alternative organizational structure, investigating how this radical self-management system impacts leadership, organizational culture, and employee motivation. His work integrates theoretical perspectives from Institutional Theory, Complexity Theory, and Self-Determination Theory to develop comprehensive frameworks for understanding non-hierarchical organizational models. He examines how Holacracy affects leader identity formation, organizational culture development, and the practical implementation challenges organizations face when adopting this management approach.

His publication record reveals a focused research trajectory examining Holacracy from multiple angles through book chapters, conference papers, and journal articles. Recent work analyzes Holacracy's potential as an organizational design option for dynamic environments, its impact on basic human needs satisfaction, and the longitudinal process of Holacracy adoption in organizations. His scholarship combines theoretical development with empirical case studies, particularly qualitative analyses of real-world Holacracy implementations.

• Principal investigator on the ongoing project "Ethical Organisational Culture: Multi-level Analysis of its Determinants, Practices and Consequences" (2022-2025), funded by the Estonian Research Council with 669,725 EUR
• Team member on the completed "Research of Estonian Management 2021" project (2021-2022), funded by Enterprise Estonia with 42,370 EUR

Dr. Valkiainen brings substantial practical experience to his academic research, having served in senior HR and management roles across diverse sectors including banking (Eesti Pank), energy (Eesti Energia AS), entertainment (Olympic Entertainment Group), and IT. This industry experience spanning over two decades informs his scholarly investigation of alternative organizational structures and leadership models, providing valuable practitioner insights to complement his theoretical work.