When the Vice President of TBWA Helsinki, Marco Mäkinen, was growing up, “nobody did any real work” in his family. His father, Timo Mäkinen, was a rally driver, and the only job he saw besides rally drivers was reporters. His Swedish teacher encouraged him to write, and it was obvious to him that writing would figure in his future one way or another.

Marco Mäkinen has found his education in the humanities to be tremendously useful in his work. He feels the problem isn’t so much the content of education in the humanities, which provides students with excellent tools for business life, but rather that corporations don't understand the value of a humanities degree.

Marco Mäkinen wrote his Master's thesis on the non-fiction novel and narrative frameworks. His thesis for his minor, comparative literature, was something completely different: Kun veri täyttää tyhjyyden: Bret Easton Ellisin American Psycho ('When blood fills the emptiness: American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis').

My best memories from the University of Helsinki deal with books and with the teachers who encouraged me to read. Esa Saarinen led me to philosophy, Pertti Seppänen to classical Chinese literature, Sara Heinämaa to women’s studies, Outi Nyytäjä to drama.

I feel I have found my vocation. It's my mission to help people, and through them companies, to succeed, to achieve what they aspire to. Too often we Finns leave things undone, fail to reach high enough, and therefore fail to achieve the success or happiness we long for.