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Eero Laitila
Managing products & facilitating teams - here to separate the essential from the noise, turn ideas into reality and ease your pain
Eero Laitila, Senior Product Owner at Haiilo
Eero Laitila is a Senior Product Owner at Haiilo, a company based in Helsinki, Finland.1 He has over 915 followers and 500+ connections on LinkedIn.1
Some key facts about Eero Laitila:
- He recently accepted the Executional Excellence of the Year Award at Haiilo's annual gala2
- Prior to his current role, he worked as a Backend Developer for 3 months3
- He has experience managing products and facilitating teams46
- He is passionate about separating the essential from the noise in his work46
In addition to his professional work, Eero Laitila seems to have an interest in local politics. There is a mention of a book he criticized called "Idiootit ympärilläni" (Idiots Around Me) in one of his LinkedIn posts from 2020.5 He is also listed as the chairman of the election committee for the city of Laitila, Finland.7
Highlights
Here’s a picture of me accepting the Executional Excellence of the Year Award in our annual Haiilo gala that took place a month ago.
A long time ago I decided I don’t want to compromise who I am as a person in my professional life. That has meant that I don’t fit into every organisation. I have strong views on what makes sense in contemporary working life and what doesn’t. I’ve given the “wrong answer” in numerous job interviews, knowing it is probably not what the interviewer wants to hear, and will probably cost me the job. But if they don’t get it, I wouldn’t want to be there anyway.
In some places my opinions might be seen as negative or counterproductive to the team. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth. I want myself and everyone around me to be better and do better, and that doesn’t happen if conflicts are avoided and things are not challenged. I try to always find the essential and remove the noise, and believe me, there is a lot of noise. Sometimes you naturally wonder if it’s worth it, staying true to principles that might not matter to anyone but yourself and in the worst case, hindering your own career progress.
That’s why it feels extra good to hear that “constructively challenging the status quo” is considered a plus and thought of as leadership. That was one of the things mentioned in the reasons for this award.
And I do feel it too. Haiilo is definitely the place where I’ve felt most confident expressing my views, knowing that I’m heard and met with respect. That’s why you can go all Gene Simmons on the stage with the whole C-level rallying behind you.
📸 : Mareike Gravenhorst
My hot take for digital fatigue: it is possible to learn to not let constant notifications wear you out. Digital fatigue is very much a real thing and can't be solved with that one fix (this blog post has many other good fixes), but this one thing I think is key. It is super weird to watch intelligent people let their flows constantly be broken by whatever nonsense notification pops up on whatever screen.
It's kind of like the regular comment on the runway of RuPaul's Drag Race: you have to wear the outfit, not let the outfit wear you. In the same fashion, you have to use the technology, it cannot be using you.
See the blog for more professional, less Drag-Racey tips on managing digital fatigue!
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Mesh works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Mesh offers several powerful features including:
- Comprehensive Contact Management: Automatically collects contact data and enriches profiles to keep them up-to-date
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
- Home Feed: Displays updates about your network including job changes, news mentions, and birthdays
- Groups: Organizes contacts into meaningful categories
- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Mesh is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
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Mesh takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Mesh encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Mesh work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Mesh is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Mesh is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Mesh is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Mesh offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Mesh offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Mesh for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Mesh accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Mesh offers extensive integration capabilities. Mesh introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Mesh supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Mesh also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
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Mesh is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Mesh stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Mesh excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Mesh is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Mesh offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Mesh's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Mesh has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Mesh is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Mesh beneficial.
Mesh offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Mesh offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Mesh's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Mesh offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Mesh focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Mesh also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Mesh offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
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Mesh is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
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