Scrum master, speaker, diversity champion, Olympic medallist. Pär Boman has many strings to his bow. Yet, he also has an ability variation that he’s turned into a strength.
Pär was born with a cerebral palsy impairment, but it didn’t affect his abilities significantly to start with. Thanks to his parents fighting for him to attend a regular school, he enjoyed a very normal childhood. He was always a part of the team as goalkeeper when playing football, ice hockey and floorball with his friends, and his first dream was to become a professional goalkeeper for Liverpool or Bayern München When he was about six years old, he ended up in a wheelchair, but he had reached the age of eight or nine before he understood that he had an ability variation.
“It wasn’t until I was eight or nine years old that I understood that I had an ability variation. It was when I could no longer play football with my friends, and not being able to be part of that when I was included in everything else was hard,” recalls Pär.
This might be what made him decide, in 1980, to set his sights on the Paralympics. In 1984 Pär won the gold medal in the 60-metre, and silver in the 200-metre, wheelchair race at the New York Paralympics, a silver medal in the 100-metres and the bronze in the 200 metres at Seoul in 1988. We’ll get back to that later.
It’s been a fantastic journey. To reach such a goal, you have to invest vast amounts of time. That’s why it’s important to have fun on the journey towards the goal, and not always see the end goal as the most important factor.
In 1985, as a 19-year-old, Pär joined Nordea.
“It was supposed to be for one summer. I usually say that it’s been a very long summer – 37 years,” explains Pär, giving off one of his infectious laughs.
Anyone who’s ever been in contact with Pär knows that he’s a cheery, positive and optimistic sort.
He started in Markets’ back office in Stockholm and has held several roles since. These include project leader and manager, and he was also part of building the IT department where he works today as scrum master.
He’s also been deeply engaged in Nordea’s work on diversity and inclusion, such as in the Ability Variation group, where he sits on the jury. He’s also on Finansförbundet at Nordea’s central board with a focus on diversity and inclusion.
There’s no doubt about Pär’s passion in his role of diversity champion (Diversity champion: Those who are involved in the ERG work and feel passionate about the issue have chosen to tag themselves with #DiversityChampion in Nordea's phone book..
The Ability Variation Group is one of the five employee-led ERGs (Employee Resource Group), which are linked to Nordea’s diversity strategy. The group focuses on ability variations. It aims to provide Nordea with an employee perspective in various matters, such as how we can make our premises more accessible and thus draw benefit from each other’s strengths.
For 15 years, Pär has been delivering internal talks on how we can attain a positive state and work with clear goals in teams, have the courage to fail, and how we can work with improving diversity and inclusion.
When Nordea introduced its first common values in 2007, he underwent training in communication and change processes. He wove the lessons he learned from that with his own journey, turning it into a personal story that he shares at a theoretical and practical level. He delivers most of the talks in Nordea’s Advisory Academy, but also in various management groups, at contact centres and externally.
“Performing on stage is something that’s stayed with me from my days as an elite athlete, and I really enjoy it. Both give me an adrenaline rush, and giving talks is a way to get that rush, as you have to get out there, deliver and perform the whole time.”
One Olympic gold medal, two silvers and one bronze. Four Olympic medals – not a piece of cake exactly. When Pär realised that he had an ability variation, he tried out different sports, joined a para-athletics club, and changed his dream to taking part in, and winning at, the Paralympics.
Elite athletics has taught Pär a lot, and this is the main topic of his talks. In order to reach the final goal of winning a race of 15.4 seconds, he needed to spend 4,860,000 seconds training.
“It’s been a fantastic journey. To reach such a goal, you have to invest vast amounts of time. That’s why it’s important to have fun on the journey towards the goal, and not always see the end goal as the most important factor. I’m now also proud of what I’ve achieved, but it took far too many years for me to feel that pride.”
Pär reflects on the fact that when you’re in the midst of something, it’s easy to become overly focused on the goal itself. It’s the same as when we deliver good quarterly results, quickly put it behind us and move on to the next set of results. To gain an outside-in perspective between the goals achieved, we need to sit down on the balcony sometimes and look out over what we’ve achieved. Take a moment to see what needs changing, reflect, celebrate and be proud.
This diversity journey we’re on at Nordea is truly amazing – we have tremendous superpowers. If 30,000 people at Nordea can do this job every day, then we can make a real difference in society.
So, what are the most common obstacles he encounters in his daily work? It’s easy to believe that there might be several for a person with an ability variation. For Pär, it’s been important to set the stage himself. When he meets a team, he always says that he’ll tell them when he needs help, so that they don’t need to wonder whether they should help him or not. That’s his opening line to his colleagues.
“I see very few obstacles. Of course they’re there, but there’s nothing that can’t be solved if you want it solved. That’s my belief. From that perspective, Nordea is a fantastic and inclusive workplace, otherwise I wouldn’t have been here for 37 years, would I?”
In his talks, he usually focuses on how people should use their superpowers – do what they’re good at. It’s a lot about reflecting on your own drivers, making sure that they’re used in daily work and having a dialogue with your manager about what your superpowers are – which is particularly important if you’ve got any kind of hidden ability variation.
“I got a very good start in life and was given the opportunity to develop my strengths. What my dad told me – that the important thing is that we do our best in our own circumstances – has stayed with me throughout my life.”
Not everyone can be good at the same thing but combining everyone’s superpowers would make us truly great – we have fun, we attain good results and we have satisfied customers.
“This diversity journey we’re on at Nordea is truly amazing – we have tremendous superpowers. If 30,000 people at Nordea can do this job every day, then we can make a real difference in society,” concludes Pär, and it’s impossible for his enthusiasm not to rub off on you.