The Suomen Ekonomit Thesis Award is being granted again! The award was granted for the first time in autumn 2024. The awards are intended to highlight the value of a master’s thesis as part of business education and the diverse ways of carrying out a thesis. At Suomen Ekonomit, we want to be part of raising the significance of graduating as a Master of Economic Sciences and highlighting the fact that completing a thesis is worth celebrating.
This year, the Suomen Ekonomit Thesis Award will be granted to a thesis that renews society in a sustainable way.
What kind of thesis can be submitted to the competition?
The submitted thesis must be a thesis in a main subject of economic sciences. The prerequisite for participation is that the thesis has been completed and it has been evaluated in 2025 or by the end of July 2026. Below are two categories that you must choose from when submitting your thesis. In order to ensure that the winning work is of high quality, we will only consider theses that received the grades 4 or 5 in the competition. The thesis may have addressed topics such as the prerequisites for a sustainable economy, the significance of artificial intelligence in the transformation of working life and society, sustainable growth or the renewal of work and management in a changing society. The research can examine themes from an economic, social, cultural or environmental perspective.
The application period starts on 4th of June and ends on 31 July 2026. After the application period, the thesis competition panel will review the entries submitted for the competition and select the entries to be awarded in each category. The selection is made based on the form responses.
The authors of the theses can submit their own work to the competition using the form, which asks for more detailed information and comments on the work. The prize money of EUR 15,000 will be distributed among the winners of the competition in connection with the Union Conference of Suomen Ekonomit in November 2026. By submitting your thesis to the competition, you agree that your name and a general introduction of your thesis can be published in the communication channels of Suomen Ekonomit.
Categories
The prizes are awarded in two different categories. A thesis that matches the category criteria can be submitted to only one of the two categories.
Category 1 Commissioned thesis
A thesis submitted in this category may have been completed under a commission agreement for a company, for example. The work does not need to have been agreed upon with an official commission agreement, but it must show the cooperation with the company, such as with regard to the data used for the research. Suomen Ekonomit wants to encourage companies to cooperate more and more with students in the field of economic sciences and to compensate students for their work. Company cooperation for a thesis also promotes the student’s working life skills.
The special challenge of a commissioned thesis is often balancing the goals created by the university and the company. The contribution of the work to the company and the scientific community must be explained in the form used to submit the thesis to the competition. The commissioned thesis must also reflect one of the themes of the competition as a whole: the work’s societal significance or a perspective that reforms working life. We are looking for themes that broadly impact working life, not just the reform of one organisation’s way of working. The conclusions of the thesis must therefore also be applicable more broadly than to the purposes of the target company. It must be possible to provide further details on the content of the work at the submission stage for evaluation by the panel, so when submitting a thesis, restrictions concerning trade secrets, for example, must be taken into account.
Category 2 Non-commissioned thesis
This category can be used for work that has not been carried out as a commission and which highlights one of the main themes of the competition, that is, societal significance or a perspective that reforms working life. The thesis being submitted may deal, for example, with the development of well-being at work or the significance of international employees for the Finnish national economy or organisations.
Restrictions on participation in the competition
A thesis in economic sciences completed and approved in 2025 or by the end of July 2026 can be submitted to the competition. The submission is made by the author of the thesis. The competition form asks for the contact details of the applicant, as well as information about the thesis, its findings and connections to the theme of the competition. It is also requested that a statement on the evaluation of the thesis is attached to the form. All questions must be answered.
The Thesis Award is for student members and full members of Suomen Ekonomit. Employees of Suomen Ekonomit or persons participating in the union’s positions of responsibility (e.g. board members of student or business school graduate associations) cannot apply for the Thesis Award.
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