Teemu Lehtinen

Teemu Jussi Eerikki Lehtinen, born 31 October 1969 in Kauhajoki, Finland, is a senior business adviser helping large corporations to assess reactions to public pressure and advising on preventive or corrective strategy and action. Currently Vice-President at , he has more than a decade of experience in working with business across Europe and beyond.

Education and early career
Having finished , Lehtinen spent a year in military service in Uudenmaan prikaati prior to starting at University of Helsinki and its Faculty of Social Sciences in 1989. During his studies, he spent a year in France studying at Institut d'études politiques de Strasbourg and working for a Member of the European Parliament, . After this year in ERASMUS programme, Lehtinen moved to Luxembourg and worked as trainee at the Secretariat General of the European Parliament.

Upon his return back to Finland and the university in the autumn of 1993, he started working on free-lance basis for and for the campaign of Finnish membership in the European Union. He also got involved with youth training on European issues and delayed his Masters Thesis in Political Science until spring 1996.

Lehtinen left Finland in March 1996 and moved to Brussels to begin a traineeship at the European Commission where he worked on anti- issues for some months. Later that year he joined , a large privately held public affairs (Lobbying) company. His client portfolio quickly grew from environment to health, from transport to competition policy and fiscal issues. Amongst Lehtinen's projects were for example defending the case of Alexander Nikitin on behalf of the Bellona Foundation in Brussels, helping European Automobile Manufacturers Association to lobby the European Parliament, improving the so-called package at its first phase and lobbying for harm reduction in the EU tobacco legislation.

He became quickly known for his enthousiasm and integrity irrespective of the client he represented. Even working for the tobacco industry (Swedish Match) did not negatively reflect on his reputation, although some health NGO representatives claimed his position unsustainable. In less than six years Lehtinen moved on from Account Executive to Deputy National Manager and became one of the company's foremost coordinators of EU-wide public policy campaigns.

The Edelman years 2002-2007
Lehtinen quit EPPA in summer 2002 to become Director of Public Affairs at Edelman in Brussels. He started by reorganising the team, improving offer and expanding its team. After the first two years, the PA team had doubled in size and was again profitable. In addition, Edelman started to take the PA market in Europe more seriously and invested in the business by hiring to run the Europe-wide service. The company still suffered from the past mistakes and this was reflected in the pitch opportunities, but it managed to win , one of the largest PA accounts in Brussels.

After two years in the company, Lehtinen was promoted to Managing Director position. He continued to develop the business offer working more and more on health policy issues and across the borders in the Edelman network. He also took on external responsibilities, including a Management Board position at the which became very involved with European Commissioner Siim Kallas' .

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