Mr. Dmytro Shymkiv, general manager at Microsoft Ukraine and one of the best top-managers in Ukraine (according to information of the international business magazine “Invest-Ukraine”) delivered a lecture on IT innovations to students of Lviv Polytechnic National University, his alma mater. This event took place on April, 11th, 2014 in the context of the project “The fifth class” coordinated by Lviv local group of BEST that is a non-profit non-political organization.
One who is involved into innovative activities has to be daring enough to act and embody one’s plans. Dmytro Shymkiv says: set a goal and even if everybody considers it unfeasible, be patient – if you want, you’ll achieve it. The lecturer himself never hesitated in going toward his aim. As an example, during his trip in USA when he served as an interpreter in the business-incubator of Lviv Polytechnic National University he got keen on the idea of creation of Internet in his alma mater just as it was in MIT. In that years Internet in Ukraine was just emerging. After home-coming he found like-minded persons and they plunged themselves into work. They drilled walls, laid out cables, installed servers in evenings and weekends. In this way Internet arose in Lviv Polytechnic.
The speaker appreciates any opportunity to get practical experience as follows from his career. He founded Alfa team company (in collaboration with his friend) just three years after his graduation from University, then worked as a general manager in RedPrairie Eastern Europe, an international company focused on solutions in productivity, afterwards he leaded the sales department at Microsoft Ukraine. In 2009 Dmytro Shymkiv became the general manager at that company.
The most valuable, most greatest for him is people: a team of like-minded persons makes business. Mr. Shymkiv is not an adherent of hierarchical formalities in human interaction, he even doesn’t have an own work table in the office.
Dmytro Shymkiv considers mobility, social networks, cloud computing and big data to be the most significant modern trends that form the basis of our close future – crowd funding and crowdsourcing, 3D-printing, artificial intelligence, robotics and bioengineering.
Source: Student weekly newspaper «Audytoriya» (in Ukranian)
