How do we live here... in @Kyiv.

My feelings...

2007-06-20T10:55:00.000+03:00

When I saw a letter of Olya Kudinenko about OCPs selection on our voice I thought: "Who will be next?"

Who will be the next LEADER of our organisation? Who will lead a new team of people to the GREAT goal? Who will feel GLORY and ENERGY at the end of the project? Who will take these opportunities on the path of their lifes...

Only after being a LEADER you can understand how much this "being" can add to your personal growth. Especially when you lead people somewhere by the dark PATH (in AIESEC almost always we can see the clear and light goal and it's achieving, but the path to it is always SO DARK) and people in your OC feel you and trust you. Because they know that you HAVE clear understanding and VISION of HAPPY END!

To know the way and to path it - is not the same...

When you make a first step on your own way of LEADER you cann't even imagine, how long and hard will be this path. But if you have braveness to make this FIRST step - you will also have enough power and energy to get to the last "checkpoint".

"Life without risks is not worth living." Charles A. Lindbergh

If you will not try - you will never understand how it can be! If you will not do it NOW - you will do it NEVER! F..k it all!!! Just do it!!! Take this CHANCE! It can be the last chance to make some changes in this world that life gives to you. Become one of the LEADER's club!!!

"Don't wait. The time will never be just right." Napoleon Hill

Blog must be alive

2007-04-10T15:50:00.000+03:00

A lot of time passed since the last posts.
You can see how really role modelling is. I stoped posting and everybody stoped.
From now I will resume my thoughts here for few months more till the end of my term.
In this post I would like to share some really cool thoughts about future and planning of future.
Few months ago I had one vision of what will be going on and what I want to do in nearest time. Now it is completely different.
I've heard really cool quotation lately: if you want to make God laugh tell him your plans for the future.
I am sure all of you lived such a moments in your life.
And I would like to finish with next thought: everything what is going on in your life is hapenning for better.
Stay tuned.

Hot period in AIESEC in Kyiv

2007-02-19T23:42:00.000+02:00

I never thought that one person can be dealing with so many projects at once and be mostly succesful in them. I can see it now in myself.
6 projects are on realization, different challenges, different help needed, recruitment is starting with its hottest period, some non-aiesec stuff appeared, exams in 2 universities.
I think I will be surprised in the future about what person can be doing in one day when he is as effective and efficient as it only can be.
I am really happy for myself and people around me who are growing with such speed in personal and professional side.
Thank you AIESEC for this.

Spring recruitment: first steps

2007-01-20T23:30:00.000+02:00

Today we had second meeting of recruitment team. And I can say that it was really great idea to organize a team separate from EB for doing all this marketing part of recruitment. Today we have our first results. This week we were negotiating with youth and student medias about putting information about organization and recruitment to their nearest releases. And we already have several positive answers. And I am extremely happy from the fact that this recruitment will be the first with media coverage in media.
It is really cool that people start understand that the more they give to AIESEC, the more they get. And I want to say thanks to all those recruitment team members for their passion for development. I am sure this experience will help them to get to know more people in our local committee which will be of a great use in the future while working in different projects.
Next week we will be continuing our negotiation with internet portals and youth medias and also there will be another objective of dealing with logistics for helding AIESEC days, Discussion Clubs and our campus promo campaign.
Wait for more updates in the nearest time.

A period of many challenges lies ahead

2007-01-14T23:17:00.000+02:00

It was time when I thought that all the difficulties and workload are already forgotten and till the end of the term there won't be so many work to do.
But I was terribly wrong. Very interesting time is coming: project relalization, recruitment, elections, transition, new project planning, new project starting, planning for the next year.
I can sense that next few month will be very interesting, everyday will bring something new and unexpectable. I anticipate all those learning opportunities life is bringing to me and people around me in this months.
And that is what cool about AIESEC. You often don't know what will new month bring to you. You don't spend time on planning a lot of stuff for a long time ahead. You plan short term and then do the stuff. Sometimes it brings not the best results and huge mistakes are made... But that is also why AIESEC is so cool.
I would with every AIESECer to fill what it is to work as Executive Board member and all those priorities changes and challenges in every single day.
Enjoying experience...

New Year Celebration

2007-01-02T12:30:00.000+02:00

I wish to tell you how we greeted the upcoming 2007 year and told goodbye to the memorable and, for sure, happy 2006.

Our party started on Saturday, Dec, 30 when we all came together to buy food for the celebration. You may wonder how shopping may be a beginning of a party, but after the first time you go shopping with crazy AIESECers you'll realize that it is. Any shopping becomes fun rather than a chore. But, well, let's come to the New Year Eve and the first day of the New 2007 year.

BTW, many thnx to Olya Kudinenko and her parents for hosting and feeding us:), Katyusha for her unforgettable pie and cake, and our New Year tree and Alyona for our contests, logistics (you're a napkin genious:)) and music.

When we came together at 10 p.m. on Sunday all we needed to do was just to serve the dinner, create a New Year Tree and find a way not to miss the President's speech and celebrate the NY.
There were 9 of us:Alyona, Katya, Slavik, Olya Kudinenko, Anton, Vitalik, Oksa, Maks and me, spending that wonderful night together.

After almost missing the first minute of the year:), we danced, played cool games (you should have seen Alyona showing "automation" and me - "Mentos":), Katya working as an artist, our boys having a nice time taking clothes-pegs off our girls and other amazing unforgettable moments). We ended up playing "bitches-bitches" around 5 a.m. and then singing and chatting in the cozy kitchen eating that superficial French-Soviet meat :)

Our second day of celebration was no less enjoyable. It started at around 12 a.m. (hah, not really a time to start a day, but it was Jan, 1 ) when we finally tried the second half of that enormous amount of food we bought and decision-making on what movie to watch and where. After 2 hours of dressing-ups, jokes, chats we decided to go to Brovary:) Yes, it was an unexpected decision for all of us, but Maks was so convincing and hospitable, that we could not but agree.

We had a wonderful time watching "Zhara" at the "Terminal" and then meeting Anechka Tkachenko andOlya Kuplivanchuk, who decided to celebrate this New Year in a train and chose Odessa-Kiev and then joined us in our trip to Brovary. Since we had almost 1,5 hrs before skating, Maks invited us to his place, where we had a wonderful lunch thnx to his parents.

Well, this is how it was: amazing, outstanding, memorable, enjoyable. I hope, you all also had a cute celebration.

Cheers!
Olya

What it means to live in EB:)

2006-12-31T12:27:00.000+02:00

It has been a long time since I posted here last time. But now I'll try to rehabilitate;)

You may wonder why I decided to write about my EB team. And even called it "living" rather than "working".

The answer is as easy as it follows: on January, 1 it will be exactly 6 months since we became EB - current and 9 months after our elections.

6 months.... 184 days... 4416 hours... 264 960 minutes... 15 897 600 seconds...

Working in a TEAM of absolutely different people with a common dream. Working in a mosaic of personalities, professionals on the greatest endeavor - to develop AIESEC in Kiev, to attract here the best people and ensure they get the best experiences possible.

Together we passed through successes and challenges, became almost a real family with our own traditions, jokes, stories, memories.

We started with planning. I guess, the most exciting period any EB might have: the time when you create the vision of your LC in several years, at the end of your term, choose the road you will take, learn to cooperate with each other, learn each other's differences. yep, when I come back to those crazy summer months with those planning-LDS-recruitment meetings 7 times per week 3-4 hours long I can say that they were among the best in my whole life. At this time you also learn to be a "executing body" - you get accustomed to the new level of responsibility, here you can really "feel" how the decisions you make influence the development of your LC, how important it is to be a role model, and how fast and much you need to learn to be able to deliver knowledge to your LC members.

Oh, I just finished that paragraph and recollected that the very first thing we developed as a team was the code of conduct within our team, within our LC, anywhere and any time.

Anyway, coming back to the beginning of my term... our term... It was not easy. We went through an intensive process of determining the main challenges for our LC, motivating members to work and research for those wonderful projects we have now, creating the culture of our LC and at the same time developing our own plans and organising one of the biggest national conferences - LDS in a new innovative way:)

Then we had recruitment... a cool one-in-a-lifetime process. The time when you can really "feel" changes in your LC. You create an image of the people you wish to see in your LC, you plan how you will attract them, you run AIESEC Days, Discussions Clubs (thank you Lena!!!!, our dear DC Coordinator:), interview them, prepare LTS for them, then go to Adapchak with them and for them, plan and run probation period, select them, then New Horizons, then they are your members. Well, it seems so easy and quick in just 2-3 dozens words. In reality, it takes the whole LC the whole piece of energy to manage all this. Thank you our dear oldies, thank you for your support and understanding, thank you for your sincere wish to bring the best poeple possible to our LC!

At the same time you continue working on your functional direction and prepare education for newies. You work on your own, in pairs, in small task forces, bring the resluts of your work together and then develop what later becomes an innovation in your LC, a new partner, a new approach.

However, maybe one of the most important things we had throughout this span is our DEAR LC. Yes, without you, we would never be doing what we do now, without you there would be no sense to work, without you and other some 800 LCs around the globe there wouldn't be this organisation activating leadership called AIESEC, without you there would be no point to be professional in this organisation, attract top talent and help them find the way in this orgnasation and outside it.

Well, I'll stop here for now:) But be sure: you can always approach EB members and talk about our experience, about our life together, our work and fun.

Cheers!
And Happy Newy Year!
Olya

Local Committee Conference: 3 in 1

2006-12-25T00:37:00.000+02:00

On this weekend we had really special event. We spend 2 days on our lovely site Lasto4ka on Local Committee Conference.
First day we had education, team building, birthday celebration and on the second one we had day of legislation.
I can say that it was best Local Committee Conference I had ever seen. And I seen some of them. Me personally had a great time sleeping during educational part, then winning with my team while trying to cross the river on the chairs and later in the evening gathering alumni all over the forest on their cars.
Actually it was really cool to have such a great guests form old generation of AIESECer. I had never seen before 5 cars full of crazy guys and girls.
I would like also to thank our great alumni for bringing box of beer and t-shirt and all other presents. It was really cool to see you there and to talk with you.
I would also like to say thank to each of you, guys, who was present there and make this event very special.
PS: Ma4o-Gvozdi...

Special LCM: watching great movie

2006-12-15T23:53:00.000+02:00

Today our LCM again was really special. We decided to watch a movie all together on 5th floor of KNEU building. That's why we did make official part of LCM as short as possible and...
The name of the movie was All the invisible children. Movie is almost 2 hours long and consists of several short stories. 7 Stories from lives of children all over the world.
One girl is HIV positive, her parents are addicted, in school she is always beached around by other girls and boys.
I am sitting now trying to remember another story. And I can remember it, from the first second of the first story to the last seconds of the last one. And when I am trying to put it into words I just can't do it. So strong, so wordless, so great movie to see.
Just watch it...

AIESEC in Odessa 10th year anniversary

2006-12-12T00:55:00.000+02:00

On this weekend I together with some other guys decided to go to AIESEC in Odessa's birthday. Actually it was the first time for me to go to other Local Committee just to have fun and it was great.
I will never forget those wanderful excursions done by Dima Belobrov around Odessa. 2 days of walking around the city did challenge myself on how many people do know about their city and how cool it can be when you have what to share with your friends when they come to your native city.
On Saturyda evening we had official and unofficial part of birthday celebration. There was guests from different cities, there was alumni and current AIESECers. There were people who are connected with AIESEC in Odessa in very different ways. There were people who gave all their passion and energy to that LC. There were alumni who were in AIESEC 10 years back. There were founders of this cool LC.
And it was really wonderful to hear their old stories about first days of AIESEC is Odessa, about key role of AIESEC in Kyiv as development LC. About successes and failures.
And now sitting back home I can't wait when we have our birthday.
And I dream about AIESEC in Kyiv 20th anniversary in 3 years:)

GREAT news about eXchange in our LC!!!

2006-12-10T04:14:00.000+02:00

This week we have a lot of X stuff. And I am really happy about it. X was my “alma mater” in AIESEC, even before Finance. Especially ICX (Incoming Exchange).
So, we do have update about two TNs and one SN.
First of all I have sent Acceptance Note to Ismail from Turkey, and he is already ready to open visa to Ukraine. We expect him approximately on 5-10 of January. We have already opened such cool position as Buddy for Ismail.
Another TN is Investment Group “SOKRAT” – we have finally sign contract with them for 1 intern. They really need Editor with Native English. I have already proposed 2 candidates from USA for this company. Now, we are trying to get in contact with them.
And our new SN is… Dobropolskyi Nikolai! He is alumni of AIESEC Kiev. He is working in KPMG now. He was in AIESEC at about two years.

That’s all news from my side on today’s night. Don’t loose such great chance to go for internship or to become TN-manager – you will change somebody’s life in both cases!

My Buddy XP...

2006-12-06T03:07:00.000+02:00

On 17-th of November 2005 (as I remember) one really special person for our LC have come to Kiev. All of you already know her smiling face and friendly eyes. Her name is Citla...
At that moment I have already been selected as Buddy for her.
So, what does it mean to be a buddy for intern? My version:
- be ready to answer for any question not only about Ukraine, Kiev, AIESEC, but also about life, relationships between people, friends etc.
- be ready to repair any kind of technik at intern's place or to find responsible person for that :)
- become one of the best friends for intern here, in Ukraine.
- be ready to talk with intern about really different trends of life :)
- be ready to get CULTURAL shock.
- be ready to provide help in cases, when intern have problems.
- .....

Anyway, when Citla told me: "Slavik, your English is really cool now! What have you done with it?" or when we have talked about her future life and I have shown to her some ways of solving her problems and making decisions and got only two, but really warm words: "Thank you!" - it was AWESOME!!!
Now, after Citla's being here for one year already I have understood - buddy is one of the most important positions in AIESEC. Because when I will go to my X stage of @XP and there will be no such person in my life at another country - it will be really, really difficult for me to be in comfort there, to enjoy my internship in 100%.
Be ready to take such great responsibility, if life will give it to you - become a Buddy for intern and this boy/girl will be one of your best friends from another country of our AMAZING world.

Very special birthday

2006-12-03T21:44:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I had my 22th birthday on this planet and it was already 3rd birthday in AIESEC.
Yesterday and today we had Local Committee Presidents meeting and it was on some site in Kyiv 15 minutes from Nyvky.
It was already something around 18.00 because it was really dark. We made some break after long hours of discussion and I was standing on the street breathing fresh air and talking with Diana from Uzhgorod.
Suddenly I've heard like some crazy young people were screaming on our site and it was really strange because there wasn't anyone. In few seconds I could hear Nastya's voice...
That was unbelievable. There were crazy AIESECers from crazy AIESEC in Kyiv. They came to the site specially to greet me with my birthday.
There was a lot of baloons and smiling faces. It was real surprise for me and it was really cool.
They gave me very cool present - electrical razor. I didn't use it still but will try in the nearest future and hope I won't have any beard anymore.
//If you have some photos from there, please, put it on blog editting this entry:)
Thank you once again, guys.

Some photos from today's LCM

2006-12-01T23:12:00.000+02:00

What does it mean to be Reception Coordinator...

2006-11-29T17:52:00.000+02:00

Hello. As my term of reception coordinator came to its end I'd like to share some thoughts about it.
First of all it is a unique experience with a lot of positive emotions. It is the position where you can challange your worldview almost every day!
How? By meeting interns, by seeing their habits and attitude towards even the most simple things, even by reading their letters... they are so different! I really became partly other individual...I know a lot of different opinions and what the most important - I learned to accept them, to accept difference...
Being reception coordinator is very responsible. Just imagine an intern is coming to Ukraine and his FIRST (and the most important) opinion about our country, city and our people. It is really imortant to show them our hospitality. Sometimes it is hard 'cause some interns are calling you and say that they arrive tomorrow at 7 a.m. to Kiev! :) Sometimes it is not funny, 'cause you have a lot of work to do and you call to other people but they have it too and cannot help you... so you miss your studies, cancelling all your meetings....but seeing intern happy - is the most imortant thing! after that you cannot regret about all your day - you're happy 'cause day was unbelievable!!
And workin with buddy team... :)
Buddy for intern it is like mentor for aiesecer. I really cannot express my emotions while working with them. When you help buddies to build relationship with interns... to set goals...

Really looking at all sides it is worth being reception coordinator!! This excperience is really unique!! I wish you to find yourselves!!! And get every opportunity...

If you have any questions do not hesitate to contact me :)

EnterCEE Visit

2006-11-29T13:35:00.000+02:00

Most of you have already heard about the EnterCEE Program: it was created in CEE region to create a network of AIESEC entities and stakeholders around entrepreneurship to ensure high quality AIESEC XPs for our members.

One of the most important initiatives within the program was LC Visits by the so-called E-Drive Team, people supporting the implementation of this program on local level. And our LC became one of the 6 LCs selected for the E-Drive Team's LC Visit, which finished yesterday.

Cecilia Karl, originally from AIESEC in Munich, Germany, now working for NEXT in Turkey came to Kiev to help our team of Activating Entrepreneurs to set up the team and processes within it during the 2,5 day visit.

You just need to look at those faces, emotions and just at the sparkling eyes of OC members to understand: yep, it was a success. During that short time they had an opportunity to understand, what it feels to lead and be led, who they are in their team, what types of personalities they are, and even try to realize a small, yet challenging project (just imagine, to create a coverage that won’t let raw eggs break when thrown from the 1^st floor in the streetJ)

It was also a time when all team members learned the basics of team management, planned their work, and got deeper insight into their functional areas.

But still, the most important thing, was the opportunity to stay together with the team for 2,5 days, working, having fun, sharing. I guess, this would be very helpful for them in their future work and motivation.

And we also had a very important guest on that meeting: our dear alumnus, Dima Melnik, decided to join the team on one of its days to challenge it with questions, thus adding value to the whole process.

I believe, it was one the best opportunities our LC could take from this program and I’m really excited about us getting it. Hope there will be much more in future!

LCP experience. Coaching projects

2006-11-26T00:24:00.000+02:00

After more longer pause then always I am coming back and continue my sharing...
I am sure that most of you don't know what does it mean to be in EB or to be LCP. Actually we event have this kind of initiative in our plans - to show people work and life in EB and motivate to apply for the next term. But be sure that everything what you is told is true and only some minor things are missing. But there always those small things which sometimes make our life not as good as we would like and only those small things actually are giving us that unforgettable experience we all want to have.
So, today I would like to share with you one of the biggest part of my role - coaching OCPs of projects. Now I am working only with 4 of them and I do feel how difficult it is. To tell the truth to be coach is almost as to be OCP, because you think about project, you anticipate its future, you think how to improve your team performance, you track the plan and always review it. The only thing which is missing is working with a team (but actually I have my own one - EB).
Today I had 4 hours meeting with newly elected OCP - Sasha Belichenko. We were preparing for tomorrow's OC meeting. We prepared agenda for tomorrow and though over each part of it. We thought about next tasks for each team member. We thought about roles&responsibilities and how we can match personal goals and project's need for human resources. We make overview of those 3 priorities we are working currently in the project. We did a lot of stuff and as always left meeting completely mentally and phisically exhausted.
Tomorrow will be his 3rd day of OCP, tomorrow will be his first OC meeting run by him, tomorrow he will make a lot of mistakes and tomorrow he will ask his team to be with him and help him learn. I will be there too. I will also help him in his learning by providing feedback and advises. This is only the beginning on his path on this position and I wish him good luck.
And all of us too.

ACCESS: How it was

2006-11-23T13:53:00.000+02:00

Hello!

Finally, I'm back home from ACCESS. Only 2 weeks have passed, but it feels as the last time I was with my LC was long time ago:)

This conference was one of the most intensive and challenging experiences I've ever had in AIESEC.

Starting from the country. As you might have already read in my previous posts, AIESEC in Finland was one of the pioneering countries in our network back in 1948. And it's also the most northen country:) (yep, there is an LC, AIESEC Oulu, which is situated northermost in the whole AIESEC world). It was something very unusual for me to see alumni who were in AIESEC , say, 25 years ago :) Yes, we are all very young in Ukraine, young as people, young as country. The country is also different in AIESEC culture. Their LCs are much smaller than ours, but comparing to country's size - it's not that little (the whole population of Finland is about the population of Kiev, without suburbs:)) And it is also different from us in members. Since there are lots of other student organisations and the general atmosphere in the country is not selective, they do not select members and allow everyone who wishes to work in AIESEC. Socialising effect is very important here and most of the interns, SNs and re-integrates are actively involve into AIESEC because of those social bonds it creates. And many other dfferences, ... Guess, it would take me lots of time to write everything and still, I don't know them enough:)

Conferences here are also different from what we are accustomed to in Ukraine. Just magine, OCs cook for delegates here (because of extremely high salaries for personnel), but they only rent venue, provide logistics and food. All the rest is done by facis starting from set-ups, moving-ins, to greeting externals, to delivering sessions. And there is a very lovely tradition: all LCs have their mascots whom they bring on all conferences and shout and perform roll-calls with them. And, there is another wonderful tradition to steal mascots and spread rumours about them around Finland:) And... omitting all detective series, I'll just want to congratulate AIESEC in Kiev with a new lovely mascot. You'll see him on LCM:)

ACCESS is an annual conference for all members of AIESEC in Finland (newbies, oldies, EBs, SNs, interns, re-integrates). There was a very diverse selection of delegates from, virtually, all parts of the world, the same as the faci team :)

Agenda was aimed to develop the 4 change agent's charactristics. It started with a meeting with alumni on the first day - our real life change agents, and moved on to sessions by externals (guess what, there were 19 externals running 5 parallel sessions during one day:)) and ending with AIESEC University on the last day which was devoted to AIESEC Subsystems and Finnishe National Focus Areas.

Well, hat was a short description of the conference and my experience. It challenged my worldview and my AIESEC approach. It was wonderful. It was unforgettable. I wish you'll have something like this or even better one day:)

Cheers!

Just don't know what to say

2006-11-20T23:44:00.000+02:00

Every conference is special one. All of you know it...
When I was going to this New Horizons there was no anticipation, drive... I just wanted to do my work and go back. In this mood whole conference went...
Only the last night changed a lot of stuff in my head. Of course, I can't tell you about that stuff something specific. The main thing is that you are making decisions and when suddenly something is happening and you are thinking about changing that decision. Now I have a lot of stuff in my head about AIESEC, university, family, personaly life... future. And I think that during this week a lot of stuff will change and at one side I am really happy because change is something which makes your life more interesting and at the same time I am afraid of that other world which is lying behind.
I thank you AIESEC for this butterfly who will change my life.

Sugarcube

2006-11-20T00:52:00.000+02:00

As some of you my have noticed I've not given sugarcubes to anyone from LC
Kyiv this day :) .
That's because each of you (or of us :) )deserves a sugarcube. that's why I've decided to write a sugarcube using such nice tool as blog, where whole LC can read it :) We, AIESEC in Kyiv are soooo nice and sooo sexy, that all AIESEC in Ukraine feels it. We are simply the best. Without of a doubt, every person of LC is such a beautiful flower in our bouquet, that Together Everyone_of_us will_Achieve More. Just happy to be a part of our beautiful team... Thank you guys, love u all.

GIVE ME A KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK
GIVE ME A YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
GIVE ME AN IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
GIVE ME AN VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

WHAT DOES IT STAND FOR?

KYIVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

ACCESS, Day 2: Faci Pre-meeting

2006-11-16T17:48:00.000+02:00

Hello!

So, today we actually had the first day of our real faci-premeeting.

I guess it feels different being on an international conference as a delegate and a faci. I've never experienced being an international delegate, but being an international faci has already become something VERY EXCITING for me. Guys, go for it if you have an opportunity!

From early in the morning we have been going through the confernce, its content and all other important things. It was some kind of a challenge my worldview day for me:) : the ways we approach everything here, starting from OCs and their responsibilities and finishing with AIESEC - all differ depending on your AIESEC country, GN. There are differences in how we perceive morning and evening plenaries, roll-calls, everything. There are even diffenerces in how we approach AIESEC XPs and any global initiatives. Just imagine, a team of 12 people representing 11 different countries and 4 GNs :)

We've just finished our OC/FACIs meeting. BTW, some facts about the venue. In Finland, prices for venues are very high, so every time they organise a conference they rent an elementary school almost for free for some weekend (there are almost no conferences that last longer than 1 weekend). And all delegates sleep in sleeping bags.

And as usual, I'm the youngest here:) among facis. Some of them still don't believe I'm 18. Yep, it's so funny to be in a team with all members at least 4 years your senior and several - the whole 10:)

Anyway, I need to go now.
Already missing you

Olya

ACCESS 2006:)

2006-11-15T17:47:00.000+02:00

Hello!

Guess what? I'm in Finnish MC Office now :) Yep, I've finally reached the place.

My journey started on Monday: I went to St Petersburg by train. There cool guys from LC SPUEF and an alumna hosted me. Then I took a bus to Helsinki and finaly arrived here.

So, a little bit about the event I'm here for and about AIESEC in Finland, in general. AIESEC in Finland is a VERY OLD AIESEC country: they were among those 7 countries that founded our great organisation. Today, they have 11 LCs and about 250 members (just after recruitment). I'll write more when I learn more :)

MC here comrises 4 people: MCP and 3 MC directors. They work in MC ffice and live in MC flat (2 different places:) They got their office in 1995 after IC in finland and Sweden (actually, at that time it was CC's office - maybe it's a good idea for Ukrainian MC to initiative a bid for IC ;)

I've been here for about 3 hourse, so cannot share much so far, but here is a poem I've found in MC office that I definitely want you to know.

Here it is:

It's up to you!

One song can spark a moment
One flower can wake the dream
One tree can start a forest
One bird can herald spring

One smile begins a friendship
One handclasp lifts a soul
One star can guide a ship at sea
One word can frame the goal

One vote can change a nation
One sunbeam lights a room
One candle wipes out darkness
One laugh will conquer gloom

One step must start each journey
One word must start each prayer
One hope will raise our spirits
One touch can show your care

One voice can speak with wisdom
One heart can know what's true
One life can make the difference
You see, it's up to you!

Cheers!
Olya

You are THE member

2006-11-13T12:43:00.000+02:00

How do we live here... in @Kyiv.

You are THE member. It is cool:)

Ones upon a time there lived another AIESEC Kiev. Those guys were doing internships and maching, local projects and conferences. They were small team. And after every meeting they gather together and have fun after great work. And it wasn’t just because they were on the conference and that meant that they had time, space, parties, and so on. They went to cinema, clubs, pubs. Walked in the parkes, hang out with foreigners, do a lot of crazy things together.

I had known that from the fotos and simple talking with these business adults. I admire them and respect their friendship and strong relationship that lasted till today. But that was THEIR history…

I strongly believe that work is only the part of @life. You are doing you job. Doing it with exellence. Why? Because you know that it will cause respect from the side of you team. There are no doubts that you would keep your promice cause you gave it to your FRIEND. And you show your will and make a step in the emptiness cause you are shure that there is the hand.
And your hand will be for the next person that needs it. To stand in the emptiness and waiting for that person isn’t your job description. But you do it cause Friend asks You.

This is the base of our work. This is what makes the stakeholders say “WOW!”
Strong Relationships, knowing each other and understanding from the half of the word.

How to achieve Relationships?
Simple answer- COMMUNICATION

Today, thanks to the air hockey I realised how important it is for definite people to be a leader. I had known that Sasha Sayfulin likes the same things as I- chokolate and apples, Zenya Protopopov can drive the car, Lena Runec is shure that woman should marry at 25…
Today I have huge number of emotions and energy from you.
Today I’ve build small part of relationships.

Words tell lies. Just do it!!!

Yours, Klukva

Kyiv post Career Day.

2006-11-08T01:09:00.000+02:00

Yes, it have happened... The brave team of AIESEC people, with list of tasks to find out in "enemy event" have come back with great results:

1. We have defined +/- of exibition.
2. 35 from 50 Proposals of our Career Day were distributed among companies.
3. We have got "TRINOG" in present from JTI - BIG thanks to Lidia-Nadiych Petrenko.
4. "BeeLine" was a sponsor of delivering "TRINOG" to Nastia's home. BIG thanks to Melnik Olga :)
5. We have got at about 30 business cards of HR-managers.
6. Now, we know for sure, that we can make our dear CareerDay 2007 one of the most AMAZING exibitions in the WHOLE Ukraine!

So, the goals of our "Career-drive team" in this "war-campaign" :=) are achieved and we have GREAT results!

I wish all of us LUCK in our future "special tasks". I LOVE ALL OF YOU, GUYS!!!

How do we live here... in @Kyiv.

2006-11-06T15:18:00.000+02:00

How do we live here... in @Kyiv.
I realy was dreaming about the time my mum would be proud of my work or my contribution.
Today it happened.
it seemes to be the usual day with usual tasks and list 'to do'... but it wasn't...in fact it was amasing and unbeliveble!!!!
today at least 15 our parents touch @Kiev and had the opportunity to see in their own eyes what the real work of their children is. They listen to our projects, our vision and destination of our work. These adults were looking as they were 20 years old and there was NO difference beetwen us and them. They like our creativity and passion. They are ready to share it with us!!!
I appriciate the huge peace of work the guys managed to do and want to say "Thank YOU" to everyone who ha've done even the smallest part.

How we visited "Karitas"

2006-11-03T12:11:00.000+02:00

Dear readers!

I wish to share one of the best opportunities AIESEC gave me: an opportunity to help needy children and spend time with them.

To tell the truth, I had never thought before that I can spend so much time with children (who were, BTW, not too well upbrought, and that made them even more precious) and enjoy that.

One month ago, when we were deciding which team would do what during the probation period, and it turned out that my team was to prepare a mini-social project, I just hoped my team would be wise and creative to make that real. Coz I had never had such an experience before, and my only memories about the disadvantaged came from my early childhood or, to be precise, a miserable orphanage near my house.

Anyway, when girls came to our meeting and suggested different versions of that mini-social project I became delighted with their ideas: something very warm and cosy enlightened them :)

When we later decided to go to "Karitas" and spend time with children there, devote our attention and help the personnel working there; I couldn't imagne it would be so wonderful;)

Thnx to our entrepreneurial teams:) and their investments we bought pencils, markers, and other colourful things to draw and make different handmade presents.

I guess you wonder what "Karitas" is. "Karitas" is a charitable foundation for children without parents, poor families and HIV/AIDs, families with many children and pensioneers. People come there and spend time together having classes, playing or just staying for some time. Comparing to other charitable foundations, orphanages and boarding houses, "Karitas" is in normal state, but comparing to normal reality,... well, you would never wish to live in such conditions.

We spent time with about 12 children, some of them became very open and joyful at once, others didn't want to talk and it took much time to make them trust us. They drew, played games, shared their dreams and were so kind and candid, that when a woman came up to us asking if we had an opportunity to find a nurse for a family I was seriuosly thinkng about suggesting myself ;)

That day it was the first time when I wrote a card for St. Nicholas (if iI'm not mistaken he's called this way) and learned about that tradition :)

On our way back, a boy living nearby told us that they had computer courses in summer and he attended them, but in autumn the teacher left and they didn't have classes anymore.

Well, I hope it was only the first time when we visited those children. And I also hope next time there will be more of us;)

Cheers!
Olya

Sunday: eating, communicating, playing quest, selling juice, doing flashmob...

2006-11-02T03:13:00.000+02:00

Yeap, I had never spend Sundays in such a way...
My morning started in the train on my way back to Kyiv from Kirovograd. At 9.40 I was on railway station and in 15 minutes already huging with AIESECers on KPI subway station.
I just couldn't miss it and to tell the truth I even didn't have any thoughts about not coming. I just know that it would be one of the weekends you will remember for a long time.
So, we started our morning with going to pizza house to play some game. But unfortunately (or fortunately) pizza was closed at 10.15 a.m. on Sunday and we had to wait till 11.00. After coming inside we prepared for something interesting, Natasha asked us to divide by pairs and sit at separate tables. I was imagining some personal talk :)
But everything was much more simplier. We played a game with matches showing how we communicate and understand each other. The idea of the game is that one person is making some figure of matches and another doesn't see it. And then my only oral communication between them second person should build the same figure. If you think it is easy you are wrong. Just sit and try:)
Then we moved to Maidan where quest was supposed to start. I had never run with such a speed in the center of the city with my eyes crazy searching for some angle without head:) And a lot more interesting tasks we had to figure out. Everybody who missed it missed a lot.
It is 3.20 in the morning and I had a thought what I am doing right now here and why I am writing this post without actually any meaning.
To tell the truth I don't know. So, I will finish...
Just want to thank all of you who came and who organized this cool Sunday. One of the best in my life.

Just another team meeting...

2006-11-02T02:49:00.000+02:00

Today our team had our usual meeting on Wednesday (it is only 3rd time but it is already usual as if you are working with this guys for few months).
But at the same time it wasn't really usual. I can say that almost whole meeting we were thinking and brainstorming together. First of all we had really important task to do - to prepare our team presentation for Local Committee Meeting. And we had great ideas for ppt, for roll call, for show your leadership. So, don't miss Friday and come and see how creative we are.
Then in agenda we had working on web site structure but we decided to postpone it till Friday because of bad logistics for this kind of work. So, we decided to think for a little bit about the future: how OC will look like, what will be phases of realization, how we will promote our web site. Don't think we didn't discuss all those things we just wrote big list of questions which needs to be answered in near future.
We also had 3 guests today. I actually liked more only 2 of them (just because they were girls - Zhenya and Lena). They were so curious how men teams are working that they decided to come to us and see it by their own eyes. Another guests was Dima Dotsenko and I was happy to see him too on this meeting only because of one thing - his motivation to work in the project organizing committee while still working on full time. That's what I call non stop personal and self driven learning - key things AIESEC will give you.
I also asked about people thinking about applying for OCP and was really amazed about number of possible candidates. That's great whey people are entusiastic and ready to challenge themselves. At the same time I want you to understand that the thing is not in position and I hope that all of the candidates who won't be selected will be working in the project with same passion and desire.
That's all for today from my side.

One day of my life...

2006-10-30T00:06:00.000+02:00

One day of an aiesecer... How different it can be comparing with other people's lives?
I counted that approximately 90% of craziest things I've done, I've in AIESEC, inspired by AIESEC, for AIESEC...

Here one day may equal to months of life , when you are living usually, doing your work and studying at the university.

Today I met people who haven't seen for two days, several days, or even couple of weeks... Understood that amazingly missed them all. Even that new people whose names I'm still mixing, but trying hard to remember.
Today I was terribly afraid of standing and jumping from that tube... people, don't make me do such things!)) I was eating pizza and tried to deepen my knowledge about difficulties of human communication throuth a game with matches.. Here you understand how your words can influence the result of the deed, and how important is mutual listening and understanding.
Today I was making a fire from pizza with matches in it... hmmm, we called it "yojik". Green peace won't let it to us, guys!
Today I was playing an amazing quest, with lots of cool interesting tasks. I'm getting to know Kiev more and more every time. But every time I find smth I've never seen before. And showing people things I can share with them.
Today we sold a liter of juice for 23 gr. I could never imagine it's possible. I understood that I have still lots of fears and I need to challange myself to overcome them. I get to know closer one really nice person, from whom I can learn more about selling than from my professors in university and books..
Today we've poured "trees" playing flashmob in the center of kiev. funny stupid thing. But i'm already enjoying people staring at us, and doing crazy things... I already have a lot to tell my grandchildren about...
Today I've visited team meeting. Nice guys with lots of ideas and passion in eyes... I remembered my OC experince and missed about it a bit... I've prepared training for 10 minutes and delivered it for 7 minutes. After all, it included only practical advices, no theory:) Sometimes that's all that is needed.
Today I felt that people I love can hurt me. Maybe they just don't know me enough. maybe it brings some pleasure to them. they are lucky that i can't be angry at anyone for a long time. But the pain still stays inside of heart.
Today I again experienced the difficulty of strategic planning in the organization. And felt how difficult it is to plan smth for yourself ...
Today I've seen people who are beginning to form a TEAM. Real team. Strong. friendly. Smart. Beautiful. Active. Positive. Challangers. My team. Cool to feel yourself inside. Like at home...

Actually that is not all the things I've done today... Now can you imagine the life in AIESEC? I think I'll never experince smth like that again somewhere...

Thank you to those people aroung who are making this life for me. Thank you for this day.
Thanks God, I'm AIESECER.

It’s better now, than never…

2006-10-28T16:46:00.001+03:00

Last weekend we have first New Horizons 2006 faci pre-meeting in Kyiv. It was something unusual for me… Why? Because one year ago somebody was preparing such amazing conference for me. One year ago I was going to New Horizons as delegate, and now I am going to New Horizons as faci. It is SO cool conference!!!
I remembered how it was for me… My NH was in Mariupol. There were no light, no water, it was cold there, BUT it was the best conference for me! We were developing the ideas of projects, which faci gave to us, during the whole conference. There were at about ten projects and ten teams. It was really great experience for me – doing project in such crisis conditions. We were thinking about the idea of our project at about one day of the conference using not only our faci, but also other facis. After that we were writing on flipcharts, making presentation etc. And all these things – without light J
The result of our work was the first place in “Projects exebition”, which was on the last day of the conference. We were SO happy! Our project’s name was “LFNP” – Light Future for National Producer. One girl from my team (she is from Lviv) even was trying to implement this project in real life at home.
Now, after all this thoughts I am thinking about preparing better conference for MY Lcand also for other LCs of Ukraine. The period from 15-Th till 20-th of November 2006 you will remember till the end of your life.

Internet-based project update

2006-10-27T00:13:00.000+03:00

I was browsing blog today and reading posts from Olya Kuznetsova about her team and all of that. Actually we are writing here not just for fun about our teams and projects. We are doing internal PR. We want all of you to know more about us and our projects and maybe join us in the future as OC member or OC support.
But actually when you read someone's post you don't think about joining another project. You are just interested what other guys are doing there and maybe how I can help them. You just don't want to join other project - you already have great team.

And now something about us. We changed name for the project (don't want to write it here). And starting developing conception. We spend about 1 hour brainstorming all the things we would like to see on our web site and at the end had a blackboard full of words without any more blank space. That was cool. And one funny thing: we remember about international experience in career only at the end. We, members or international organization:)

Anyway if you want to know more you can subscribe to our mailing voice and receive all the information from there or you can approach somebody from our team.

Leadership: everytime new experience

2006-10-26T23:47:00.000+03:00

Today I want to share some of my thougts lately around team and leadership. I am now a team leader for our internet project. I have only guys in my team and it is really unusual for me because for last 2 years I was working with girls all the time in my teams. And you know this time is really special (the first one:))
We are working only for 2 weeks but it in your memory it looks like you are working for years. But it only looks. Because I can say that I do know very little about this guys, about their life now and before AIESEC, about their passions and hobbies and a lot more things I have no idea about. And that is what makes a difference here and that's what means that I am not their leader and we are not a team.
I am sure you've heard that to lead people you should know them. And by this message I want to tell those of you who is going to apply for organizing commitee president of any of these projects: every day starts today.
Start your everyday journey of opening new doors and challenging your way of thinking today. Get to know people around you far better you know them now.

Overcoming of "learning plato"

2006-10-23T13:31:00.000+03:00

Hmmm, post with such sophisticated title:)

I guess that this term I first saw at Karnegi's books. Imagine the situation, when you are learning some foreign language. You learn lots of words, grammar and so on, but once a moment comes when you feel that you're not progressing enough. You're like standing at the same place without moving forward... In such moments plenty of people just quit learning, coz it seems to them that their efforts are not worth of it. But others who are strong enough to overcome this moment, to learn harder without seeing visible result, soon get a new wave, break through, I'd say! They see a huge progress just after period of "learning plato" when it seemed that they are not progressing at all!

The same situation I felt this weekend. During a lot of time in AIESEC I felt myself proficient enough at numerous meetings, I was either leading them, or actively participated being proficient and experinced in the issue... To say honestly, I was a little bit bored with that...

This weekend we had 1st faci pre-meeting on New Horizons conference preparation. My aim is not to tell how it was - you will hear bout it soon. I just want to share with you how happy I was to feel myself STUPID at this meeting!!!:) Seems weird? No, I felt that I have a chance to learn intencively. I have never experienced facilitating on the national level, at such big conferences for 250 and more people, I didn't know how it looks like from the inside! That's why I felt difficult to get used to the discussion... but soon I was able to propose my own ideas and to shape the vision of the conference in my head.

the most important thing is that I felt in practice how much can I learn still in AIESEC. I think my lerning plato is behind, I started a new stage. We'll see if that's really true during NH2006:)

Conclusion: never stop!

Creative ACT - new edition:)

2006-10-22T23:48:00.000+03:00

Starting from the last LCM we renewed our tradition of organising Creative ACTs on our LCMs:)

This time Sasha (The soldier:)) shared with us his understanding of ideal enterpreneurs, their skills and what you need to do to become one of them. And Sasha also shared his personal experience with us:)

Guys, guess what, Sasha's approach was so serious that he even prepared a ppt presentation for it! Just think, and it's only the second LCM in his life and his first month in AIESEC. My big respect:)

I believe this experience will be valuable for him in his public speaking skills development, as well as for all of us - about the topic, about the way we behave and the way we listen.

And of course, we continue our Creative ACTs and next time we'll have another Sasha:), now Dots telling us about his issue:)

Waiting to see you all!
Olya

CSR Team Meeting

2006-10-22T22:26:00.000+03:00

Today we had our second meeting with our CSR Project Team :)

We now have one more member joining us - Inna:) And of course, other good news and constructive ideas: you must have heard how we discussed the state of CSR in Ukraine and in the world, its perspectives, and how we can influence that. Sitting there I felt mysellf being in some kind of a mosaic: different people come with different information, different approaches, and different points of view, we share that together and come to some common vision. For me, personally, those 30 minutes of our update were highly informative, and even more than that, girls will soon send additional materials on voice and we'll learn even more:)

Than we had a nice time thinking about a social project to perform. There are several cool ideas from girls; and, in the end, we chose several, and we'll soon consult with orphanages about what they prefer to have. So, guys, soon you'll have an opportunity to join us in our endeavours of cleaning yards for children, playing and teaching them or bringing useful stuff for them, and all that accompanied by home-baked cookies and cakes:)

Yeah, our meeting today was a burst of creativity:) - we went on with our "Show Your Leadership Task". I won't tell you now what it will be, but I'm sure you'll enjoy it:) Just wait! As well as wait for our team's presentation. You could never imagine you'd have such people in your home LC:)

I won't describe every part of the agenda, our tasks, because it may not be interesting for everyone ( for those, who do interest, you may contact any of us personally:)). But if you wish to experience our meetings or learn more about our project and CSR in general, just join us on some of our meetings:)

Web 2.0 isn't a thing - it's a state of mind

2006-10-22T00:36:00.000+03:00

Today was a special day for me. I’ve prepared training “Web 2.0” and dreamed about the moment, when I will perform it. I wanted to share the latest tendencies in Internet with you. So, I would like to say BIG-BIG THANKS to people who devoted some part of their time and visited this training. I really hope, that you learned something new. The training consisted of 2 parts:

Getting Things Done system by David Allen: how to raise your productivity

Web 2.0 or how to make Internet work on you

Thanks to you, I’ve learned lots of new stuff about my presentation skills and how to work on it… I have no hesitation that I will improve my work. I would like to say also BIG THANKS to 3 Alumni, who visited training. It made me feel of creating some value.

If you missed the training and would like to come to it later, I think we will make it in future one more time :)

AIESEC is place, where you can begin doing something. You don’t need be great to start, you need to start to be great!

I love this organization!

I love you!

AIESEC is everywhere

2006-10-20T00:36:00.000+03:00

Today me and some other guys from our LC was on presentation of Center for leadership development in British Council.
There were around 60 people sitting in the room waiting for Something. For Something which will answer on their questions about how to be successful leader, how to make a lot of money and stuff like that. Of course, they didn't receive that answer. Because there are no universal answer to that question.
Today guys from Global Leadership organization partnering with Center for leadership development where talking about importance of self-awareness and understanding of your own place and role on this planet and creating whole your life around it.
Great idea with so little percentage of realization among people...
Then they told us about conception of their center and how people are learning there. And when I heard it I was shocked. They told about AIESEC but without international reach and with guys working on the projects a little bit older then we are.
The main idea is that you can understand what is leadership only in real combat and real work in a team. Participants of the center share in teams and then select project they want to be doing. And then simply do it. During whole time they have theoretical support, coaching and feedback from trainers and coachers.
On the presentation there was a team who told about one of their project. They wanted to make society to think and talk about absence of movies for children on our television. They conducted social research asking children to remember some movies... and the result was that children couldn't remember any of it. Later they presented this research on press conference with a lot of medias present and make real boom medias of all sizes.
And when looking at those guys I saw all of us doing the same things but being just a few years younger. And now I know that when I quit AIESEC I will join Center for Leadership Development because of things they want to do in society around us. They want everybody to make a difference.
What difference do you want to make?

About my first meeting with my new team

2006-10-20T00:22:00.000+03:00

Today we eventually managed to come togething with our tight schedules:)
Never before I worked with a team of only boys and think it will be quiet interesting for me. Today we talked about current conception of the project, what we should do during probation period and why do we want to be a part of this project.
I saw in their eyes a lot of stuff. Somebody was shocked about the tasks we should do during this 3 weeks, somebody was wandering how he is going make everything of this at first time, somebody was already anctious to take first actions and waited for tasks sharing. And that's leadership is all about... About influencing people in order to reach common goal. And with such a guys I am sure AIESEC will do this project on the best level possible.

My experience about mentorship

2006-10-18T23:12:00.000+03:00

Today I decided to share some very personal thoughts and moments of my AIESEC life. And today I want to tell you about who does it feel to be a mentee.
When I only joined AIESEC I never believed that some other guys can help me in my growth, personal development, achievement of my life goals and so on. And because of that I had only 1 meeting with my mentors from AIESEC.
I do remember that meeting as if it was only yesterday. And now I can say that the questions are the same as they are now. Same questions, different mentors, different myself. And because of that difference in myself I can now see who mentorship can help me and I actively seek for more and more involvement with my mentor.
Now few words about who he is:) His name is Dima Melnik and he is AIESEC alumnus (actually very old one). Some of you had an opportunity to see him on discussion club, some of you will have that opportunity in the future. I met that guy only few months ago, but from the very first meeting and till now every time I talk to him or he talks to me my head is blown away. I don't know how to explain this. I just can say that after my mentorship meeting it seems to me that I am a different person now:)
Yeap, all of this is really very difficult to understand until you try. The last this I want to tell you: be proactive in your learning. In future try to find yourself mentor outside of AIESEC, somebody more experienced in life and somebody you will like the same as I do now. Good luck in your discovery journey.

People in our lives

2006-10-17T14:17:00.000+03:00

Today I met with our german girl Astrid. She left today back to Germany and we met on trainstation to exchange presents and say goodbye. I've got german T-shirt saying that in 2004 15 countries joined EU:) As you can see not only in Ukraine we have ledership development seminar.
This day make me think alot about people in our lives. Stop for few minutes and think how much of new people did you meet in last month? How much of them would you meet anymore in your life? How well do you know them? What are their dreams? What do you have in common?
Do you see all that synergy you can have working together on common interest. I am not talking here about business - I am talking in general about our lives.
In my AIESEC life I met and talked with hundres of people. With many of them I would like to get in touch now, but the problem is that I don't have their contact information or the one I have is not relevant anymore.
This problem is experienced by many people and in our new century of information system we thankfully have solution for it...
And it is called social networks. Among them I use linkedin.com and moikrug.ru.
Today when I want to stay in touch with somebody I know what to do and recommend you to use them too.

My adaptation camp experience

2006-10-11T11:08:00.000+03:00

Eventually I did manage to find a time and to gather all my thoughts at once to share with you. Only yesterday morning I did return from Adaptation Camp and it seems that I didn't go anywhere and only few small things and one big feeling inside tells me that it is not true.
And that feeling is that I am a different person now, I have changed something in my mind about perception of other people, about ability to work as a team a group of 14 people, about what conference can be and what you can gain from it. And more and more and more thoughts about the world, my role, my strong side, my weak side, my attitudes, my abilities, my dreams.
After such events you can easily explain what does challenging worldview means to other people and you are crazy about such a great point about AIESEC.
I don't want to write more about how it was cool to be a faci and so on because Olya did her best in that. Today I want to share with all of you how happy I am because of our newies. Last year I didn't experience this feeling and I don't know why. But I am sure that this is what makes thousands of people all over the world everyday to come to AIESEC office and do their job and it is the knowledge that we are doing the great job and that our vision is not so unreachable.
Next session is over and you see all those guys dancing and smiling, talking and laughing, making new friends and trying to argue about something and then somebody from faci team came to you and said that your guys are the best. And in few moments you see it... You see how whole delegation is going to be punished as one team for one rain coat, you see your best roll call in your entire AIESEC life done by those people, you are running in the plenary and screaming "Give me a..." and they support you with all their energy.
And then everybody left and we stayed on the site for one more day: without sessions, without agenda, without hurrying somewhere... And here is where you see how these people are already living AIESEC culture. They are dancing with you Tunak, tunak in the center of the city and then dealing with police, they are playing beaches, beaches for few hours don't want to stop...
I am sitting now and thinking what will be ahead and then I do remember those moments with all of you and remember that in our lives we have only present moment. I can say that that day was the best example how people can live their present with whole passion, committment and energy.
Waiting to see all of you in 2 days.

Central Adaptation Camp 2006, Simferopol

2006-10-09T22:34:00.000+03:00

It has been almost 11 hours since I returned back to Kyiv today from Adapchak.

A unique experience with unique people.

This cool time started about 2 weeks ago with preparation. We shared all sessions among all three adapchaks and there was 1 main responsible from 1 region and 2 other responsibles from the other 2 regions. We prepared our sessions, then sent them to conference managers for feedback and then revised them.

But the best time started at the very minute when our pre-meeting started. I could never dream about such an experience. Experience where I reached ALL the goals set beforehand:) (just imagine)!

There were 14 of us: 13 facis and our chair, Lukamasha, preparing the conference in the hospitable flat of LCP, Simferepol, Lilya Kutuzova (guess what, she is also from Uzbekistan:)). Our team was deemed to be successful: we even had a muse spinning around us ( a small kitten which was supposed to be a girl but in the end turned out to be a boy:))

We had a dry run, learned a faci dance (many thnx to Vika, LCP Cherkassy and Dasha, X Coordinator Odessa for teaching this dance), learned our shout (Zhenya, LCP Sevstopol was the poet) and even had pancakes baked by our male trio (Oleg, VP PD Sevastopol, Zhenya and Vitalik) and a dinner by MC :) Just imagine...

And at the same time efficient work and discussions. I will never forget how we sat together on the last day and composed topics for connection times starting from "what for to use media products", "where is the place for independence", "what is love" and ending with "how to stay a person with 2 higher educations:)" Nor will I forget the time when we had our first dinner with baked mushrooms and potatoes and cocktails by Zhenya. And Ezh's (VP PD Odessa) glass will stand on my table to remind me about that time.

The time spent with our great conference manager, Anechka Tkachenko, LCP Odessa. Without her we would never had such a great time.

Then we dove into the conference itself. After 2 hours in electrical trains with Odessa's newies (songs, shouts, talks:)) we came to Evpatoria. Our base was situated in the centre of the town almost on the shore:) I lived together with Dasha and Tanya Mikhailyuk (hope, I've not misspelled your last name, dear:))

Have you ever felt that excitement of seeing the new people in your organization? Have you ever realized that the words "I dream about AIESEC where I wouldn't be selected" get to come true:) Have you ever felt proud for those small stars entering your LC, other LCs? If not, you wish you to feel that one day!

From the very beginning, from our first GTKEO, I felt the special spirit of the conference. (BTW, just want to share:): it was the first time in AIESEC when I played trust fall and that was with my home group:) Sorry, I haven't explained it: the content was developed so that almost all sessions were delivered for the whole plenary, but the plenary itself was divided into small home groups with 7-10 people in each with special facilitators for each; and every session had several discussions held in groups. There were 2 soft skills modules: time management and presentation skills for bigger groups and the last "personal discovery" session without group discussions.

My group was number 12 and we composed a name for ourselves: Sablebelki:) So, you can call me Sablebelchiha:) I'm so proud of those cool guys: Maryna, Sasha Dots, Sasha and Vita from Kyiv, Olya from Simfer, Natasha from Sevastopol, Kostya and Dima from Odessa - they were so clever and actively learning that my facilitating was more about listening than facilitating:)

And our newies... i don't know how it feels to be a mother but I guess it's something like that: to see them answering, dancing, listening, asking and learning. To listen other faciltators telling, "yeah, your guys are cool , indeed, they stand out" :)

This conference had also a very special OC: I've never seen such a hospitable and kind OC. I love you OC, I do:)

Now, finishing my post I understand: there is another special thing I will never forget about this conference: the closing plenary. With facis' wishes for delegates, with AIESEC's song singing, with grateful words from delegates and, of course, with sugar cubes!!! And with my sablebilki throwing me up:), hugging and shouting!

And with the post-meeting on the shore after it. Sitting together with Anechka, Dasha, Inna, Masha, Ira and Vitalik. And having a nice time... writing our legacy:)

Yours,
Olya!

Reportage from central adaptation camp faci premeeting

2006-10-05T23:26:00.000+03:00

I am writing you from Lila's apartment (LCP of Simferopol). Today we have second day of our facilitator premeeting before adaptation camp.
There are 14 people here in 3 room apartment working 20 hours a day, eating, dancing, having fun and sharing their past experience. It is the first time I am on faci premeeting for more then 2 days and it is really great experience.
Today we had dry run for all sessions which means that we talking them throught receiving feedback and making all corrections needed. I am sure that after this we will have best conference ever possible.
In less then 12 hours we will see first delegates on the sity of the conference and our common journey will begin. We will have only 3 days for this journey but I am also sure that it will be life changing experience for most of us.
Just wanted to share.
Keep in touch.

Welcome Newies!!!!!!

2006-10-04T21:55:00.000+03:00

Дивилась я сьогодні на наших малих і стільки думок промайнуло в голові.Які ж вони однак щасливі, що серед купи різних речей, які їм трапляються в житті, вони все ж помітили АЙСЕК і не відклали це на потім або взагалі не викинули як зайву річ цю можливість.

Це цікаві і різні люди. Кожний з них по своєму чудовий і поганий, у кожного свої таракани в голові.Але більшість з них скоро так само будуть кохати цю організацію як і ми. В кожного будуть важкі хвилини, інколи аж занадто. Інколи ці хвилини будуть найщасливішими для них в житті.
Ця організація дарує нам таку нескіченну кількість можливостей, відкриває очі на такі речі про які ми ніколи б самі не задумались.Люди наколо дарують тобі щастя. Робота - приносить задоволення. Ми розвиваємось і стаємо щасливішими, цікавішими.Світ навколо стає меншим, людей більше, проблеми стають очевиднішими і ми не закриваємо більше на них очі.Ми дивимось туди і намагаємось зробити хоч щось, щоб змінити світ на краще.І комусь це вдається.
Саме такі речі чекають на цих людей, а вони навіть не уявляють зараз як їм пощастило!

OpenCO "WWB".

2006-10-02T16:04:00.000+03:00

YES!!!
It's started!
I wanted to tell how it was, but I can't find proper words for this.
I just want to tell - THANK YOU ALL, who helped me with trainees: before, during and after.

Only with your help I was able to do everything.

Thanks!!!!!!

Recruitment

2006-10-01T21:29:00.000+03:00

I want to share with you my thoughts and emotions about recruitment. Actually, it’s the first time I’m experiencing recruitment as an oldy. Just cannot imagine how people, who’ve tasted it several times, feel.

It’s something awesome when you see those people who will soon be called aiesecers, you listen to them, you realize how cute they are, how much they can contribute to the organisation’s development and their own growth.

Today, at the end of LTS, I was thinking: my whole work in AIESEC is worth this moment: the moment that will make a difference. The moment we will remember long time after it passed.

This starts from preparation: you just sit down with your fellow VPs, LC members and draw a vivid picture of the person you wish to see in your LC. The person who will drive this organization towards AIESEC 2010 and even further towards our vision. At first, it’s something very abstract, but very-very attractive. Than you make a profile of people you want to recruit. Who they are, what they like, where and how they study, what past they have, what their future potential is.

And then you think how to attract them. And then everything becomes a plan with action steps that you implement.

And now, having passed almost the half of that work I do understand how important it was. That is what I admire about AIESEC: you start doing something more imaginary than real, than you work on it and in the end you achieve your results.

You read those application forms and get excited, you interview those people and understand: yeah, they should be in AIESEC, since it is the experience they need and since they are the people AIESEC needs, and then you see them during LTS: active, proactive, clever and eager to learn new.

I enjoy this moment!
Olya

Autumn Conference

2006-10-01T19:02:00.000+03:00

Today is the last October, 1, 2006.

You will never have it again. Think about it. Enjoy it!

And think how you can use this very minute to do what you dream about. Just think: this is the last October, 1…

This is a paraphrased passage from one of the presentations shown during AutCo 2006.

Now, back in Kyiv, I understand that this conference was probably the best experience I've ever had in AIESEC. The moment when we all, EBs from different Ukrainian LCs, came together to a wonderful city Sevastopol to share what we've done, to see what is planned and help each other to improve what needs to be improved.

It's hard to convey the burst of all those positive emotions that just inflame you when you see all those familiar faces. Faces from all over Ukraine. Faces envisioning one dream, one passion, one road. And that is what stands behind AIESEC 2010. That is what motivates us to wake up early every day, go to bed late and still sparkle with motivation and enthusiasm. It's something incredible, it's something that turns you upside-down and gives a new way to everything. It's the place where you forget all failures, remember experience and dream for the future.

When I return back to those 5 days some impressions and experiences stand out in my mind - and I wish to share them with you, my dear, best LC!

First of all, it was IC update: many new emotions, stories, talks. We spoke about global update and our national XPs on IC. Guys, when you hear those stories, see those faces and, most importantly, get at least a distant impression of what happened there, you understand: whatever you may have in AIESEC, however difficult your life can sometimes be, - it costs IC.

The next snapshot is about our MC. Their plans and legacy, their devotion to AIESEC (indeed, inspired by AIESEC) and creativity in making this conference the best XP possible. Just imagine: they even decided to dress as AI and play their parts to present AI and when Masha Savranskaya invited a prophet Chunga-Changa (aka Vika Odnokoz, LCP Cherkassy:)) to predict the future of X, we were all just startled. That is a real team with great devotion to our organization. Devotion to facilitate and coordinate our best XPs possible, devotion to develop @ in Ukraine, and not only that... their plans and legacy makes me believe that whatever will happen, AIESEC in Ukraine will have a way.

I started speaking about our MC and instantly remembered another faci - Ira, MC VP PD Russia and Kazakhstan. You should see that kind, open girl speaking about emphatic listening, roving you that the best you have during a conference is what you hear from people around you.

This conference had several sessions delivered by LCPs. Anechka Tkachenko spoke about Competency Model introduced on global level this year. I believe there is no one left after that sessions who hasn't already read Competency Model Docs even if they hadn't done that before it.

One of the peculiarities of the conference was that every day, every minute, every session proved us that everything is inside ourselves: we know all the answers; we can do everything, just go and do that. You can make a conference experience as excellent as you wish to make it; you can make your LC as excellent as you wish it to be. And only you can make a high quality issue-based AIESEC XP out of all opportunities that you have here.

This conference also gave us our new MC Responsible - and that is Slavik Lysak!!! (Udaff)

How often do you have surprising sessions in your conference agendas? Not too much, ya?

And this conference also gave us such a present: unexpectedly Pavlo Sheremeta turned up to have seminars near that place and he suggested coming to our venue to join AIESEC life and make a small speech for us. This speech challenged the worldview of many of us; it made us think about the purpose of planning, about our uniqueness. As for me, it reminded me that whenever we plan, whichever tools we use we need to do that for a supreme purpose: the purpose of developing agents of positive change, reaching our vision and supporting our development. Just a tool - but very influential in skillful hands.

And of course, there can be no conference without fun, roll-calls, shouts, punishments, etc. I want to thank you, Natasha, Lena and Inna for sharing with us the script of that cool roll-call you showed during LCC. That was impressive:)

You may be thinking, "Ok, but what about the chair?" yeah, you are right. And he was Igor Solodov, ex-LCP AIESEC in Odessa, alumnus AIESEC in Odessa. Just if you once have an opportunity to talk to this person, use it! He showed us what we couldn't see without his help, he gave direction to our work during the conference and he was the person, looking at whom you understand how much we can gain from simply talking to our alumni: their experience, knowledge, advice.

I wish you all have such an experience one day!
Your excited and extremely motivated
Olya

First day of Local Training Seminar

2006-10-01T01:03:00.000+03:00

Hi, dear AIESECers!
This day our AIESEC Kyiv Family became larger, more beautiful, and definately better!!!
I've just came home to sleep, while everybody has nice time at LTS partying. Still you deserve it!!! You are great people and we are happy that you became a part of us.
You can not imagine, how we dreamed to see you, real 'persiks', who will move forward one of the most precious thing we have in our life - LC AIESEC Kyiv. Now we can sleep well, knowing that we are not alone.
It is hard to explain in words the feeling that old AIESECers expected today - when newies show excellent knowledge about organization.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU
Thank you for being yourself, thank you for drive and energy that you gave back to us, thank you for the time of our life. We really believe that you will go with us through all 5 stages of AIESEC eXPerience.
Now there are no we and you, now there are only we!!!
AIESEC KYIV 2006/07
Here we begin our fight for the right to start our flight...

First day of interviews

2006-09-26T00:36:00.000+03:00

Today we started the most difficult part of recruitment process. So, called interview week.
Theoretically we can do more then 150 interviews, but unfortunately we didn't have such a lot of applicants. Anyway, the selection will be taught.
During Monday 16 people were interviewed by 8 people working in pairs 3 pairs at the same time all around Kyiv. It was more then 20 hours of talks with new people each of them really different.
I was lucky to have the first and the last of my 2 interviews today and I can say that I did really like the people who will be working with us.
A lot of work ahead with interviews, LTS, Adaptation Camp, probation period and more and more and more. But the main thing that we DO know why we are doing it and really feeling excited about everything.
Till next time... really soon.

How do we live here... in @Kyiv.

2006-09-24T21:10:00.000+03:00

Today I had to meet an australian intern at 7 a.m. He's making tour around Europe...and he had a train at 2 p.m.... I waited for him for 2 hours at train station....and then got sms taht he's coming at 10 a.m. on our time - just forgot about time in different countries :) what can I say.... globalization :)

Leaving for Autumn Conference

2006-09-19T22:44:00.000+03:00

Today our delegation left for Autumn Conference. Only I stayed for one more day to deal with some problems in university:)
I never did understand how can aiesecers when travelling somewhere by train be constant late on it. Today 3 people were being late and I had to run from one end of the train to another to take a stamp from Slavik (and they were supposed to be in one place).
Everytime when I do get on the train it seems that you are going somewhere far away. And eventually you had a great time there on AIESEC conference. It can be from 3 days to 2 weeks and you can be either facilitator/training or delegate. It can be either international conference or small regional one. Anyway... Every time a totally new world opens to you. And it doesn't matter if you meet people you know for several time already (as at this conference). The thing is that each time you can find something new and something really excited about them. And it is another chance to have a great time challenging your worldview and finding new friends.
Autumn Conference is a working one and it means that from morning till evening we will be discussing, working in groups, listening to great speakers and watching amazing presentation. We will create our ambition for the future, we will challenge our view on the things and the way we do it. We will motivate to work further.
... And in 5 days you are back in your city. You go home and it seems (at least for me) that you didn't go anywhere and only one thing is different. And that thing is YOU! Me now and me in 5 days will be a lot different person with changed plans and vision on many things. And that is great about AIESEC Conference.
See you, guys!

HR Budget exibition

2006-09-19T02:56:00.000+03:00

How to teach and develop the employees?
Where must one put in the content of HR budget?

The answer on these and other questions was given by the HR Budget exhibition conducted 15 of September in House of Receptions. The small contribution has been brought in also by AIESEC Kiev, which has participated in this event. We represented two actual products for the participants of HR Budget: projects (such as Career Day) and internships.

Table with the two leptops, new marketing materials and friendly Slava and Nastya were looking rather prospective next to HR Department, Rich Strategies, HR Center and other well-known companies. To refresh the old acquaintances, to meet new potentsial partners, to listen to the useful trainings… the list of possibilities can proceed.

Pleasantly surprising was the fact that HRs nodded their heads and answered, that they have already heard somewhere about AIESEC . The business cards were given with gladness and the collaboration was offered. From the very beginning of exhibition everyone was actively interested in unique organization that develops leaders and human potential. That fact confirms again that we are needed and we are important.

Conclusion: such steps are extremly useful for the promotion of knowledge of outer world about AIESEC, for establishment of new contacts and for raising of self motivation!!!

Today's quest around Kyiv

2006-09-17T22:47:00.000+03:00

Today we had really special day. Today we had great time while participating in quest prepared for Local Committee our Natashas. And it was really unusual quest because the questions were around historical and geographical and other interest information and places in Kyiv.
I am living in Kyiv for more then 10 years already and I never thought that in Kyiv we do have elevators for one person only and 3 big vorony living in center of Kyiv.
That was just amazing running around Kyiv and trying to guess something and to notice something else.
Thank you girls from all of us. That was cool and much better and interesting then simple quest.

First step in recruitment is done!

2006-09-17T22:34:00.000+03:00

On Friday we had the last promotion event during this September. In general we held 3 Discussion Clubs and 2 AIESEC Days during one week.
I can't say that everything was perfect during some of them but the last one in KNEU was just amazing (as people say, I was actually making a presentation together with Alyona). We had our dear guests - our intern from Mexico Citla and one of our oldiest alumni Nikolay Iliyn.
When I was making presentations during the previous recruitment I do clearly remember how frightened I was and how unsatisfied with myself. And now I do see the different and I do see how I did changed during this year (and, of course, I am talking here about positive changes:)).
It is really great when you can share with people something you really like and something you can't imagine your life without. Something meaning so much for you that you just can't explain it for people around you. And even better when those people sitting and listening to you came there because they found interesting your organization and they do something in common with our vision and they do believe in development and better future... And they do want to be a part of change around us.
That's really cool to understand that now you are changing somebodys' lifes. And you just can't hide big smile on your face when trying to remember it.
Just want to wish all of you to experience such kind of feeling.
Your LCP.

The first Discussion club during rekruitment!!!

2006-09-11T00:12:00.000+03:00

WOW!!! WOW!!! WOW!!!
It was awesome! We have the first Discussion club in KNEU on Saturday. Our expert was Olga Melnik - HR direktor of Beeline Ukraine. We were talking about success - that it is reality which everybody can achieve. There were 27 students and at about 6-10 AIESECers.
Well, what can I tell about how it was... It was really great to see such peaches, whom Sveta was talking about. There were really great people. Kate was doing like "check list" - ok, finance people are here, managers are also here, IT are here and journalists are also here :)
First of all we had a lecture from Olga. Then, we had working in groups and discussing problem of soft skills in student's life and success. After that one person from each group were presenting solutions for this problem. After that we show them AIESEC-video and give our promo-materials. It were amazing four hours and I think most of these people will come to AIESEC-days. We will rock!

After International Congress feelings...

2006-09-05T12:42:00.000+03:00

I am eventually home after travelling in Ikarus during the night from Warsaw to Lviv and then 12 hours in the train. I am sitting at my laptop and listening to song of AIESEC International dance. It seems that I didn't go anywhere...
But something had changed. And not something but SOMETHING. Changed my perception of many things and my worldview around many issues. I am still and will be for few weeks understanding all what happened during those 2 weeks...
I arrived today and checked my mail: 4 mbs - not so much. But one letter was really special from one of our members. I want to thank you for that letter. It really means a lot for me.
See you all on Friday's LCM.

The Last Day...

2006-09-03T13:59:00.000+03:00

In our life we do always appreciate something which is already gone. The same with this conference. At the end you do understand how you can invest better during the conference. Who you should meet more, who you should talk to and stuff like that.
And this is great thing about AIESEC. It gives you an opportunity to learn by yourself, to understand yourself.
We do have ahead closing plenary then in few hours we are already back in Ukraine. I have so much thoughts in my head about the way AIESEC is, the way AIESEC should be, my role in it and all other things.
And one more advice for me and I am sure I had already told it to you several times: have a time of silence to think!
See you really soon already in Kyiv.

Another day at International Congress

2006-09-01T21:16:00.000+03:00

Another day is coming to the end. There is only LCP track in agenda. Finally will see all of those people in one room :)
The best moment of the day, of course, was AI 2005-2006 final report. There was almost whole previous team and, of course, Brodie. There was a small update and in the end Brodie shared some of his thoughts with plannery. And I want to share one of them with you:
Receive by giving with love.
Give by receiving with gratitude.
Read it at least 3 times. Then you will understand.

Developing leaders day

2006-09-01T01:55:00.000+03:00

Guys, can you just imagine 32 corporate leaders from all over the world from 2 companies, totally different nationalities meet in a one place for several days?
And can you imagine the reason why they do meet is AIESEC and belief of their companies to AIESEC? I now really can...
Just because I was on developing leaders day on International Congress in Warsaw. It is already for a 7th time in a row Cadburry Schwepps together with some other companies are organizing this great even for IC delegates. And a woman from CS actually saw 7 IC in a row. More then any AIESEC member alive :) And can you imagine that 50 years old woman talking about how AIESEC inspires her every year and how she is looking forward for the next august to scream: "Hey, AIESEC!"?..
I can... Because I heard her screaming it and emphasizing about that enxious she has about IC.
So, the theme for DLD this year was leading from within. And today we discovered more about ourselves, about drivers which creates our behaviours, about interactions of those drivers and how they influence team work. We had really cool role game for around 1 hour involving reading, discussions, communication with other team, negotiation at the round table and other stuff. Guys, that was something incredible and I think we should held this session on one of our LCM.
Really cool experience from today and another point to my last thoughts about personal development.
Keep in touch.

AIESEC University Live: global perspective on local issues

2006-08-31T00:07:00.000+03:00

Today we did have first round of sessions called AIESEC University Live!
The idea is really simple: to run workshops on things related to Critical Cussess Factors and then do real case studies sent by Member and Local Committes.
I was on a workshop on competency based performance appraisal. Yeap, sorry for such a topic.
In general the idea of performance appraisal is to give a external perspective for employee on his performance assessing his skills, reviewing goals and planning development plan. And by competency based we do mean that we assess competencies from Global Competency Model (if you want to find more just go to Global People Development Community) and you will find more :)
That was not really practical but gave a few cool things to thought while implementing it on local level.
And then we had case studies. Actually our local committee submitted 3 case studies (max number per one entity) about mentorship, external event, and allocation of people. The idea was that if there was a person from LC or country which case studies are studied then he should be in that group. And I was called to a group which had a case study on our mentorship implementation.
Actually to tell the truth I didn't expected anything really great from this AIESEC University Live!, but after few minutes listening to people I changed my perception. The main thing is that all those people are really excited about helping AIESEC development by that way and they are really open and trying to understand situation. There was a lot of proposition from their side and a lot of challenging from my side, but I can say that I had a huge amount of ideas and things to pay attention for.
We will have 2 more rounds of AIESEC University Live! and I hope I will be able to participate in a working group dealing with our case studies.
That's all for now. I am heading to dorminotories for country meeting.

International Congress during the night...

2006-08-30T23:58:00.000+03:00

After a little pause in posting I am returning to you, guys!
So, today is already 30 in the calendar and there's not so much time left to learn, to interact, to ask, to listen, ... to party :)
Yeap, and I can say that party on IC are just amazing and not only because of a beer selling only for 0.5 euros, but also because a bunch of people living same values and really enjoying being together in one place.
Some parties are dedicated to Growth Networks and on those parties countries are presenting their food and alcochol for all party attendance. I didn't actually try any but people really like it.
And another cool point about party is that you have an opportunity to find out more about each other (I mean here mostly country delegation). And when on first party everybody just came to me and said: "Oh, my god, man, you are cool! I didn't know you can have fun in this way" it was a little bit funny. In AIESEC we don't really know each other from other cities in all areas in life and I am sure that this parties are really making us closer to each other.
And for the last some of the photos.

How do we live here... in @ Kyiv ? :)

2006-08-28T18:59:00.000+03:00

Indeed, how do we live? How do we spend our time ? What do we do?

So, these days we are saying farewell to the last summer 2006 days:)

And we've recently met - everyone present in Kyiv - to spend this wonderful time on the bank of the Dnipro. Even more, Alyona brought her sister with her, so we had "AIESEC+" Day

It was great: we played valleyball (big respect to Slava:), badminton (Alyona, Anya that talky game was cool :)), talked, created new underground stations (which was meant to be written "AIESEC" on the sand) and just had a nice time.

For me, personally, it was very pleasurable since it had been a long time since I met AIESECers without talking about work and another important thing: it was the first time I saw Citla after her vacations :)

BTW, this day-out was called barbecue, and even supposed to be, but then we decided not to go crazy with meat and just bye anything we like in a supermarket.

All in all, many thanks to Anya for suggesting such a cool place and thanx to everyone who came on Thursday!!! And thnx to the weather which was forcast to be rainy but in the end was pretty fine and warm.

And then...
Friday came.
And we had our LCM on Spivoche Pole. There lots of people because of the Flowers' Exhibition, but still, we succeeded to find a cute place under trees and have the first after-summer LCM! :) (BTW, Nadya, I know you read our blog, guess why we chose Spivoche Pole;))

We shared our impressions about the summer, talked about work and recent news: everything on green-green grass, with beautiful flowers around us! I'm looking forward for another LCM :)

Soon we'll have our new HR Audit, Discussion Clubs, AIESEC Days, and .... of course, OUR NEWIES!!!:)

So, check for further posts to learn about our life.

P.S. I dodn't write that out LCP is on the International Congress in Poland now, but I guess, you've already realized it reading our blog:)

Cheers!

Generations from different centures meet together to award our best alumni

2006-08-28T16:23:00.000+03:00

>
Yesterday we had alumni hall of fame ceremony together with guys from YouCan and alumni congress. That's was great... Too see all those men and women in on planery with all of us and celebrating this great journey we all have in organization.
Actually we did even see one of the founders of AIESEC and some of ukrainian delegation including me made a photo with him and you can see it here. I can't even imagine what does he feel when he sees his idea working and living for more then half of the century. That's great experience I suppose.

Another day started...

2006-08-27T15:34:00.000+03:00

Today I decide to have some more sleep and didn't go to breakfast and morning planery. So, I can say that I am feeling as I only arrived at the conference after almost 8 hours of sleep.
We started with presentation of AI Plan (which you can find as everything else on live.ic2006.pl) and then moved to presentation of AIESEC Global IS system development of which will be started very soon. AI was finding for a vendor of this system and they stoped their choice on TATA Consulting Services - big international company dealing with IT development and based in India. So, we had a small presentation of the company and then AIESEC and TATA official signed partnership in front of a whole planery.
Then we had a session about Our management philosophy in which we talk on how we should use Scorecard in our daily work. And main stress was that Scorecard shouldn't be seen only as a tracking tool, but at first as a tool for understanding and showing our global direction and strategy.
Running for a next session now. See you.

AIESEC dialogues

2006-08-27T01:46:00.000+03:00

Do you know what is the difference between dialogue and discussion?
Anyway just take your vocabulary and take a look what both of them mean.
In general in dialogue you try to understand on the point of view of other person, see it and learn from it rather then just add another comment about the things previously said.
So, the conception was this one and we had 12 topics to choose and participate. All of this was transmited via live.ic2006.pl, so you have an opportunity to find everything there.
I was deciding about the topic for a long time and eventually joined a group of people with topic: Who will change the world.
There was around 35 people in a corner of a huge planery sitting on the floor and LISTENING to each other. There was different cultures, there was different ages, there was diversity. And as all of you know the diversity is one of the success factors for good outcomes.
You can see all the discussion on the web site.
I just want to share with you one thought I had constantly for a long time from now and it is about this: if we are so cool and we are going to change a world why it is so difficult for most of us to change ourselves. No, you just remember the last time you wanted to change something in your life and what was the results? Yeap, I had some problems with this too.
Just think about how you are going to change something and someone around you if you can't make yourself to get out of the bed in the morning while you need to go to university. And now decide whether you stop talking about changing the world or you start making changes in yourselves.
Sorry for such a long post. Hope you find something usefull for you here. Just remember you don't need to take my point of view as your own, you just need to see the stuff from my perspective and decide if you can learn something from it.
Keep in touch, guys.

And eventually you can see me on a photo

2006-08-27T01:41:00.000+03:00

I will be short with this posting. I don't know if anybody of you experience the same problem I do. I do have my own digital camera and I have it with me all the time, but I can say that I don't have photos with me on it. And it has already been almost a week I am here in Poland and I only have several of my photos and all others are done by me.
So, I just want to advice you to make as much as possible photos with yourself on them. And it is not about selfish:)

What does partnership with AIESEC means to Global Partners

2006-08-26T21:51:00.000+03:00

Today we had opportunities to get to know more of Global Partner and it was DHL and Alcatel.
The first presentation was from DHL and we were celebrating 10 years anniversary of AIESEC-DHL partnership. They gave every delegate an orange bag (similar to one Slavik has) with a small car inside :)
Then a short presentation followed by ballons and salute. Just amazing. They just spend a year amount of money we receive in Ukraine for a year based partnership for this 30 minues presentation :)
And the other one was a guy, Vice-President Global Marketing (I hope you do understand what does it mean) of Alcatel. And can you imagine... He was talking about his company less then 5 minutes during whole half hour. He was talking about himself, AIESEC, us, our future, our next page in life. And he was joking like crazy and my favorite one was: "AIESECers are so strange, they know what they do want to do a whole life, but don't know what they will do next year! :)" Just amazing isn't it? And this guy wasn't in AIESEC, he got to know and learn it later and now he is almost 40 years old. He also shared some ideas about our first work place and his thoughts are next: find a job that will help you to CHALLENGE YOURSELF, WILL BE PRACTICING ACTIVE LEARNING INSIDE OF YOU and something else. And the main message is that it doesn't really matter what company do you choose first if you are basing yourself on this principles you anyway will be successful.
And in the end I want to say that those people (I mean corporate folks do really know why they partner with AIESEC.

Sitting in HP Digital Cafe

2006-08-26T13:31:00.000+03:00

Guys, you know technology is a great stuff. I am now sitting on the 3rd floor of our planery building with my laptop and having wireless access to internet. This great opportunity was given for AIESEC by Microsoft and HP and they are doing it for several ICs already.
Internet is really fast and there around 50 laptops available for everybody.
In few minutes next session will start and actually it is continuation of a previous one and we are talking about freedom centered organization and how AIESEC is in relation to this concept.
That's all for now.

AIESEC opening, global village, and and end of the day

2006-08-26T01:52:00.000+03:00

That was one of the longest days in my entire life. Imagine you are waking up at 7.30 because OC in knocking in the door asking us not to forget anything for Global Village. Then you go wo a shower and there is no water there :)
Then you run to a dinner tent to be one of the first and not to stand in the line because of logistics and amount of people there (I will surely put here photo of that line). And then you are running to a plenary because you want to sit in the first raws and look to those people speaking there in the eyes and see there the future of AIESEC in general and the future of AIESEC in Kyiv.
OK. So, we started in the morning with roll calls. Can you, guys, imagine over 90 countries presenting their roll calls. At the beginning it is interesting and at the end you are almost sleeping :) And in the middle whole ukrainian delegation is going out to repear our roll call once more time and in the end we just sing a song. Crazy AIESECers :)
Opening plenary is finished and I go to a dorminotary to take stuff for Global Village and back and it takes around 20 minutes because of the distances. Over the road to the center of Warsaw where the whole event was running you are traveling in a bus with tunisian guys singing and singing so loud you want to kill them in the end :)
Over 90 cultures, over 700 people representing them, over 2000 citizens, TVs, cameras, excitement. You just need to feel it by your own! So, apply for LCP next year and you will have a possibility to go to IC in Turkey.
And in the evening serious stuff started. Yep, agenda overview. AIESEC 2010 pioneers: about us and how ready we are to lead those changes we should make in order to achieve our vision. And A SESSION FROM PAI named Rocket without science. Imagine the whole planery, around 600 people, I can't even say how much square metres. And a one guy on the chair near the flip chart, and 2 HUGE screens with projectors connected with video camera to show what he is doing on that flip chart. And a voice of around 7 PAI starting from 1996-1997 via a phone. And those "Hey, AIESEC" from them and "What's up from the plenary". Yep, one in a life opportunity. So, in general the idea of that session was to show how did it come that now we have our AIESEC 2010 vision, what was the priorities of AIESEC back 10 years ago on global level. What was the reasons for AIESEC 2005 and how did it turned out it didn't work. You just feel yourself as a part of the history! And the future!!! The future created by you, those people around you, those people now reading their mails back home. And during this moment you can actually say that AIESEC does change your worldview!

IC Official opening

2006-08-26T01:39:00.000+03:00

As always. A small update about what time it is now in Poland. And it is now 0.40 and I just arrived from plenary actually.
So, now I want to share with you very special event which happened yesterday, here on IC, in Warsaw. Yep, yesterday we had an official opening of the conference in the biggest hall of Poland: Dvorez Sporta. There was huge amount of people, you just can't imagine that diversity flying in every corner and every second. You are going down the corridor and can only count: africa, japan, chine, europe, again asia, again asia, ... Ariadna ;) Yep, I met her there and she was on party yesterday. The world is really not that big when you are in AIESEC, guys!
Among the speakers there was Minister of Finance and ex-Prime Minister of Poland. Can you imagine that? Standing there while delegates shouting la-la-la, la-la-la, ye-ye-ye, take your close of :) That's just amazing.
And, of course, a lot of dances and speeches from Congress Committee President and our dear PAI. As always it was AIESECly with enjoying participation and challenging worldview.
Read next posts.

The day when everything will begin

2006-08-24T16:39:00.000+03:00

So, today is a starting point of International Congress 2006. I am now sitting in my room preparing for Official Opening and in 20 minutes we are leaving by buses to the city. Official opening will be in a best hall of Poland with more then 2000 guests there, so, it should be just amazing.
Today we had Closing of CEE pre-meeting and HP internet cafe lunch. You can really see the approaching of IC on people's faces.
Also today delegates for YouCan arrived and I already saw our Katya, Slavik and Nastya. They are doing great with opening and out door games.
That's all for now. Read more on the evening.

3rd day in IC

2006-08-24T02:56:00.000+03:00

Hey, guys!
Now it is around 2.00 am in Poland and I am going to my bed after very difficult time during the day and evening.
So, today we had the most important part of agenda for CEE premeeting: we were discussing CEE initiatives, how they should like, what challenges can we face in implementing them, what you should change and add to them. There were several working groups and I was working on the group dealing with potential challenges in Enter CEE. And you know... when so different people come together to think about something you are actually experiencing what does it mean working in multicultural environment. I got already used to different accents and I hope they did used to mine too and now I am trying hard to understand the people see the whole picture based on their own background (country, LC, culture etc). And I can tell you, guys, that is really challenging stuff for me now. In general the main challenge we saw was the demand and supply in our exchange pool. The thing is that we do have a lot of PBOXes planned inside the program and a lot of SN realization throughout the year, but those TNs and SNs should be realized in different time frames. We came up with some of the ideas, but as always we should do more deep analisys.
Then we had skills building sessions. I attended team management and effective meetings. I can't say that I did hear anything new for me, but again I can say THE ONE thing I was thinking about lately: we DO NEED to do something with our KNOWING-DOING GAP. And what I mean by this is that we do, guys, know a lot of stuff, but using not all of it in the practice. And our main efforts should be on selfmanagement in order to fill that gap.
OK. Then we had visit from AI (and you can see them on the photo, the right one, Dai, is President of AIESEC International). They are really cool guys (actually about 20 of them) and I looking forward for sessions from them.
That's all for today. Tomorrow YouCan delegation arrives and IC starts with official opening. See you all really soon.

Second day in Warsaw

2006-08-23T01:40:00.000+03:00

Now it is around 12.30 by polish time and I am sitting in my room connected to high-speed internet and writing this post.
Today finished my second day in Warsaw on IC and first day of CEE (Central and Eastern Europe) premeeting. As always we started with getting to know each other: we were catching people and telling them some crazy story from your life. So, I managed to talk with 2 MCPs, 2 LCPs and some other MC members. And each time you need to think out something new and crazy because it is a little bit boring to tell about the same thing again and again and again.
Then we had opening ceremony with history about CEE GN and analysis of performance of previous 2 terms and then we were talking about CEE Initiatives that will be developed this year. And they will be EnterCEE, CEE The Difference, Country2Coutry mentoring, CEE CEEDs etc. All of this was facilitated by CEE GN Board 2006-2007: Jaroslav Dokoupil, AI Director, Jens Christian Borgen, CEE Chair, Ines Djuric, CEE Program Manager, Agata Lis, CEE ER. All of them are great guys and girls. But one of them is even more special and it is because you already met him on our Winter Conference 2006 when he was a chair with yaki-yaki :) Today he repeated it already :)
You can see our plenary for CEE premeeting. As you already know IC is located on really big University Campus. And here it is on the photo. We have our dinners and lunches in a big tent (you can see it too).
In the evening after agenda official finished ukrainian delegation wasn't leaving a plenary building while trying to rehearse roll-calls and dances for tomorrow and the day of official opening of International Congress 2006.
So, that's all for today. Stay tuned.

First day in Warsaw

2006-08-22T09:32:00.000+03:00

Now it is somewhere around 8.30 in the morning by Polish time and I eventually have time to sit near computer and check my mail and write to blog.
Yesterday we arrived around 22.00 again by Polish time after travelling in city for almost one hour and walking in night not knowing where to go. You know I always thought that I have problems with map but as it appeared I did manage to find a way in new city for me only with one map with not the highest quality.
We travelled in tram not paying for because the driver didn't have rest and wandering when will somebody come in and ask for tickets.
Then there was metro station and you have to look for a place where you can buy tickets for 10 minutes because there is nobody on the station (I mean working there - everything is automatic).
There are already a lot of people here: different countries, different cultures, different races. And all of them walking to a shop on petrol station and I think guys who working there will be wandering what is going on till the end of the Congress.
3 person is leaving in one room with all furnitures and even fridge. We do have unlimited internet access in every room. You only need to have laptop and TCP/IP cable for connection. So, it's great! I will be able to be with you all the time.
For now I have to go to breakfast and further by agenda.
Take care guys and see you in 2 weeks:)

PPGB 2006

2006-08-21T22:17:00.000+03:00

This was my first AIESEC Conference made by AIESEC Kyiv. I think I will always remember it, even though I wasn't a memeber of the OC PPGB 2006.

This conference was an important stage for many paople: OCP, OC, LC Kyiv, delegates, partners and others.

And now we can use OC's XP for further improvement of our projects, we can capitalize on it.

Thanks to Dasha Anyakina we now have an exhaustive PPGB2006 package where there is everything connected to this project: all documents, budget, all relevant stuff and much much more.

Don't lose your opportunity and make copies of it for your selves (contact me for it)

Cheers!

Just news and my thoughts...

2006-08-21T20:55:00.000+03:00

Yes. There is no cool title of this post, but!.. There will be alot of news here...
First of all I want to wish Good Luck to Vitaliy, because he went to the coolest AIESEC conferences named Internatioanl Congress 2006. It takes place in Poland this year. I wish you find the best international friends and to get enough motivation for the whole term of your being LCP of the best Local Commeette in the whole AIESEC world. Guess what is the name of it??? Of course LC KIEV!!!
Second important part of these post is news about YOU CAN 2006 and it's participants from our LC. You Can 2006 will take place this year at the same place and also the same time, where IC 2006 takes place - in Poland. There are four delegates from our LC: Slava, Nastya, Katya and me. Slava has problems with getting visa, so he will come later(I REALLY HOPE SO!!!). Katya, Nastya and me will go to Lviv tommorow night and the day after tommorow we have a bus to Poland. In Lviv we are going to buy national food for Global Viladge, national flag and other stuff to show our country on this conference - as the best country in the world :)
And now my thoughts... Tommorow recruitment materials will begin printing in Cherkassy, from the end of August the recruitment campaign will begin and till the end of September we will have a lot of new faces on LCMs :), a lot of new posts on our voice and a lot of motivation and spirit! I want to develop our commeette this year as well as it is possible and I will do everything for discovering and developing my potential and potential of all people in my commeette - THE BEST LC in the WHOLE world. I LOVE YOU, AIESEC KIEV!!!

My first mentorship meeting with Dima Melnik

2006-08-19T00:17:00.000+03:00

Few months ago I didn't think that I would ever will seek for a mentor. There was a lot of reasons why I didn't do it and a lot of them there now to do it! And I did, I saw a person who I respect and who has enough living experience and just went to Dima and asked if he want to be my mentor and he agreed.
So, today was our first meeting... 2 hours... A lot of thinking process before, during and even more after. You know a feeling when you think you don't have any brains because you can't tell if you have any thoughts in your heads. It happens with me after very challenging worldview things (it can be event, movie, chat, talk or anything else) and I can stay in such a condition for several days. I don't know what happened but it seems that my brains are not any more working and I am dealing directly with my subcontiousness.
Yeap, I wrote that paragraph and then thought that some of you can think of me as crazy :) But I am not believe me.
And the last thing: guys, whily you are here and have a lot of time and energy and time to use all those opportunities DO IT! Go and find yourself a mentor and try to create win-win relationships and try to challenge yourself, to learn from other people.

Travel, learn and share - 2

2006-08-16T20:10:00.000+03:00

From time to time, when I do not have enough concentration for work to do I review some videos or ppts that give me motivatian. One of the ppts is very known in AIESEC and it is called “Sunscreen” and it consists of general advices how to live. One of the slides that I remember pretty well was only with one word “Travel”. Just travel. When you travel you meet new people, who broad your worldview, you have an opportunity to look at your routine things from another angle, share your own experience and get a feedback. As for I am really passionate about IT, I always want to share my knowledge in that sphere, so that people make their life’s easier, more exciting and challenging. So, I when I had an opportunity to go to Kirovohrad to make a training I had no hesitations.

There is direct train to this city, but when you go out from train in the morning and see that there is only one carriage and it looks pretty funny. The architecture in Kirovohrad is not so pretty, especially, the central square, but the Lenin street, that starts near it is just amazing – it reminds Western Ukrainian cities – Lviv and Chernivtsi.

Soon after my arrival I was met by VP PD of AIESEC in Kirovohrad Katya and the official part of my visit began. We went to nice place that is near Kirovohrad – to Berezhynka, where nature is beautiful and it was really fascinating experience. The training I delivered was a part of my new training about Web 2.0 conception – what today’s internet looks like and how it can be working on you (for example, one of our favorite things – blogs and podcasts are from Web 2.0 conception). The training was a kind of conversation between me and listeners that I liked very much. From time to time we talked about personal development, lucid dreaming and other interesting stuff I learned about not long ago. After that we had a talk with LCP Angela and VP PD Katya about what IS in Kyiv and Ukraine looks like, in what way it may help the development of Kirovohrad’s committee. I was delighted about persistence and confidence of Angela, cause it was my first private conversation with her. She reminded me our dear LCP in some way. As for VP PD, I think almost everybody from active AIESEC members knows she’s pretty funny and serious person. Luckily for me, I’ve taken some discs (podcasts, training, ppts etv) with me, so it was not only help in words for LC Kirovohrad.

As for one of private conversation, one of my talks was with guy (everyone called him Dosja) as I just described a little bit what AIESEC is, which opportunities it gives and how IT is perspective. So, really-really hope to see more ITified ( my own word, I’ve created just now, comes from electrified :) ) LC’s and some more experienced specialist in out National IS Team…

Thanks for LC Kyiv for an opportunity to travel and support Kirovohrad!!! They have a great future so let’s give them a hand of help!!!

I am really looking forward to the start of new year and hope to deliver full training “Web 2.0 or how to make internet to work for you” for our LC Kyiv Members.

Still, Kyiv is the best !!! :)))

Recruitment is knocking on the door...

2006-08-16T17:36:00.000+03:00

Ya-ya... Time is passing very fast and today is already 16th of August and it means that we have only 2 weeks before great event in every Local Committee all over the world. And that event is Recruitment.
We have very ambitious plans, we want to recruit great people who will find themselves in AIESEC and align their personal goals with those opportunities AIESEC can give them.
We do see already how challenging it will be to cover in few days all universities with promotion, to run 3 Discussion Clubs and 2 big AIESEC days and all this in a time of one week.
I am just excited about all of this and see how in 2 months we sit on LCM with bunch of people with lights in their eyes, people who want to discover and develop their potential and have a positive impact on society.
And another thought that come to my mind is that I am extremely happy about all of you excited about this event on the same lever as I am and your eagerness to help.
Keep working this way!

TTT by Nordic

2006-08-13T23:10:00.000+03:00

While Vitalik was obtaining new knowledge on Counterpart's training, Slavik, Katya, Alyona and I attended another TTT, now by our national partner - Nordic.

This was an unforgettable experience for all of us. We had an excellent trainer - Diana Kebas, one of the best I've ever seen, - so professional, flexible and open that, personally I didn't feel being "supervised" or taught, but at the same time I looked at her and could see those things, skills and tricks she revealed for us. She was as an open book with good illustrations: you can read, you can imagine and you can see everything.

More than that, she was very open: open during discussions, open for questions, open for our organisation and us, open for further co-operation. She was as if she had been an alumna.

We learned many new things about the 3 elements of any training: a trainer, a group and content. We learned how to develop oneself as a trainer and stay motivated and optimistic throughout a training and after it, revealed groups' peculiarities and why they behave as they do and mastered techniques of content creation.

So, interesting, so useful...

I'm now dreaming about the time when we start preparing the educational cycle and teach our newies:)

First day of TTT from Counterpart

2006-08-10T23:50:00.000+03:00

All of you visited trainings and do remember the way business trainers look like...
Today was the first day at Counterpart training and the first thing I was amazed was how their trainers look like :) One of them is from Western Ukraine (the big one on the photo) and another one from Crimia (the small one). Yes, it is not like business guy or business woman, but believe me they are not worse and I would say even better. They talked on different languages (ukrainian and russian) and it added another fishka to this training.
I was a long time I enjoyed training so much: full of individual and group work, full of fun and learning. There was no ppt only flip charts and they were hanging all over the room on the walls and any time you could return to those things, read them again and think more.
There are only 9 delegates and this is great, because a lot more attention can be given to each of participants. And participants are all different, with different background and different experience in delivering trainings and that diversity added another points to learning process.
In general I can say thanks again to all people that make it possible to attend this great training... And by those people I mean Olya Kuzentsova for raising Counterpart and Counterpart itself for great job they are doing here.

Learning to deliver better experience

2006-08-09T23:53:00.000+03:00

Tomorrow I will have day # 1 out of 5 days training on training skills. This great opportunity will be provided by our yet unofficial partner Creative Center CounterPart. Mission of this organization is to support development of NGO and whole 3rd sector in Ukraine and I do believe they are doing it great.
I am sure this training will be a huge step forward in my public speaking, coaching, training and conference development skills and I will do my best to convert my knowledge and skills to your benefit in personal and professional development.
Also some members of Executive Board will take part in Train The Trainer 2 days training delivered by national partner of AIESEC in Ukraine - Nordic.
Stay tuned and be ready to start one of the best years in your life in few days... Year of AIESEC in Kyiv 06-07.

One Week vacations

2006-08-05T13:36:00.000+03:00

From yesterday Local Committee of AIESEC in Kyiv has official holidays for one week...
In several days we will come together again and start our "new" year. There will be only 2 weeks before start of recruitment and a lot of things to do in all subsystems. We have to review our year plan and finilize budget, we have to review all what have been done till now and try to start with blank page.
Only few days... Till the begining of something. I am excited about it.

Leadership Development Seminar 2006

2006-08-01T13:50:00.000+03:00

It was something incredible, something I could never expect, something that makes a difference.

Leadership Development Seminar 2006.....

When we talked about it 3 months earlier and decided that we connot afford not doing it because whole Ukraine was waiting for it I couldn't even imagine how deep that was.

Those delegates' faces, their excitement, compliments....

cute speakers, devoted professionals, outstanding personalities...

and all in one place....

When I was very small my Mom once told me that if a play or a concert or anythiing that neds audience is successful people come out of it and speak mostly about it. They go out and don'tstart speking about their home problemsa immediately, they discuss the performance. And that was what I saw during LDS. People came iout of sessions and discussed them, their speakers, new knowledge.

I hope it will become one of the most memorable and dearest XPs for all of us!

P.S. Many thanks for everyone who helped the OC during the conference, especially LC Kyiv and LC Vancouver!!!!

My Leadership Development Seminar

2006-08-01T09:45:00.000+03:00

Today is Tuesday and it is already 2 days left after great event in life of AIESEC in Kyiv, huge conference where whole Ukraine gather in one place to get new knowledge, challenge worldview, broaden personal network, have fun.
In my life I saw 2 Leadership Development Seminar and I hope next year I will experience new one. And each time they are different... Previous year I was Organizing Committee President and this year I was conference manager. Totally different roles and experience. And there will pass few weeks when I start understand what I've learned, where I was wrong and how I can change to better. This way it was in 2005.
And as I know it is always this way. In new situation you have to deal with new things, you have to think fast and make decisions, you have to lead people around you and often there is no time to stop and think about what you are doing. You have that chance only after event when you can't change anything and the only thing you can do it to deliver your message to other people who will be going through the same experience in future and not to repear your mistake yourself.
Yeap, that's why I do love AIESEC. I love it for opportunities to learn things by doing. But don't get me wrong. Try to learn things by doing after you have theoretical knowledge. It is more effective this way.
And in the last I want to thank all of you people who was connected by this project: OC, AIESEC in Kyiv, MC, delegates from other cities, students, companies, site personal, alumni and much much more. There won't be any conference without you!

Travel, learn and share

2006-07-22T21:41:00.000+03:00

I had a trip to Dnipropetrovsk to work for National IS Team. Right at railway station I was met by guys and seconds after we had a nice chat. Working in one room for three days made us being real team and I really want to say big-big thanks to all people, whom I met during this days - they all are real Personalities.
Of course, at Dnepr we had not only hard work, but a hard play. No, I'm not talking about FIFA 2006 and Magic Card games, but about it too. I'm talking about nice party we had at first day. Thanks for all people, who came to it, sorry for not remembering all of you, I was so drunk that don't remember largest part of party :) I remember party partly. Nice calambur. Still, I saw that AIESEC in Dnipropetrovsk are very friendly, funny, great and easy-going people. Without a doubt, they can work just as good as relax.
Luckily, next morning we had no headache and continued our productive work. New ideas appered in our heads, we shared them, brainstormed, another ideas appeared, and the main thing I liked was sharing expirience.
That is the most great in every trip and try to take every opportunity to learn something new from other people, see your daily thing from another angle and be happy sharing your knowledge with other people. For example, I've promoted my and Vitalik's favourite thing for last month - podcasts.
What else? Enlarge your network - you do not need anything to do it, just come to person, say "Hi, my name is..." and heart will advice you what to do next.
After meeting we had a big analyzing conversation after which our work in platform made a large step forward. So, that's another my conclusion - always analyze anything and try to critisize it - just to make it better.

but... you know... still Kyiv is the best :)

With great respect,
National IS Team Art-Director
Anton Chornyy

P.S. for more info about my hot summer visit my blog at http://chornyy.blogspot.com

Idia is not dead=)

2006-07-21T00:16:00.000+03:00

I was about finishing my previous post when light turned off. ****
But I think it's a sign, now I'l write better. =)

I'm happy!!!
Why?
Because I could see that my idea is still alive.
I could see that all that things that u write here is about REAL LC Kyiv and about Real people, who are my friends and my team.
I could see that all my words in description are True.
I'm sure that this Blog part of our life now, here all of u write that things that usually u can't find time to tell about them. This thing are very important, for me, for u, for everybody in @Kyiv.
I'm sure this @Kyiv Blog in the future helps us to make newes change their mind about to be or not in AIESEC.
Because when they read this posts there won't be doubt that they won't find so many interesting, kind, different and hardworking people in their life.
I love u all.

p.s. thank u very much for "award", I think I'm worthy of it.=)

AIESEC Kyiv touch and feel it!

2006-07-20T22:36:00.000+03:00

Yesterday I had a very special feeling about our LC.
Something very warm and excited, becuase of us, AIESEC Kyiv.

The feeling, the wave of emotions had been rising for several weeks, starting from, maybe our 1 Discussion Club, maybe the second one, maybe from one of the Project Planning Days, I don't remember exactly, but it rose.

The feeling of something new being DONE. In capital letters.

Those emotions, work, challengers, everything they create good things.

Honestly, I couldn't even imagine that we would have such cool projects and their presentation in the end, that we would have such outstanding Discussion Clubs with such interesting topics to discuss.

Not that I didn't trust and believe in us, but my own box just couldn't give me an opportunity to imagine all that. Even though I always believed it would be something great :)

And now, when our Entrepreneurs are among the GCPS of Project Planning in Ukraine and all the rest are distinguished for their excellence, everything that was before seems just a wonderful story of our experience. Oh, well, better to say, the introductory word of our projects' realisation.

And our Discussion Club... That's something incredible. Especially yesterday's. Just don't want to repeat Vitalik and Alyona. But the most incredible thing about it is the passion and interest of Lena. Of coz, I have very special feelings about Discussion CLubs, but still :))

I'm so proud to feel I'm a part of you, AIESEC Kyiv!!! :)

What is the goal of starting business...

2006-07-19T22:22:00.000+03:00

That was the topic of today's discussion club (it was 3rd release of our educational project aimed at deepening our knowledge around enterpreneurship and changing some attitudes toward it using such tool as discussions).
Many of you've already heard that 97% of new enterprizes die the first 3 years and only 3% of them contninue their life. There many explanations why it is hapenning... Today I've heard another one and it is the goal of creation of those enterprizes. And for many of them the goal is wrong. It can be make money, get some attributes, realize your dream and so on.
Dima Melnik (our expert for today) thinks that business should be created with goal of future selling...
In general the idea is next: when somebody wants to buy business he will check and recheck everything before doing it because purchaser must be sure that every information is correct and that business is what it is declared to be. And buyer to be sutisfied and willing to buy your business it should be ideal and it should be autonomy system where you can change any part of it and it will stay the same.
Let me explain the idea about changing any part. Really often business is working because of some starts (people) which are key person and part of that system and when the person leaves whole system is going to fall down. It can be welknown person in certain circles, it can be really good professional in something, it can be very energetic person... And usually it is the director (owner) who makes the whole system to work and give money and without this person your business is not going to work.
So, the idea is that your business should be system where every element is replacable! That was another challenge of worldview for me. And it can seems a little bit contrary to principle that our people is our main active. But it doesn't...
Just try to think about it...
That's all for now...

The power of our mind.

2006-07-19T08:03:00.000+03:00

Here are just my today's morning thoughts...
What have everything begun from?
Vitaliy and I visited progect of Victor Svistunov "Health - is our main asset". And there I heard one thing: "We can develop any habit, if we'll do one thing every day, during 3 monts". And then I decided to check this. I decided to get up at 6 in the morning, run to the stadion and then shower and then - cool mood for the whole day! And what do you think? From 14 mornings I got up/didn't get up at about 50/50. :) (it is really hard, even if you go to bed till midnight.
And today I decided to get up anyway! And I have done this.
While doing my morning exercises I was thinking about all this...
Last time, I begin to belive more and more, that our mind - is our best tool and best enemy at one time.
From one side, everyone and everywhere tell us, that our mind is most powerfull thing in the whole world. For example, we can take Bible, different films, such as "The matrix", etc.
But from another side, our mind is our enemy...
In different situations it begin offer to us only that things, which we put there before. For example, if I have a problem - my mind will give me only that solutions, which I put in it before, or heard somewhere.
And in my case, when alarm rang (budil'nik) my mind told me:
"O!", "F...k", "I want to sleep SO much", "I don't have to got to the stadion". Or "I can run only 2 circles, why have I run the third?" etc.
And now, after all these thoughts I am surely agree with our slogan "IT'S UP TO YOU!". And all...!!! Only the box of our mind don't let us to do, what we want. It tell us: "O! You can't do this!", "Nobody do things in such way, you're crazy!".
BUT! We are, who we are! And only we can decide what to do with our lifes!
Even our mood we can program in our heads - because our minds are the greatfull weapon, which we can remake in tool, which will make from us Change Agents. I really belive in this.
We just have to work about finding solution for one question:
"HOW TO GO OUT OF THE BOX, WHICH CALLED OUR MIND???".

First Functional meeting

2006-07-14T00:51:00.000+03:00

Fuuuf! I finally managed with the stupid situation with my blog account which didn't allow me to post messages here :)

Today I wanna tell you about a little piece of ER life.
On the 1-2 of July functional meeting on ER was held in Kiev. Functional meeting (FMka) is gathering of all VPs which is held by functional MC VP. The aim is to give VPs additional knowledge, discuss working moment, general strategy, share experience...

This year the first FM was on ER, most of the others will be held just after LDS.

This was one of the events that makes me feel that I ADORE my work instead of its difficulty, fuck-ups and so on. And we're becoming a real team - VP ERs of whole Ukraine, aroud 15 bright people. So the first day was fully dedicated to the training on Effective negotiations from MC learning partner - training company Nordic. I must say it was one of the best trainings in my life. Most of the information I heard already before, but here it was structurized, practised and we were motivated to turn them into actions. Such trainings are especially useful when you already have some experience in the field and can apply those instuments to your practice. The trainer was also a cool guy: we saw that he really enjoys this time and especially the audience - active and smart. We worked almost 12 hours with breaks, were really dead at the end, but were really excited and surprised to get sertificates for the training! That is my first one out of those numerous trainings I attended:) That's why it was really memorable.

The second day we discussed lots of working moments: team leading, national proposal, pricing system, Career days, JDs...

To days left like a second...as usually. I remembered one frase our MC VP Yulia Gorb told: "One year in AIESEC equals 7 years of usual life considering the development of the personality"..

That is really true. Now I imagine that I lived 14 years instead of only 2... I don't feel myself old. Just happy.

AIESEC in Kyiv on international conference

2006-07-10T21:21:00.000+03:00

2 brave girls from our Local Committee are approved as delegates for You Can! 2006. This is annual conference run together with International Congress with common opening, global village and so on. Delegate's profile: LC EB members all over the world. This year Ukraine will be represented by 11 people together with our girls. I am sure that will be best experience in their life as non of them was on international conference.
The last thing to say is that people don't miss changes AIESEC gives you, because time will pass and you will regret that you never was on big international conference, you wasn't OCP of project, you wan't on internship and a lot more opportunities.
Be conscious about all opportunities lying ahead and plan how you will catch them.

Career Day News

2006-07-09T00:59:00.000+03:00

No, we are not organising a new Career Day next month:)

And I didn't mix time:)

I just want to thank the cool team that worked in this project.

The team that not only realized the project

but that also saved its experience for future generations.

The team that acts sustainably and wants our projects improve continiously.

That's why they decided to save their work here:
http://www.aiesec.net/members/ai/ukraine/kiev/file-storage/index?&folder_id=44896349
and share it with us:)

And from now and then all future OCPs and OCs may use that preserved and structurized XP for their own development, support and bringing excellent work to AIESEC.

Thank you, OC CD !

AIESEC. Summer. Beach...

2006-07-08T17:14:00.000+03:00

AIESEC in summer is different. We don't have studies, we don't have work. We have loads of time to spend together and it doesn't matter would it be time working or having fun or lying on the beach.
This Friday we decided not to make LCM but to go to sunny beach and spend great time. Some MC members who was in Kyiv at that time also joined us.
The most challenging was to get to the Truhaniv island under such a terrible sun we have this summer. But we finally managed to do that and appeared on different earth. There was no traffic sounds, no crouds of people. Just we, river, trees and some other guys:)
Despite I was screaming and asking to play crocodile we spent almost all the time playing voleyball (not my game at all).
And, of course, we played twisters making all the people on the beach turning their heads in our direction.
In general that was great few hours, in great place and with great people. Don't miss such an opportunities.

Work, work, work....

2006-07-07T00:01:00.000+03:00

And this post is not about an event, its about a process

The processes we live in AIESEC: working, however different it may be and playing. I think they will never end here.

Only 3 days ago we were sitting on LCC , having fun, learning new information and presentating our work till then, and now we already have OCPs' positions opened and our projects are under further development.

That is about AIESEC and about life: you cannot stay at one place, you always need to develop just to be on time and in place.

Life changing experience. Only one step to make

2006-07-05T22:49:00.000+03:00

Today in our local committtee we released application forms for Organizing Committee Presidents of 3 pboxes we were working on during last 2 months. It will be only one part of the selection process and it will be a difficult one. But I know you can make it. I know that you are sure about your future in AIESEC.
Being an OCP is difficult. It is difficult to lead people in your team. It is difficult because of thousands of situations you encounter first time in your life. But you also know that it is worth of it. This is what we usualy call life changing experience. And it is difficult to believe in such a big words now. You will believe only when you become.
I wish all of you good luck. And I am sure that we will make a right choice.

Stay tuned. Your Local Committee President, Vitaliy Drozd.

2006-07-03T00:54:00.000+03:00

Local Committee Conference is over. 2 incredible days full of new discoveries, new thoughts and ideas, new lessons and dreams. A lot of things. I don't know how about you, but I start understanding such events only in few days. I read sugar cubes only few minutes ago. Thoughts are different. Yep, sugar cubes is a cool thing and thank you AIESEC for letting me get familiar with it.
We tried to focus on future, on future of AIESEC in Kyiv, on future of every member. I do know that all of you had a lot of thoughts. I do hope that all those thoughts won't stay in your head. I do hope that as people say thougths will materialize.
Just want to thank everybody for participation and special thanks to our dear guests Tonya, Sveta, Alyona.

Keep moving...

Important step

2006-06-28T20:23:00.000+03:00

In few days we will have our Local Committee conference. And one of the part is PBOX presentation. We were working for more then one month from our first PBOX planning meeting. And the more we work the more we understand that we don't have a clue about how we want to see those projects. After LCC there will be a lot of work and very little of time to do all of it. And I am sure we will do it because we have enough ideas, motivation and energy toward our projects.
We are starting new era in AIESEC in Kyiv development. This year is really difficult: we are moving stress in our work on PBOXes, we are switching to matrix system, we are making our first steps toward AIESEC 2010.
I am really excited in this hot summer evening about the future ahead of us.

LCC is coming

2006-06-24T20:09:00.000+03:00

LCC is coming...

A special day, a special event.

The day and time when we'll all come together to learn the global strategies, refresh our knowledge and present our year-long WORK.

Our cool PBOXes. Their show. Yeah, we've been working hard for almost 1,5 months and now we have 3 almost developed PBOXes. And we'll share them with each other. Share the ideas, share motivation, share experiences, share new shouts :)

Our LC's plan. Our direction and plans. What we wish to reach, who we want to be.

And of course, lots of other cool, interestng, new and fan things!!!

Waiting to see you all there :)

Cheers,
Olya

LCM. You can gain a lot here

2006-06-24T00:30:00.000+03:00

In AIESEC people are strange. Today when Ukraine was fighting with Tunisia to go to next round of World Football Cup crazy AIESEC members of AIESEC in Kyiv had their usual LCM. You know I even happy that we don't have such a big fans in our local committee and don't have to change time and day of LCM.
Just wanted to share once again about how happy I am for 3 brave ukrainians who applied to International Teams and were elected and they are Nadiyka, Kiyaha, Mashka. And I am proud that one of them is from AIESEC in Kyiv :)
Today we also had another interesting person on our LCM and it was Alyona (AIESEC in Donetsk). This girl spent more then 1.5 years in India including 1 year of internship and 8 months of running business. And afterwards she decided to go to Germany on internship! You really can't understand how much you can gain from international experience before you go there, but anyway communication with people being already there can show you a lot of things.