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Укр The Association of Ukrainian Banks at BUSINESS THINKERS FORUM'2024: investment in outlook and business ethics in action
On October 30, the BUSINESS THINKERS FORUM'2024 was held in Kyiv, which brought together business owners and managers, innovators, philosophers and thinkers to discuss breakthrough methods for achieving ambitious goals in extremely difficult conditions. The partners of BUSINESS THINKERS FORUM'2024 were the companies WORK.ua, MHP, UKRSIBBANK, whose residents shared their expertise in speeches and discussions.
The Association of Ukrainian Banks (AUB) acted as an information partner of the event and actively supported the ideas of creating a responsible business environment. Vitaly Romanchukevich, the first vice-president of AUB, took part in the forum, representing the Association and expressing his support for the development of corporate culture and outlook in Ukraine.
The leitmotif of the forum is "The art of creation", which requires a high level of business ethics, systemic thinking and openness in the search for meaning. And also - courage and leadership potential to direct, inspire people, give them a vision of the future. More than 300 participants and 26 speakers attended the forum. The event was full of useful content "for growth", insights, new ideas and productive networking with colleagues from more than 40 companies of various branches of Ukraine.
Alyona Zhupikovafounder of KA Group
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"At the time when the masks fly off, we become incredibly real and understand that we can do things that the world has never known in its history.
Today we really want to create a space for you where new ideas will be born. The leitmotif of the event is "The art of creating", I would also add "Courage to create". Today, we want to create a space for you where you will think differently, where you will rethink certain things that are important to you.", Alyona Zhupikova, founder of KA Group, started the forum.
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"Business Thinkers Forum gathered business thinkers, visionary people on the stage and in the hall. We have managers, company owners in the hall today, on whose shoulders lies a great load - both cognitive and courageous, because today we need to master not only art, but also the courage to create, to master it, involving critical thinking, systemic thinking. triple, and maybe multiply tenfold. To make it easier, to give you the opportunity to see a certain guideline, to see your path more long-term, we have gathered a really powerful team. The topic of investments in the worldview is a high note of our meeting." Lana Mitchenko, CEO of KA Group.
And that's why, as noted by Artur Mikhno, CEO and co-founder of the company WORK.ua, the title partner of the forum, investing in worldview should probably become a key task for every CEO and HRD. Only through the corporate culture, which will change and will deal with development, not instrumental, but worldview development of people, can the culture change first, and then, probably, the level of development of any team.
The Association of Ukrainian Banks was presented by the first vice-president Vitaliy Romanchukevich, who highly praised the level of the event and the participants. In his opinion, such forums are an important tool for investing in a worldview, because they contribute to the development of corporate culture and ethics, which are fundamental elements of sustainable business development. Vitaly Romanchukevich especially noted the inspiring speech of Artur Mikhno, CEO and founder of Work.ua, who touched on the importance of investments in the development of worldview and corporate culture.
Vitaly RomanchukevichFirst Vice President
Associations of Ukrainian banks
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"With his speech, he inspired me to invest even more in the outlook and expansion of corporate culture - even ants crawled over my body during his speech," - shared his impressions of Vitaly Romanchukevich.
Other speakers also shared their valuable thoughts and insights.
Business is naturally, probably, the most innovative, the most flexible, the most result-oriented, Yevhen Hlibovytskyi, director of the "Frontier Institute", member of the Supervisory Board of Public Broadcasting, noted and asked in his speech. - But then why is business so excluded from the social process? Why is the business not the one who determines what the strategic directions should be? Why is business not in a permanent coalition with other changemakers?
We have two complications. The first is inexperienced young capital in Ukraine, which is just learning to get back on its feet and just learning how to decipher the world for itself.
The second is the business, the business owner, the business manager are people with tunnel vision, they look inside their business, they look at the margin, they look at the product, they look at the suppliers, they look at the customers, they try to understand what is going on with their the market
The following important points were made in the speech of Dmytro Morozov, deputy chairman of the board of MHP for business development of clients and the company-general partner of the forum.
The position of a manager is a position, it is positional leadership. Personal leadership has no purpose in principle. The “Five E” model of building personal leadership:
Envision - a leader forms a vision.
Engage – the leader ensures engagement.
Enable - the leader provides resources.
Energize - the leader supports the charge to achieve the result.
Execute - the leader is responsible for the result.
A leader needs to build a Shared Vision, - says Dmytro Morozov. - When the leader answered for himself that for me success in the project is a good business result for me. After all, it is a manager's trap or a leader's shortcoming when he broadcasts his vision to people and expects that they will also want to achieve it.
In the discussion on business ethics, the panelists shared their opinions about the signs of ethical business in conditions on the verge of survival and development.
For Lana Zerkal, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine, ethics is about future generations, it is about the long view. I think that it becomes easier for me when I see some events that inspire me, I see humanity, I see what we really lack in communication, I see trust and agreement.
Vakhtang Kebuladze, doctor of philosophy, publicist, translator, expert in phenomenology, determined that this war started precisely because of the change in business ethics and values in Ukrainian business in particular. Russia felt the threat that we are already transforming, we are lost for them. That our society is becoming healthier and is already breaking away from the terrible immoral Russian swamp.
Military, lawyer, founder of the company Millers and NGO "Princip" Masi Nayem, found the answer in Viktor Frankl's book "Man in search of true meaning", namely in the phrase: "If you don't have your own meaning in life, society will create it for you." If the word "meaning" is changed to "ethics" or "values", then in fact it is the same thing.
Lev Zhidenko, co-owner of the Aurora chain of stores, claims that business ethics is an issue that is imposed both inside the company and works externally as a coordinate system.
In the discussion about women's leadership, theses about androgynous leadership, androgynous behavior, which includes both the positive qualities of conditionally stereotypically feminine characteristics and the positive characteristics of conditionally stereotypically masculine characteristics, were voiced.
And the challenge is that, while maintaining a leadership position, at the same time not to fall into the abyss of femininity, and not to lose femininity. Somewhere on this balance, somewhere in this harmony, we have to find our way, - believes Nataliya Kryvda, Doctor of Philosophical Sciences, head of the supervisory board of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, academic director of the Edinburgh Business School.
Among the challenges faced by women leaders, says Yanina Olkhovska, Director of Communications, CSR and Engagement at UKRSIBBANK BNP Paribas, the general partner of the forum, is, firstly, war as economic instability, confusion about what to do with business. Second, the loss of customers. The third is the balance between war, business and life. The fourth is a critical lack of energy, which must be restored at business events, from experts, partners, colleagues.
In a dialogue about "blind spots" that are important for business to take into account, journalist, publicist, analyst Vitaly Portnikov shared a recipe for growing a business.
So, this is a civilized economy. When a person is responsible for his own decisions and his own business, he grows up. It is necessary to form a society of proactive people. Initiative people are the only hope that we will be able to change and reformat this society, even in such difficult conditions.
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"If we rely on what is called "maybe" or "somehow it will be" or "everything will be fine", each subsequent cycle is a cycle of degradation. Without strategizing, without relying on Vision, without a proactive position, the system itself has tendencies to degrade, - Oleksiy Timofeev, Member of the Board of Directors of BGV Group Management, convincingly asserted in a discussion about crisis management and strategic challenges.
Ihor Smilyanskyi, the general director of Ukrposhta, added frankness to this discussion: "If you don't do it, no one will love you. Therefore, you have to realize inside yourself why you are doing it, be comfortable with yourself and thus inspire the team to be like-minded with you remained".
Mykola Skavronsky, deputy general director of Sinevo Ukraine, determined that the main role of the CEO is to see a picture of the future and consciously broadcast this picture to his subordinates.
In the discussion about the military rethinking of business, Ivona Kostyna, the founder of Veteran Hub, drew attention to one of the main steps of changes at the level of internal processes in the company - to implement the development of an adequate, realistic HR strategy, because so far there are no people who are really ready to invest in return of labor force to workplaces.
Maria Berlinska, project manager of Victory Drones and co-founder of the Dignitas fund, announced the main pain that should be the focus of the rethinking of business and the state: various funds are carrying buckets of water and putting out fires because fire sprinklers [state institutions] are not working. If we give you more water in a bucket where dozens of firefighters are not working.
"Thank you to everyone who joined the BUSINESS THINKERS FORUM'2024. We will be glad to see you at the next KA Group events during the year" - note the organizers of the KA Group forum.
BUSINESS THINKERS FORUM'2024 became an event that brought together leading thinkers and leaders to give Ukrainian business a new impetus for development. The Association of Ukrainian Banks, as an information partner of the event, supports the aspirations of Ukrainian business leaders for high standards, systemic thinking and leadership, which inspire the creation of new visions of the future.
