At least 18 companies, all on the lookout for employees, have signed up to take part in the Kyiv Post Employment Fair on April 23, where job seekers will gain not only chances to start a new career, but get valuable advice on how to succeed.
While the freefall of the Ukrainian economy has stopped, the country’s job market remains a tough one.
The general unemployment rate in Ukraine is estimated to be 9.4 percent, with youth unemployment more than double that, at 21.8 percent. According to the latest statistics from Ukraine’s State Employment Service, there are 13 times more registered unemployed people than jobs currently on offer at the service.
Job fairs are one way to close that gap. The career event organized by the Kyiv Post brings companies and job seekers together face-to-face, as actually meeting with a possible future employer yields much higher chances of gaining employment than just sending off a resume via email.
“It’s a speedy way of understanding the atmosphere of different companies,” says Pieter Kinds, the director of ControlPay, one of the enterprises participating in the career fair. “And you can decide whether you want to apply or not, because … you can ask a lot of questions that you can’t in a formal interview.”
Inspiration
The speakers at the event will cover employment trends in Ukraine, where freelancing, volunteering and charity work are the new normal.
Yulia Voloshyna, the co-owner of art gallery Mystetska Zbirka, will reveal how she and her husband managed to open their gallery in their 20s. The recipe for Voloshyna’s success is simple – find a job you love and work hard at it. But the devil is, as always, in the details, and visitors to the fair will be able to hear all about them.
Self-organization and motivation pave the way to freedom, says Vladyslav Kryveshko, the CEO of international freelance marketplace Proffstore. Kryveshko says freelancing gives a people valuable room for maneuver with their working time, and place of work.
“The most important thing is to have your working equipment with you, at hand,” he said in an interview with the Kyiv Post. “I’m now in a taxi, speaking with you, while working on a laptop. This is convenient.”
However, not everyone is able to juggle activities as adroitly as Kryveshko, and so the secrets of time-management and finding clients will be also revealed during employment fair seminars.
Those considering volunteer work will be able to pick up tips on building a career in a workshop held by Mariya Boguslav, the deputy director of the Institute of Education Content Modernization.
In Ukraine, the notion of volunteering has been distorted, Boguslav told the Kyiv Post. It is not just about helping fighters on the front – volunteers themselves also gain by receiving valuable experience from active civic work and traineeships in commercial companies.
“This develops not only soft skills, but also values like responsibility, tolerance, the ability to do something well for free, and understanding that you become not only more successful but also more moral,” Boguslav said.
Another speaker at the fair, the founder & CEO of the Happy Paw Charity Foundation, Olga Spektor, will tell visitors how she made her childhood dream of opening a shelter for animals come true.
“When I grew up, I understood that I couldn’t and didn’t want to open a shelter myself, and it would be more effective to work via a foundation,” Spektor told the Kyiv Post.
The foundation encourages people to adopt homeless dogs, and make donations in order to fund their accommodation. According to Spektor, a charity fund can only be successful if it is honest and does exactly what it was created to do. Happy Paw, which draws in up to Hr 1.5 million in donations annually, proves her point.
Jobs in Ukraine, Canada
The Kyiv Post Employment Fair will also give visitors the chance to apply for a number of positions, from chef to auditor.
The participating employers include international companies involved in retail sales, tax and audit consulting, logistics, recruiting, banking, insurance, the media, and advertising.
Those with good English or French will have the opportunity to have an interview with Canadian Embassy representatives for several jobs on offer in Canada.
The Canadian government is offering skilled workers the opportunity to immigrate to Canada via a new system called Express Entry, which helps immigrants settle and start contributing to the Canadian economy right from the get-go.
The Kyiv Post Employment Fair will be held on the third floor of the DEC Place events venue at 23-B Lesya Ukrainka Boulevard on April 23. The event venue is a four-minute walk from the Pecherska Metro station.
The entry fee for the fair is Hr 25. Applicants should make sure they bring several printed copies of their resume.
Some job vacancies at the April 23 Kyiv Post Employment Fair
Auchan Retail Ukraine, retail
Department manager, project manager “Tradesman of the Future;” international standards reporting accountant, director’s assistant, veterinarian to monitor fresh product supplies, recruiter, baker, butcher.
BDO in Ukraine, auditing
Auditor’s assistant, auditor, tax consultant, expert accountant.
Brain Source International, recruiting, outstaffing, outsourcing
Trade marketing manager, real estate manager, online sales managers, secretary, accountant, English teacher, personal assistant
ControlPay, freight auditing
Invoice auditor, contract manager, implementation specialist, QA engineer, project manager
Danone Ukraine, FMCG
Kyiv: Jr. Activity manager, CBS finance head, master data trainee, junior IS specialist, forecast coordinator, SC & logistics trainee, SSD controller, sales supervisor, trade marketing specialist, CAPEX and treasury specialist, recruitment specialist, learning manager.
Lviv: Sales supervisor, CS & WH administration specialist, WH administrator.
Kremenchuk: Processing system operator, lawyer, safety engineer, project engineer
Kherson: Power engineer, QA technician, automation engineer, accountant.
EY, auditing and consulting
Transfer pricing department trainee, tax and legal services department trainee.
Grade Education Center, education services
English teacher, English teacher for children, English tutor for corporate department, education center administrator.
Interpipe Ukraine, metallurgy
IT project manager, sales control department analyst, procurement analyst, production analyst, assistant translator (English), leading methodology specialist, leading investment project planning and analysis specialist, NDT inspector, journalist, content manager, design engineer, process control engineer.
Mazars Ukraine, auditing, tax, and advisory services
Tax consultant, junior auditor, senior auditor, accountant.
Mindy Supports, cosmetic business
Sales & marketing assistant, key account manager, business development manager, sales & marketing manager.
PDFfiller Inc., IT
Senior flash/JS programmer, android developer, PHP developer, NodeJS developer.
ProCredit, banking, finance
Front officer (with good command of English)
PZU group, insurance
Actuarial expectation department chief, actuary, leading specialist of international insurance department, sales manager.
UKRSIBBANK, banking
Partner loyalty programs group specialist, auditor, retail business trade network project manager.
Kyiv Post, media
Chief executive officer, office manager.
SMART business, IT
ASP.NET, MS Dynamics AX developers, MS Dynamics AX technical architect, .NET, AX, NAV developers, support team leader, QA specialist, designer, consultant.
