Vacancy competition is fierce now, and there are a lot of requirements for candidates. But still one gets the job quickly, and another keeps trying for a long time. What is the reason? What employees employers rate highly? What makes the employer refuse the candidate even if his CV suits the vacancy requirements?

Oleh Dmytruk, meat processing company director, Volyn businessman tells us what employees choose current employers.

- Mr Oleh, you have more than a hundred employees. Are all of them working on speciality they have got at the university?

- For me, speciality indicated in a diploma is not a crucial factor when hiring someone. My company has many professionals who have found themselves in something different from what they have in their diploma. I have no degree of meat processing technologist as well.

Luckily I always meet people with no field-specific education but ready to solve problems more successfully than those who have experience. I think this is the result of more rational and progressive thinking; these people have the fresh eye on the problems. Youth has this trait.

I tend to believe that many employers - small and medium businesses representatives do not pay attention to the record in diplomas.

- What is the most important thing you pay attention to when you hire a person?

- The most important for me is motivation - the person should be hot-eyed for his/her activity and progress prospectives. If to choose between the willing to work and bare experience I would prefer the first one for sure.

Let’s say someone comes to interview with a CV that meets all the vacancy requirements. But you see “This work is just the set of duties for 8 hours working time” in the eyes. I will hire this kind of person if I urgently need to close the vacancy. And I am going to watch carefully if the attitude to work changes. Usually, he/she drops out if not. We do not fire these people. They are just leaving the company because realise that they are not holding the same views. Usually, I try to avoid situations when you have no time for selection and education of specialists who are willing and passionate about their work.

- Why is motivation so important? What is wrong with an employee who just performs duties?

- Almost all CVs contain phrases like “I always work for result”. In fact, just those who love what they do can work for the result. Let me explain. Every company has nontypical situations happening every day. For example, a client has delayed the payment, price for raw material has increased, a colleague has got sick and hasn’t come to work, and you have to work for him partially. The approach like “These are my duties, and I don’t care about the rest” has many disadvantages. First of all the slightest change in job conditions obstructs to achieve the final result. Then you try to find out where the failure was and come to the situation where everyone was performing his duties only and was not responsible for the failure. Responsible is the next person performing his duties. In other words, employees start to shift responsibility from one to another. So you will never find someone responsible, and this causes irreparable damage to the team environment.

Every nontypical problem is a new challenge for a person who loves his/her job and makes some progress. Employee takes this challenge, overcomes the difficulties with enthusiasm and comes off victorious. Moreover, he makes the profit for the company and particularly for every employee!

- Have you been looking for motivated specialists since the very beginning?

- Actually no, I realised the importance of motivation later. All my family was working for the company at the beginning. Motivation question doesn’t arise in family business. Everyone is interested in the maximum result and development of the enterprise. Then we realised we need to expand our team and hired professionals with production experience. We had no time and resources to train employees with no experience. Some time later I faced the problem of shifting responsibility and “star fever” of some professionals.

- How have you overcome this issue?

- As I have already mentioned, I hire motivated people only. I am trying to do everything possible to create comfortable work conditions. If the team, chief or salary don’t satisfy the person, she or he will start to look for another job no matter how much a person loves her duties or result of it. We can talk a lot about team building, career enhancement training, fair wage. But I can’t admit that I had overcome the problem of automatic approach. Memory can’t erase the customs from memory in a day.

- Are you talking about older people?

- No, I was not saying about age. We had been living in USSR until 1991. We got used to the fact that everyone gets a job after university, the job where you have a given set of duties, where no initiative goes unpunished, and there is no chance to have your own business. Nobody cares whether you like your work or not. You did your part - fine, you can be free. And then whatever! Employees of large factories might not even know what their company produces: meat grinders or tanks! Soviet people went to work like doomed ones or made favours by staying at work. The situation hasn’t been changing for decades, and it's hard to change something in short time.

- And finally your wishes to our readers.

- I like one short parable. A passer-by was walking near stonemasons and asked them: “What do you work for?”. “To have food,” one said. “To polish the stone for that wall,” another said. “To build a beautiful temple,” said the last one. I would like to wish everyone to find the job which will inspire to achieve great results.