Semifinal of the Leaders of Russia Team Competition

When I registered on the platform last November, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. But I think that if I had known, I would have registered even faster. We invited 7 or even 8 people from our circle into the team - the best specialists in their fields. We invited extra people, understanding that not everyone would make it further. That was the zero stage of the competition - you had to get off your butt, register, fill out a long form with your full work profile, scan your documents, take a photo, record a video interview, and, most importantly, read all the requirements so you wouldn’t get knocked out right at the start.

After we completed all the preparatory procedures, we ended up with a dream team of 5 people: 4 men in their prime and 1 wonderful and smart woman.

This year the competition began. Starting around January, informational emails began arriving regularly, and you had to follow the instructions in them. The first stage was the qualifying round. We all passed the individual testing. We took fairly difficult tests in Russian, writing dictation accurately and quickly (the text is not easy, and if you have no experience with that kind of writing, it is especially hard), understanding text, getting to the essence of texts from a wide variety of fields of knowledge, most of which you are unlikely to be familiar with, solving financial problems, using a regular calculator, doing long division, and solving management problems. I’ll admit, it was quite a stressful time, because the conditions were strict and the pressure of responsibility was high. What scares you most is responsibility to the team: if I don’t pass or if I fail, we all fail. But at the same time, there is also something in that that makes you pull yourself together and do it. I think that if this competition had not been team-based, I might have slacked off and dropped out at one of the stages.

One stage of the competition was especially difficult, when there was proctored testing and the rules stated that no one else could be in the room, you could not use phones, and you could not switch away from the platform tab. Everything was organized very strictly, the proctor monitored what was happening very closely and listened in as well, and of course that added pressure. But the main trial came during that exam, when I woke up in the morning and discovered digital silence all around me - mobile internet had been shut off and had already been down for about a week, and on that very day my home internet was shut off too. I had to make a decision very quickly and ask a friend if I could come over so I could have privacy and a stable connection for the duration of the exam. It was not easy. It was especially uncomfortable to take the exam with a ticking clock and a hard stool under me. In the end, I did much worse on that exam than on the previous ones, but still with enough margin to move on.

And so, little by little, we made it to the semifinal, which took place today. The event was very interesting, dynamic, and demanding. The organizers strongly asked us not to publish details of the competition, and I will follow those recommendations and won’t spoil things for future generations, but I will say one thing: throughout the whole day, my team and I solved 6 very different management problems of varying levels. All the tasks are connected only by a common goal and the initial input, while different roles with their own input are automatically assigned to team members. With limited time and a ban on sharing information with each other in any way except verbally, we had to self-organize so that everyone could build the full picture of the task. It is a very interesting process. For the first couple of tasks, we were getting used to the pace and working out a strategy for collaborating, and then we picked up speed. Honestly, this kind of task has been familiar to me since childhood — even back in pioneer camp we learned to solve different problems together, from performances and staging acts to making all kinds of crafts, but in Leaders of Russia the assignments were very specific and came from the commercial sector, public administration, planning, and production. It was interesting. I still don’t know whether we will make it to the final or not, but I think we have a chance. We’ll see.

I’m writing this note first and foremost for myself, so that when I reread it after some time, I won’t turn down new ideas and will throw myself into the fight, despite the fact that it takes resources, is hard, and I’m too lazy to get my ass up. You just have to do it - do it (that reminded me of the tattoo I almost got about 10 years ago).