Leadership Under Pressure: Overcoming Challenges Amidst War in Ukraine—Leading a Business with Vision and Goals

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Listener, I am very impressed with our guest this week on the podcast, Alexander Korshakov. He's giving us a masterclass here in leadership, resilience, and honestly, emotional intelligence well beyond his years. You know, leadership isn't just about making decisions. It's about how you show up, how you make others feel, especially when the pressure is at its highest. And my guest today, well, he knows this firsthand. At just 26, he's leading DreamX, a company in Ukraine, through the challenges of war, keeping his team focused, motivated, and driven by big goals.

And in this episode, we're talking about how he can turn obstacles into opportunities.

All right, let's meet Alexander. Today's episode, Leadership Under Pressure: Overcoming Challenges Amidst War in Ukraine, Leading a Business with Visions and Goals.

All right, Alexander.

Yeah.

So good to see you. Welcome to TFR This Feels Right Podcast. So many questions. You're my first guest from Ukraine, and when I heard your story, you know, 26 years old, owning this company close to 30 people, how you built it, but more importantly, how are you managing and communicating, collaborating under such duress? So. Let's start with how are you doing today?

Oh, busy day, busy day. I have so many tasks of the work, so many. We plan right now, uh, our year, and in the end of this month we want to finish all our plans, financial plans, goals, uh, and the, the, the projects, etc. And I'm still in planning with my different department in my company, so that's, I think, my focus, and I'm pushing this so hard that to achieve these plans as soon as possible and to do them.

Well, you're, you're a very ambitious person, and we'll learn more about that ambition in just a little bit. But let's go to the main thing I think that all our listeners want to know, and I'm dying to know, is, you know, I'm in Toronto, Canada, you know, here you are in Ukraine, which has been in a war climate for quite a long time now. And in fact, my wife was saying, I can't believe how long it's been going on there. How, how are you managing? How are you continuing to inspire your team and yourself?

Oh, in Ukraine right now is really challenging, Tom. Absolutely. The economy system is not so good. Very difficult to hire new people because a lot of people leave from Ukraine. That's the challenge. Absolutely. But I still motivated. I don't. I understand that I have big passion. I have big goal in my company and doesn't matter what's going on in the world. What does for me doesn't matter. Of course, the alarm and rockets, etc. It's too dangerous and difficult for sometimes for work. I had situation in my company when. Russia sent the rocket to Ukraine in the morning, and our working day already started. And I wrote to the general chat: Nobody will start work before that space, like air, will be without rockets. Right. That's my. I reject all starting of the people before to have like safety space, safety air. So that's challenging. That's challenging. But I understand. One for my people in my company, and I'm full of this, that I need to be responsible. I need to show them like my passion, that I'm the person who is ready, responsible for agreements, contracts, etc., with them, with clients, to be a person who will deliver the work for clients and give them salary. I'm very conservative in my plans right now. Very difficult to have long-term plans in Ukraine. because really challenging time and the situation change, I would say monthly. And I think in our money, like cash flow, we need to be very conservative, very conservative.

Yeah, I would say, um, well, uh, absolutely, because you don't know, you know, you say it's changing monthly, but I think it's almost, I would imagine it's changing daily.

Absolutely, I would say yes, but yes, that's changed absolutely. We cannot plan like for 5 years. You cannot have a business model for 5 years. We plan, we plan like up to 3 months. We usually do something, we have plans for 3 months, then try to make analysis, retrospective, and understand how we can move forward.

And, um, and, you know, and personally, how, you know, how have you figured it out for yourself just to sort of self-manage yourself? Like, as you said, you're, you're, you're a leader You've been doing this for a few years. But during this time, you've been in this, this under this duress, under this, this, you know, war climate. How do you, how do you manage your own nerves during this process?

Great question. I'm a little bit crazy, in my opinion. All people told me, my, I have assistant. Okay, she always told me, I don't know how you can be still motivated to do some things. Because, for example, you have 20 calls a day. Yeah, and in different, different direction, from marketing up to sale process, up to financial, up to clients, up to design, etc. So, um, I'm a little bit crazy because I follow my heart, and my heart is in big goals. As I said, um, money is not motivated me. I think motivate me big goals. For example, in my life, I ran marathon when I was a 19. 19. I ran full marathon, 42 kilometers. I achieved this big goal, and I understood at that time that if you have big goals, it doesn't matter what's going on outside. You need to follow your goal and you will achieve. So this motivates me to— still motivates me to do whatever, as much as I can, to do my business, that my people will feel safety in mental health and financials, etc. And that motivates me. Support people, as I would say, support my people.

Okay. Yeah. Well, you're, you're, you know, you're very clear about yourself. Like, you're— it sounds like you have a, you have a very clear goal and you're always continuously challenging yourself. So how do you, you know, so as you said, you're supporting a team of almost 30 people. I would imagine that there's some days where somebody comes up to you and goes, Alexander, I can't work today. I'm— it's really— it's hit me. What's going on? In our in our world, I just you know the rockets were just coming. You know I can't do it today. I can't do it.

I would say that I had situation when rockets hit something next to my building, something, and I had many situation when of my people also had the same situation that something hit a rocket, Russian rocket hit some buildings next to them. I would say my people, if someone know the like the map of Ukraine, my people work from Kharkiv— this is next to Russia on the border— up to Lviv. This is the border of Poland. I have people from whole Ukraine. We work remotely. And really, if Russia sends the rockets, for example, yeah, we will feel it. My company will feel it because I have people from different cities. Because we right now work remotely, we cannot have office. Why? Because some people want to be in the West.

Yes.

And we will give them opportunities to be there. So that's why. And also I have one very interesting rule. I have HR manager in my company, so I have a rule. If Russia sent or something like so many rockets or drones fly to Ukraine, yeah, as faster as I as I can, I need to have information about all my people that everything fine with them and with their family. Yes. But if some and will be destroying some windows or flats or something, my company said we will put your windows by our expenses if something happened with your windows of explosion. That's my rule of my company. That's— I think people feel it, safety, when they hear it from the boss.

Yes.

That really will do this if something happened with them or with them windows, etc. So we are ready to support in different direction people And we don't think about money. We think about personal relationship, like people to people.

I love that, Alexander. Absolutely. I think that creates a lot of comfort when you when your intentions is not to obviously you need to make money. You want to grow financially, but it doesn't happen unless you invest in the people financially and personally. I think is what I'm hearing you say.

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, absolutely. We don't worry about the money really. We worry more about. About people, about people. Because in challenging time, someone need to support them. I try to be the person who support them, that they will feel it, not just in the words like, oh yeah, be motivated. I'm, I'm show them, I'm show them by myself. First of all, that I still motivated. Secondly, I'm ready to support them by money. If they need some, um, psychologist, I'm ready to share with this. I have HR manager who always in touch with them about some mental health And if we will detect that someone is in not in not good conditions, we will try to support some some in some direction this person.

So important that you have this awareness of that, and and you know I I'll share your age. Yes, you're you're twenty-six.

Yeah, I'm I'm I'm I'm twenty-five, but I will twenty-five. Okay, twenty-five, twenty-five. Yes, twenty-five for now. Yes.

So that you know that's that's quite a lot of maturity to and responsibility to have it. You know my my son is twenty-one. And, you know, I'm still making his lunch as he's going off to college. So how did you figure this out? You know, how did you learn these sort of leadership skills? Was it someone that inspired you or you figured out your own?

Like, I would say that I always wanted to be independent. It's my opinion and all teenagers need to have this passion to be independent. I wanted to be independent as soon as possible. I got first my money, I think in 17, when I was working on the buildings to help build buildings.

Construction.

It was yeah construction. It was dirty work, but I got some salary. I like.

Yes.

I wanted to be independent, but I have one rule that in my in my mind, like that I need to earn money by my mind, by my. I like a hat.

Yes.

Not by hand, right? By hand, you will have a time to earn money in your future. Like, so, um, need to make money by your mind and to be independent. I wanted to be independent. Right now I am absolutely independent. I support my family, I support my people, I support all my friends if they need some help. I'm ready to share this support. I like this. I like to, um, To share this passion and to share the support. I think this is the biggest my passion, and that's why I got this independency, I would say, and leadership.

Yes. Well, I think the leadership is coming from, and this is a great leadership lesson, is you are not you. You are motivated, but you're and you're passionate. But at the same time, the key word I keep hearing is that you want to share it. And and how you express it, and that you invest in people, and you're interested in the people, and and and want to support them. And I think that that intention is what's driving you because a lot of leaders or entrepreneurs can be just you know all about me me me me me.

Yeah yeah yeah that's I don't like it I don't like it. I always said that I have a strong team. I always said that. For example, Alex, how you achieve so many goals? I said, guys, because I have a strong team. Really, I always said about my team, I never said that me, me, me, me. I always said my team helped me so much. I have a strong team in different departments: sales team, HR, design, development, etc.

And so, you know, it's talking about like teams. Did you, you know, as growing up, did you, uh, I, I know you, you did some sports, uh, but did you play on, on team sports? Or, or did you learn teams like when you were working in construction and you learned how important it is to work in a team?

I learned it, a team, a corporation, when I was a teenager. I played football, like soccer, American soccer. I was European football. I played and I understood that how to be in the team because the, um, when you play football, soccer, yes, you 11 people on the, on this, the field, play this game. Yes, in the field. And You need to be in the team. Team will win the game, not the person. It's important. So I think in the company, in entrepreneurship, one, you can do nothing. You will not achieve some big goals. But if you have the people and you know how to build the processes between them, you will— you can achieve a lot. So team is super important, super important. And I learned that when I played football when I was a teenager.

Yes. Yes. Well, that's— I mean, that's both— both my kids have played team sports and I definitely see I didn't play team sports, but my kids did. And I saw the value of learning about winning as a team and losing as a team, which is—

Yeah.

And so let me ask you that. So how do you deal with maybe things didn't go as planned? Like, as an entrepreneur, it sounds like things have been going really, really well. But Alexander, yourself, how did you manage when Um, you had a setback, like, oh, this maybe was because of the war climate or the economy or a client didn't agree to something or so maybe a— what kind of a— I don't know.

Rejection.

Rejection.

Yes, rejection. I would say, look, rejection, this is the journey. I think when— I don't know the person in the historical or in the business world who never had a rejection before. This is your journey. And this— if you understand the rejection, this is not a punch, this is the journey, you will move, you will move. And I, for example, I like rejection. Why? Because I can analyze what I didn't make something clear. I need to figure out how I can do better, and I do better. So rejection teach people, in my opinion, and fails teach people. For example, I had funny situation, I will tell you, because as I said, I'm a little bit crazy. My financials told me around 8 months ago that, uh, Alex, we are— it can be in crisis if we will not— if we will not have more sales.

Yeah.

I said, amazing, we need to find new something that to push our sales. So crisis, I understood that crisis, this is new opportunities for me to think about, to focusing with my team what we can do better. Crisis without— because without crisis, we we were in the same, like, way and didn't change something. So when we got crisis, where we got information about the crisis in my company, we understood that we need to move. We need to move. That's why I like this. So as I said, I need to see in right way the, the bad situation.

Yes.

To see not standardly on them, because I follow the ideas that a smart person can see problems Some crazy person can see opportunities. I'm that person.

I like that. I'm gonna use that quote. Smart person sees a problem, crazy person sees an opportunity.

That's me, yes.

I would say the word is passionate and that your passion to always be better, your passion to find opportunities, your passion to, you know, to find the stuff that's maybe that you hadn't thought of yet. Is what is what drives you?

I think dreamers, like my company called Dream X, Dream X, and I put this name. I choose this name. Why? Because I'm a little bit dreamer. I dream about some big goals, and I understood that I want to have a name of the company something with word dream, and the name of my company Dream X and all your dream like X dream. So. Need to be little bit dreamer. Dream about something big, like the biggest entrepreneur in this world. They had some big dreams, like Jeff Bezos, etc. So they did. They do every day so crazy things. They are dreamer. I try to be the same dreamer, but on my on my level. But I I always dream about something big, and my company called Dreamix. Like follow your dream, follow your heart.

Well, you know the entrepreneurs that you speak of. None of them were were were living through a war climate. None of them were under the stress that you're dealing with.

You know, that teaches you a lot of— that teaches you a lot of— because in the crisis, like in this war situation, real people shows. Real people, the inside of the people shows, right? Who is truly person, who is fake. I try to be truly person who is ready to support, not to cry, to do something, push support. So am I ready to be this person who is ready, who can be, who can give them this like support. It's important. I think so.

Yeah, I agree. So last question, speaking of Dream Act and being a dreamer, I'm just curious, you know, young Alexander, little Alexander growing up, before there's any type of— before any war, before any conflict, what was your dream? What did you think you were going to do as an adult?

I want to have uni. I want, I want to build university in Ukraine. I will tell you why. This is one of my biggest dreams because I didn't, I didn't finish university. I have never studied in university. I don't know how to do this really. I, I just finished it like a college, high school, right? But I have a passion to build university. Why? Because I think the young people, if they, if give them right society, right opportunities to show that they can do more than they think, they will have the great result. As I push my philosophy, I'm not worried about some people who said, oh, you are so young for this. I said, chill out, I'm, I'm do— I do what I want. So that's why, um, my biggest dream, when I, when I will have like more money and I can afford this, I will, I will build university for, for the young people, for teenagers. For people up to like up to 25, yeah, to show them that they can achieve what they want if they be on the right way.

I I love that. Would it be called Dream X University?

I think so. Wow, it's a great. Thank you so much to helping with the idea of university.

It wasn't it wasn't too complicated to come up with that idea.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Look, a great great name for the university.

For sure, for sure. I I absolutely. Whether you— for so many, for so many young people, they don't know what they want to do in life. And the idea of a university to give them, to widen their perspective, to, to give them more knowledge or just an opportunity to experiment with different ways of looking at things, I think is, is that— would that be the goal of the university?

The goal of university will show the, like, people, young generation, that they can achieve what they want. Absolutely. I don't have details about this university.

No, no, that's fine. Yeah.

Yeah, I, I, I understand that too early to work on this because, you know, I want to be person who will be sponsorship and push this. I don't want to raise the money for this. Yeah, I don't want to make miss way, like miss, um, I don't want to attract someone that help me with philosophy. I want to follow my philosophy in this university. That's why I don't think that will be a right way to attract, to raise some money for this. Or to get some investment because the way will be different. I want to do it by my experiment, by my money. Yes, that will be my philanthropy way, I would say.

I, I, I will so support that, uh, because I think education has been the same way for so long. I look forward to DreamX University where it'll— I know it's going to be something very, very different. And hopefully you start with a great cafeteria because It always starts with great food. Absolutely.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely.

All right, Alexander, thank you so much for sharing your journey and sharing your experience and being a guest on TFR: This Feels Right.

Thank you so much for having me. Thank you so much for the invitation. Thank you.

Thank you for listening to this episode of TFR: This Feels Right.

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