Nikolay Boukovski - Embracing Change: a Life Journey

The idea of a person (family) coming from a communist country to a capitalist country and not just surviving but thriving is quite intriguing. The lessons in this book are excellent. I found them interesting, relevant and informativeeven though Ive been working for over 20 years. The fact that you are critical of yourself and admit to some of the mistakes youve made allows the reader to relate to you and find you human. There are some real gems in this book: Earthquake Resistance, which is just splendid; Tenacity and Pain, and Apprenticeship After the Leapa lesson I want to give to my children.

Jonas Bogoshi, Vice President at T-Systems, South Africa

Dr Nikolays book is a must for leaders at all levels in organisations. His life story beautifully captures the realities of being a professional without downplaying any area. From diversity and stakeholder management and change management on the one hand, to reinventing oneself, continuous learning and learning from ones mistakes on the other, words do not suffice to express how I felt when reading Embracing Change. I highly recommend it.

Mathane Makgatho, Group Treasurer, Transnet SOC Ltd

Nikolay Boukovski is a fine example of how:

• an individuals perseverance, tenacity and self belief to do the right thing for himself and his family and the Corporation can lead to a fulfilling and rewarding career;
• a commitment to continuous learning and self-development is critical if an individual is to adapt and take advantage of changing circumstances and opportunities;
• change should be embraced for the opportunities it presents rather than feared for the impact it may have, and
• working with other people towards a common goal is so much more rewarding and powerful than trying to do things by oneself.

Paul Hartwell, Chief Executive, British Arab Commercial Bank

Real African Publishers

2nd Floor The Mills

66 Carr Street

Newtown 2001

Johannesburg, South Africa

Nikolay Boukovski

ISBN 978-1-920655-08-2 (paperback))

ISBN 978-1-928341-17-8 (PDF)

ISBN 978-1-928341-18-5 (ePUB)

ISBN 978-1-928341-19-2 (Kindle)

First published January 2015

Editor: Angela McClelland

Book design by M. C. Studio

Printed and bound in the Republic of South Africa

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without prior written permission of both the copyright holder and the publisher of the book.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Geraldine Connell, Jonas Bogoshi and Mathane Makgatho for their valuable and insightful comments.

This book is dedicated to my wife, Irina,

who has helped me enormously with it.

In all fairness, I wouldnt have written it without her

inspiration & guidance.

This book is about how to survive storms, weather cataclysmic events and find your feet in a new world. Building a new career from scratch, adapting to different cultures, settling in new countries these are some of the things that happened to my family and me back in 1991 when, right after the fall of the Berlin Wall, we fled Communism. This was a watershed year in our life. We took a plunge into the unknown, crossing borders and even continents.

To say I was unprepared for the sequence of events would be an understatement, for nothing seemed to happen in a planned manner and the change was heart-rending. The volatility of the present and the uncertainty of the future were scary: often I felt ill-equipped to face them. In retrospect, if I had to do the same today, knowing what we have been through all these years, I may not muster the courage to start all over again

Yet my family survived the turmoil. Twenty years later I feel relatively comfortable, even though the times we now live in are even more unpredictable than before. These days my wife and I often reflect on our hard-learned lessons, the dramatic changes in our lives and the ultimate rewards we gained. Though truly traumatic at times, the changes we had to go through eventually proved uplifting and broadened our horizon.

What surprises us the most is the scope of our change over the past 20 years: something that allowed us to survive and succeed. We might be in a celebratory mood if not for the new calamities the world is facing: the decline of the Western economies, a possible Euro collapse, the turmoil in the Arab world, to name but a few. But then the wisdom weve gained over the past years gives us the confidence that we will be able to cope with the future changes yet again.

The purpose of this book is to share my experience through little stories grouped into themes. Management consultants would call them case studies. These stories will attempt to reflect the pains and twists of my learning curve. They are not structured chronologically but rather aim to highlight key moments of my evolution. As you will see, the journey was bumpy and definitely not gradual, with successive failures followed by new lessons thus learnt. Bruised and often shaken, I pressed on until change and learning became a way of life for me.

The target audience of my book includes everyone who is willing to embrace the changing world in order to explore the broader opportunities it offers, rather than be confined to the sheltered place where they grew up. Seen as a self-study book, people may find its stories and lessons relevant and worth internalising. The book will also be used as course material for my seminars. Some of the stories from the book have already been used in these seminars and the feedback, overwhelmingly positive yet constructive, is now incorporated in the book. This feedback loop will continue after the books publication.

Let me start from the very beginning: my formative years under Communism.

I was still a very little boy of a healthy constitution when my dad first introduced me to the magical world of mathematics. Given the choice and being full of energy, I would have much rather spent my time on the street kicking the ball or playing games with my friends. Gentle and persuasive though, my father made mathematics more fun than hard work, and much to my surprise I took to it. As early as Grade 1 I was already able to mentally multiply two-digit numbers. Today this may sound quite unnecessary as the most basic cellphones now have built-in calculators. Back then, though, calculators were bulky and not in wide use. Thus, if people needed to do multiplication, or any arithmetic calculation for that matter, they had to use pen and paper.