INSIGHTS
Denys Strobykin will be one of the INnovators at the Economic.bg business forum – ALL IN – taking place on September 19. During the first stage panel, he will expand on the topic of the transformation of the traditional industries and the innovations that aid this process along the way.
Denys Strobykin has been the general manager of Philip Morris Bulgaria since August 2024. He has nearly 20 years of experience at Philip Morris International. He started his career in the financial department of the company in Ukraine, and in the following years held various positions related to sales and marketing in Moldova, Poland and Romania.
Mr. Strobykin, imagine that Elon Musk has achieved a big breakthrough in space travel and you are able to go on a year-long trip to Mars. Which three celebrities (living or dead) would you like to accompany you?
Stephen Hawking, Stanislav Lem and Yuval Noah Harari.
You are entitled to spend one working day with a company executive (living or dead). Who would you choose and why?
Tony Hsieh. I would be curious to learn more about his experience with self-managing teams at Zappos.
Imagine you are shipwrecked on a lonely island with all your basic human needs (food, water, shelter) met. What two other things would you like to have with you and why?
- A solar-powered satellite phone for communicating with the outside world and organizing my rescue.
- A good book to pass the time while waiting to be rescued.
If you could give just one book as a gift for the rest of your life, which one would it be?
Solaris by Stanislav Lem.
You are a time traveler. You have the option to move forward into the future or go back into the past. Where would you go and why?
I would go to the beginning of the universe. To see how it all started.
AI is a hot topic these days, but what is the most neglected issue that is important to discuss about it?
Probably ethical considerations and biases.
What work task would you never want to outsource to a robot?
People management.
Which is more important: talent or hard work?
Hard work.
Which is more important: education or experience?
Education. Experience easily becomes irrelevant in the dynamic and fast-paced world that we live in these days.
What are the three things without which success is impossible?
Hard work, consistency, luck.
What fascinates you nowadays?
The way technology is transforming our lives.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?
It isn’t really advice. It’s a Henry Ford quote that I really like and try to follow – “A vision without execution is just a hallucination.” It is not enough to have an idea, an ambitious goal or a good strategy. What matters is how you execute things.
When was the last time you said to yourself: “This was my best day at work”? What was the occasion?
Throughout 2024 at Philip Morris International there has been one occasion – we celebrate the beginning of our transformation, that is, 10 years since our main smokeless alternative IQOS made its global debut on the Japanese market. This is an opportunity for us to reflect on how much we have achieved in the last decade in terms of helping millions of adult smokers around the world, who would otherwise have continued to smoke, to leave cigarettes behind and switch to potentially less harmful smokeless alternatives.
What is your biggest passion – something you are ALL IN?
My family.
