KMG's Youth “UNconference”: Beyond Stereotypes

Paying great attention to the development of the human resource and development of the young employees’ leadership, KMG is successfully implementing its own youth-oriented programs. Establishment and activity of young professionals boards in the Group's enterprises, yearly rallies and training workshops, industry-specific competitions to select the best professionals, charity events and community clean-up days on historical sites in the regions of KazMunayGas’ presence is an incomplete list of what is done to engage young people in the company's management.

 An unusual format of the youth forum – “UNconference” - held the other day in Nur-Sultan, was selected not without reason. The forum with the “UN” prefix is intended, in the first instance, to assist in strengthening the horizontal ties, exchanging knowledge and experience between the representatives of the corporate centre’s and subsidiaries’ young people. “UNconference” enabled the activists of KMG's youth movement to “break the mold” and in an informal setting go into the matters important to the young people – how to become successful, grow personally and professionally, and, what is of particular importance to KMG – make a contribution to the company's improvement.

Well-known young Kazakhs, who have become the pride of the country and role models, have acted as speakers and business coaches. Contributions of the same-age peers, who have achieved real success in major multinational companies – Azat Murzabayev (Suleiman Demirel University, worked in Twitter, the U.S.), Alibek Datbayev (Team Lead in Booking.com, the Netherlands) and of many others aroused a keen interest from the UNconference attendees.

A master class in upgrading leadership skills was given by the prominent Kazak marathon runner Marat Zhylanbayev – the first and the only athlete in the human history, who has run unaccompanied an aggregate distance of over 160 thousand kilometres in the biggest deserts of Asia, Africa, Australia and Americas.

The forum was organized by the personnel and social activity corporate block of KazMunayGas. The leader of the unit, Managing Director for Human Resource Development Dauletzhan Khassanov, addressed the attendees, noting:

“Our future lies with the youth. The world of today is information-intensive and digital, and it requires of the young people not only knowledge, but an ability to communicate as well. I am confident that the free and informal exchange of opinions will catch the fancy of the forum attendees, and the workshops and business games will provide you with the motivation for professional and personal growth”.

The goals that KazMunayGas sets to young professionals were addressed at a session of the Forum by Deputy Chairman of the Management Board for Production Operations Zhakyp Marabayev. The manager emphasized that KMG's young activists, sharing the corporate values of the country’s main oil and gas company, should become the beachhead of the corporate ideology, innovation-based policy and workplace culture:

“Teambuilding workshops rank high in the programme of our youth forum. Join hands for achieving success. Not everyone is able to survive and succeed on their own, that is why you should look for partners. At least, you will learn to clearly establish common objectives, will find the ways to achieve these objectives, and pave the way to addressing external challenges and threats. At a maximum, you will acquire invaluable skills of managing joint business and ideas”.

A most interesting programme of UNconference continued, as sessions with symbolic names “NE khabar?” (“Howdy?”), “NE zat” (“What's up?”), “NE aitasyn?” (“What do you say?”) opened. 

The UNconference hosted training workshops in financial awareness, social networking rules of conduct, and communications, the own success-story of the forum attendees were discussed.