1) How do you utilize your position to make sure that expertise and coverage are actually inclusive?
In my position main the World Authorities Know-how Centre in Kyiv I give attention to guaranteeing we serve our main objective: being a platform for dialogue and cooperation between governments, personal sector entrepreneurs and tutorial circles.
From the start, we constructed GGTC Kyiv as an open, collaborative house the place policymakers, civic tech leaders, innovators, and worldwide companions come collectively to co-create by breaking the silos and isolation.
Via the Improvements Gateway programme for piloting improvements, to the GovTech Observatory, producing cutting-edge analytical instruments, the place we analyse insurance policies and legislative framework to determine and remove coverage gaps, we constantly be sure that actual human wants are within the spine of GovTech ecosystem.
2) What’s a second in your profession whenever you noticed firsthand how expertise or a brand new coverage modified a citizen’s life for the higher?
One of the vital defining moments in my profession got here after the outbreak of the complete‑scale warfare, after I noticed expertise not as an summary sign of progress, however as a lifeline for kids whose lives have been torn aside by battle.
Originally of the Covid pandemic, the Ukrainian Authorities engaged my crew to create the Ukrainian On-line College. It covers all the secondary faculty curriculum and brings each little one in entrance of one of the best academics.
I by no means imagined our EdTech challenge could be wanted in a scenario much more horrible than Covid. However at the moment greater than 1 million youngsters are studying on the platform. They’re connecting from inside Ukraine and from 130 international locations the place they’re refugees in the mean time.
After the complete‑scale warfare breakout, schooling in Ukraine is beneath existential risk: over 2,800 faculties have been broken or destroyed since February 2022.
As of this tutorial yr, 4.6 million kids face ongoing academic boundaries due to the warfare, with almost 1 million counting on on-line studying.
3) What was probably the most impactful challenge you labored on this yr, and the way did you measure its success in constructing belief and serving the wants of the general public?
This yr, one of the crucial impactful initiatives we led at GGTC Kyiv was the launch of GovTech Lab, Ukraine’s first open innovation programme for a public sector designed to prototype real-life options for presidency establishments, aligned with OECD frameworks and Interoperable Europe requirements.
Via this initiative, we partnered with authorities entities in sectors corresponding to tourism, authorized help, and development permits, and introduced collectively startups from Ukraine and 17 different international locations, together with United Kingdom, Lithuania, Germany, Romania, Argentina, Nepal, Netherlands, Ghana, India, Spain, Brazil, Estonia, USA, Indonesia, Norway, Denmark.
Within the first stage alone, 69 startups utilized, and seven groups will advance to testing their options inside our Innovation Bootcamp and to presenting them on the Demo Day.
Alongside the Lab, our GovTech Ocean challenge mapped over 150 digital improvements throughout public sector areas together with healthcare, surroundings, vitality, schooling, and social safety, making it simpler for ministries, donors, and innovators to determine gaps in options and collaborate extra successfully.
We measured success by way of concrete indicators: the variety of startups making use of and advancing, the quantity of digital improvements we mapped brazenly, and the direct engagement of ministries with new options.
Finally, success is seen in quicker, extra responsive companies for residents and in seen, accountable collaboration between authorities, innovators, and the general public.
4) What was one sudden lesson you realized this yr about designing for actual individuals? This may be a few particular challenge or a broader lesson about your work.
This yr gave me a worthwhile perception that folks don’t assume when it comes to “digital transformation”. They assume when it comes to what issues most to every of us – life milestones.
Moments that actually matter: registering their new born little one, receiving a profit their life will depend on, changing a misplaced doc, getting their first driving license, or, in case your digital companies provision system is progressive sufficient like in Ukraine – the day they concluded a wedding with a liked one.
Actual innovation is commonly invisible – when it really works nicely, individuals don’t discover the expertise, they only discover that life is simpler. That is the perception on the coronary heart of Ukraine’s digital success story, on the coronary heart of our progressive Diia ecosystem with over 150 companies on-line.
5) We hear lots about AI. What’s a sensible instance of how AI can be utilized to make authorities companies extra inclusive and reliable?
A sensible instance of AI making authorities companies extra inclusive and reliable is Ukraine’s Diia.AI – the world’s first nationwide AI assistant, really.
Launched in 2025 in partnership with Google, it’s a national-level AI assistant that guides residents by way of public companies utilizing pure language. As a substitute of navigating advanced web sites or standing in queues, individuals can kind requests like “I want an earnings certificates” or “My home was broken,” and the assistant directs them to the correct service or generates the required paperwork.
Since its launch, over 35,000 Ukrainians have used Diia.AI to generate greater than 1,000 official paperwork, demonstrating that AI can have tangible, on a regular basis influence.
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6) How are you making ready for the following wave of change within the public sector? What new talent, strategy, or expertise are you most excited to discover within the coming yr?
Making ready for the following wave of change within the public sector means constructing on what Ukraine has mastered over the previous six years: digital resilience.
From disaster response to warfare and displacement, we’ve realized tips on how to stay a citizens-oriented state beneath excessive strain and circumstances.
The following frontier, in my opinion, is AI literacy, particularly for public servants. Instruments like Diia.AI have proven that AI could make authorities companies extra inclusive, accessible, and reliable, however to harness this potential responsibly, officers want sensible expertise in designing, managing, and evaluating AI methods in real-world coverage contexts.
7) What recommendation do you may have for public sector innovators who wish to construct a profession targeted on serving all residents?
Begin with individuals. Construct options that make every day life simpler, particularly for many who are on the margins of service supply and need to be included first. Construct prototypes, take a look at concepts, study from actual customers, and maintain knowledge safety and privateness safety on the centre of it.
And don’t innovate alone. The perfect outcomes come from synergies and collaborations – throughout businesses, throughout sectors, with tech communities, and with companions who share your mission.
Innovation grows once we work as one ecosystem.
8) Who conjures up you to construct a extra inclusive and reliable public sector?
I’m impressed by younger individuals. They might be solely 15 per cent of our inhabitants at the moment, however they’re 100 per cent of our future.
When younger persons are given equal entry to alternatives by way of digital instruments and inclusive public companies, they grow to be highly effective brokers of change, pushing us as policy-makers, as a society to construct a extra open, reliable, and inclusive public sector based mostly on fairness rules.
9) In the event you had a vast price range, what would your dream challenge be?
As somebody from Ukraine, my dream challenge could be a large-scale reskilling and upskilling platform providing high-quality on-line studying. With thousands and thousands of individuals internally displaced by the Russia’s full-scale warfare on Ukraine, entry to new expertise is important for rebuilding lives.
This could transcend employment, reskilling is about restoring dignity, goal, and psychological well-being, and enabling individuals to contribute meaningfully to their communities and the nation’s restoration.
10) Exterior tech, what excites you probably the most?
Schooling excites me probably the most, notably faculty methods and the way nationwide transformation will be pushed by way of schooling.
I’m deeply all for schooling reform and EdTech, in addition to in literature, particularly basic fiction, which continues to form how we perceive society, values, and human nature.
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