Global Serb Network

Dr. Dejan Slavnic

Tampa, Florida, USA Web Spotify YouTube

We are lucky to have Dr. Dejan Slavnić a neurosurgeon give a presentation on how to get into medical school and neurosurgery residency in the United States.

Dr. Dejan Slavnic is a neurosurgeon specializing in minimally invasive and complex spine surgery.

• Neurosurgery Residency - Michigan State University (MSU)
• Medical degree - Midwestern University
• BSc in Health Sciences - Northeastern Illinois University

Read Dr. Slavnic's impressive bio here: https://totalspinebrain.com/dejan-slavnic-do/

• #science
• #medicine
• #neurosurgery
• #education
• #medical school
• #usa

Igor Janjetovic

Vancouver, Canada Spotify YouTube

Highlights

• Principal Engineering Manager - Microsoft
• Software Development Manager - Amazon
• MSc Computer Science - University of Belgrade - School of Electrical Engineering

• #leadership
• #business
• #computer science
• #electrical engineering
• #software
• #people skills
• #cross-cultural competence
• #canada

Lazar Cadjo

Halifax, Canada Spotify YouTube

• Constable - Halifax Regoinal Police, Canada
• Bachelor Degree in Criminology - St. Mary's University, Halifax, Canada

“Any traumatic situation is 50-50 you either fall into the negative side of it or the positive side of it. Understanding that angle that not a lot of people can understand, and I used that in a positive way and a grateful way and wanted to do something good with it.”

• #police
• #education
• #canada

Ivan Avramovic

Washington DC, USA Spotify YouTube

• Sales Operations Analyst - Juvare
• Master's degree, Business Analytics - Quinnipiac University
• Master of Science (M.S.), Conflict Analysis and Resolution - George Mason University
• Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), Conflict Analysis and Resolution - George Mason University
• Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), Global Affairs - George Mason University

Career Path Seminar on job positions: Analyst, Business Analyst, Sales Analyst, Data Analyst.

Also, great insight offered on Conflict Resolution in a professional setting.

• #business
• #data analysis
• #conflict resolution
• #education
• #usa

Hristijan Stojkovic

Rochester, NY, USA Spotify YouTube

• Master of Science - Optics/Optical Sciences - expected graduation Dec 2023 - University of Rochester
• Bachelor of Science - Laser and Optical Engineering - University of Rochester

Hristijan Stojkovic, orphan turned scholar, knows the value of mentors

Hristijan talked about optical engineering and shared a bit about his unique life story.

Hristijan is the epitome of resilience. He lived in an orphanage until age 12, at age 16 he won a scholarship and moved oversees by himself, started an advanced academic high school program - Internatioanl Baccaulerate, in English, without prior knowledge of English, and he did well ever since.

Hristijan now wants to help other children without parents. One way to help is to become a mentor. Based on Hristijan's experience, aside from financial help which is always needed, there are other ways to help - any support, any mentorship, and any good advice can make a change and have a positive impact. Please reach out to Hristijan if you are willing to help.

• #science
• #education
• #optical engineering
• #usa

Mira Popovic

Tampa, Florida, USA Web Spotify YouTube

• Master of Business Administration - Southern New Hampshire University
• Bachelor of Science - Illinois State University

If you want to read something funny - Scroll down to Promaja

If you want to read something serious and profound - Interview with Milica Vuckovic

• #business
• #ecommerce
• #entrepreneurship
• #books
• #usa

Sandra Saric

Ottawa, Canada Web Spotify YouTube

Chat with Sandra Saric, Founder, Inclusive Path Inc.
Sandra, based in Ottawa, Canada, is an executive, leader, and entrepreneur who works globally with organizations on strategic and innovative ways to design, develop, implement and promote inclusive, systemic change practices and initiatives across sectors.

Sandra offered such wealth of career related information including building network and client base, public speaking and much more.

• Vice President at Information and Communications Technology Council (ICTC)
• Senior Consultant with Microsoft
• Speaker at the United Nations in New York City
• Interviewed by CBC

• #business
• #leadership
• #entrepreneurship
• #cross-cultural competence
• #diversity
• #children of immigrants
• #canada

Dr. Mladen Nedimovic

Halifax, Canada Web Spotify YouTube

Chat with Dr. Mladen Nedimovic and learn about geophysics as a career choice. Mladen Nedimovic is a geophysicist with experience in academia, government, and petroleum industry.

Some current roles:

• Director, National Facility for Seismic Imaging; Canada
• Full Professor; Earth Sciences, Dalhousie University
• Senior Research Fellow; University of Texas Institute for Geophysics
• Adjunct Senior Research Scientist; LDEO of Columbia University
• Associate Editor; Journal of Geophysical Research - Solid Earth

• Research Scientist; LDEO of Columbia University
• Ph.D., Department of Physics, University of Toronto
• M.Sc., Department of Physics, University of Toronto
• B.Sc., Faculty of Mining and Geology, University of Belgrade

"Everybody has setbacks, everybody is knocked down one way or the other, financially, emotionally, professionally, whichever way, all the time, that's just normal in life. The only thing that matters, because everybody will be knocked down in every possible way, just depends when, is how fast you get back on your feet. Try your best just to brush off your losses and move on, never look back, just look forward."

• #education
• #university
• #professor
• #research
• #science
• #geophysics
• #canada

Jovana Papaz

San Diego, California, USA Web Spotify YouTube

University California San Diego Volleyball

Jovana Papaz's impressive journey from a small school in East Sarajevo to graduating from the University of California San Diego on a full volleyball scholarship.

"Give your 100% every single day"

• #business
• #sport
• #volleyball
• #usa

Snezana Pesic

Toronto, Canada Web Spotify YouTube

• Assistant Professor - University of Toronto, Canada
• Performance Designer
• MFA in The­atre Design - University of Alberta, Canada
• BFA/​MFA in Cos­tume Design - University of Belgrade, Serbia

Career choice in theatre, costimography, performance design.

• #art
• #performance design
• #theatre
• #education
• #university
• #professor
• #canada

Dr. Nikolina Ilic

Geneva, Switzerland Web Spotify YouTube

• Assistant Professor - University of Toronto
• Research Scientist at CERN European Council for Nuclear Research - Geneva, Switzerland
• PhD Physics - CERN, University of Toronto
• BSc Physics - University of Waterloo, Canada

Career choice in physics, university professor, researcher

• #science
• #physics
• #education
• #university
• #professor
• #research
• #switzerland
• #canada

Jelena Radonjic

London, United Kingdom Web Spotify YouTube

Highlights

• Award-winning Career Fulfillment and Leadership Development Coach
• Speaker
• Author
• Forbes Coaches Council contributor
• Bachelor Degree Japanese Language and Literature and Bachelor Degree English Language and Literature - University of Belgrade

• #leadership
• #business
• #people skils
• #cross-cultural competence
• #entrepreneurship
• #uk

Sara Doder - MBA

Charlottesville, Virginia, USA Spotify YouTube

Conversations about the unique situations faced by youth of Serbian descent, who are born or grew up in diaspora. In their struggle to connect two different worlds, some immigrants reject one or the other. Some immigrants fail to integrate in the country where they reside. Some children of immigrants develop aversion towards many things Serbian perhaps because their parents unreasonably insist on certain things. All immigrant children face those issues, however parents' trauma from wars, and the bad reputation from the 1990s are extra burdens.

It is especially interesting to explore how all of this ties into professionalism.

• #business
• #education
• #cross-cultural competence
• #children of immigrants
• #parenting
• #usa

Dr. Dijana Kosmajac

Ottawa, Canada Spotify YouTube

Highlights

• Research Scientist at Dash Hadson, Halifax, Canada
• PhD Computer Science, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada
• MSc Computer Science, University of Novi Sad, Serbia
• BSc Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of East Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina

• #science
• #computer science
• #software
• #startup
• #research
• #canada

Dr. Miroslava Kavgic

Ottawa, Canada Web Spotify YouTube

Highlights

• Assistant Professor - University of Ottawa, Canada
• PhD Environmental Design and Engineering - University of Colleague London, London, UK
• MSE Environmental Design and Engineering - University of Colleague London, London, UK
• BSE and MEng Mechanical Engineering - University of Belgrade, Serbia

• #education
• #university
• #professor
• #research
• #science
• #mechanical engineering
• #environment
• #canada

Dr. Natasa Zatezalo

Halifax, Canada

• Doctor of Medicine - Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada
• Resident - Psychiatry - Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada
• Postgraduate Program (class of 2024) - Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada
• MSc Microbiology & Immunology - Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada
• BSc Biology - Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada

Join us for a Career Path seminar with Dr. Natasa Zatezalo. She will give an overview of her educational/work background, how she got into medicine, how the Canadian medical school system and residency works and her experience with it, along with some useful insights related to general day to day work-life/responsibilities.

• #medicine
• #psychiatry
• #education
• #medical school
• #canada

Zeljko Iliskovic

Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA

Project Manager interested in IT, Startups and Entrepreneurship

• Project Manager is a job everyone has heard of. Can you briefly explain what project managers do? What does it mean to manage a project?

  A project manager is a professional who plans, organizes, and executes projects within budget, scope and upon-agreed time parameters. To give value to stakeholders and interact with them, as well as to lead entire teams, establish project goals and see a project through to completion, project managers utilize a variety of specialized knowledge, abilities, tools, and approaches. Their responsibilities include concrete, tangible things like planning and budgeting, as well as less quantifiable, but no less significant duties like providing leadership and moral support.

• They say project management is both art and science. Can you talk about some soft skills crucial for the job?

  I would say that leadership, communication and critical thinking are the most important soft skills for one professional Project Manager. Real leader and project manager needs to know how their teams work and the characteristics of each team member, and also to have the ability to get things done together with team members, by inspiring them and making them excited to do the work. Regarding communication, it is necessary to have clear, open and effective communication from top management to down below connecting each involved in a project. That way the team builds trust. It is also to always communicate correctly at the right time and place to avoid issues and confusion in the work in progress. The last one that I’ve mentioned is critical thinking that helps to understand and assess any situation based on facts, data, information, and organizing them to derive meaningful information to identify the barriers or obstacles and find potential solutions.

• You manage projects in the IT sector. One could say project management is all about risk management. How do you make sure you stay on top of IT Security Risk Management?

  Because I worked for organizations that had already established security procedures with specialized sectors and enough assistance, I didn't have the opportunity to work extensively in this field. For the mutual benefit of all employees, company like the one I worked for, first teach you about the protocols and best practices that you must adhere to. Therefore, preventing IT security vulnerabilities rather than fixing them is in my opinion the most crucial thing. The most important aspect of prevention is the adoption of healthy practices and education. In order to reduce risk, we also need to involve the entire team. Each team member should be informed about the resources they manage, be able to identify potential security threats and vulnerabilities, rank risks according to their significance, design and assess security controls, and have access to enough assistance at all times. I would just like to add that any security issue will be only one more clear step in everyday routine for the well-prepared team.

• Would you like to share some parts of your professional journey? How did you decide to become a project manager?

  I’m 26 years old. I got my first job in high school while I was studying at culinary school. There we had the opportunity to work in hotels and restaurants that had agreements with school. At that stage of my life, I realized that I’m good at organizing people and tasks. At this moment I thought that in the future I would like to organize and manage people, resources, times etc. The IT industry extensively expanded in my region during this period, and I got attracted to it. In high school I started learning Java on my own. This was one important step that helped me to enroll in college for Information Technology where I learned a lot about technology and development. I graduated with honors in 2019. During college, I spent two summers working on Work and Travel student program, organized by the United States State Department. I was located in Lake Placid, NY. Here after some time, I got a chance to manage important tasks for hotels that I worked for. This is the point where I figured out that I am good with managing people, resources and time and I said to myself: “Zeljko, you will find a job where you will be able to do this”. After graduation I applied for my first job in the industry that attracted me so much. I got job as a technical support representative in NCR corporation. At this company I learned what it means to work in the corporation and to have someone above you to coordinate and to motivate you. But I didn’t stay too long there because of the covid. This job was in a different country from my original residence so I decided to come back home to be with my family. In Serbia I started working as a freelancer. I started as an Assistant for a company based in Switzerland. Company was developing their own web application, and at the beginning I was just doing research and guide creation for new employees. After some time, the owner of the company promoted me and I got my first job as a project manager. I was responsible for the entire team of translators for web applications that this company developed. During this period, I learned a lot, but I figured out after some time that I need a more challenging position where I will be able to obtain more knowledge as PM. I decided to move on, and after a couple of months I started a career, as Project Coordinator, in one of the biggest south European telecommunication company where I had ability to work with C-level and top management. I consider this as my most valuable experience where I gained a lot of new experiences, skills and tools necessary for a PM career. Parallel with this job I enrolled for master studies with a major in Project Management. Lifelong learning, no matter formal or informal, is the must, and without it we can’t strive for excellence. Last year I got a Green Card in the lottery, and now I am in the US ready to obtain more knowledge and accept a more challenging position where I will be able to offer my all.

• You worked in a variety of industries and companies. How is managing a project different in a small company vs the big one?

  Project management is a very challenging job, if we look at it from the side of small companies, we can conclude that there are fewer people employed, which means that there are also fewer teams, or more teams with fewer people, which leads to easier communication, that there is more the belief that everyone has a common goal. While looking from the side of large companies there are more teams, if not well-organized communication can be significantly more difficult, as well as the delegation of tasks. In essence, both have their advantages and disadvantages, it is important to be aware of where you are and, against that, to form a team and go together with it towards achieving your goals.

• You work as a freelancer. How do you find work?

  Mostly I use platforms for freelancers, such as Upwork or Freelancer, but LinkedIn is also a good tool for finding job opportunities. Another way of finding work are recommendations of previous employers that are recommending me on their own, and that it is the proof of my knowledge that pushes me to learn more and improve myself as much as possible.

• Can you list some advantages and disadvantages of freelance work?

  The biggest advantage is working for different types of clients, because then there is the opportunity to learn something from each one and to improve overall skills. Another advantage is freedom, even if I’m always at work, I feel freedom to go wherever I want and to work from any place. The biggest disadvantage is the uncertainty of finding the right job, or if it’s paid enough to cover life cost but besides that I wouldn’t be able to find any other disadvantages of freelance work.

• #business
• #project management
• #usa