Life took young Vedad Mahmuljin from Kozarac to one of the world’s largest companies – he works at Boeing that has about 180,000 employees, of which about 80,000 are engineers.
Two years ago, he was elected as the engineer of the year thanks to his idea that brought multimillion savings to this company.
He considers his success as a product of education, and a different set of circumstances and tests that life and war brought to him, the work in which he invested a lot of effort, and the culture of Balkan ingenuity and American confidence as well as “you can do anything you want” attitude towards life.
He got the job in one of the world’s largest companies, as he said, very simply – University reported that Boeing needed a few young engineers, and he simply applied.
“I’m sure that there was a bit of luck as well. My grades were not exactly the best. During my studies, I worked at least 20 hours per week on average in order to earn a living. From delivering pizzas and parking cars in the hotels to a bit more serious research projects at the School of Medicine. Americans value work experience more than some perfect grades, and that certainly helped me a lot,” stated Mahmuljin.
Although he could, this young man from Kozarac did not use his success as a way to go to the very top of the company, but he decided that he still prefers to participate in the technical aspect of the aircraft, rather than political one.
“It gives me great pleasure and peace. I love to be a technical leader in the background and enjoy the work without too many responsibilities, I am working on projects that I love and that have a perspective to change something big, and not some administrative work that needs to be done. Many senior managers turned my success into a big promotion, so I have friends at the top of the company. I am currently advising them on how to change the culture of the company in order to boost innovation part and reduce the bureaucratic culture, which was established in recent years. Recently my plan ended up on the desk of the CEO, General Director of the entire company.”
“On the technical side, I am pushing one project that would potentially be much bigger than the one for which I received a previous award, with a potential value of several billion USD, but the process to prove it will take at least a year or two. It is a too big bite for me and those who have to approve it. I need a bigger team of people to prove this in the multidisciplinary integration of future Boeing models. Now I am doing it with much more relaxation because I already proved myself,” said Mahmuljin, and added that he is doing everything slowly because “there is a lot of time until retirement.”
“I would recommend to young people to learn and work and do not expect from the state or anyone else to give them what they need. Whatever you decide to do, be the best in the world. Nothing superficial, do not fool yourself. Do not criticize, but change or adjust. Take a stand that anything can be done when you want it. Stop looking for excuses why something cannot be done, of course within the limits of common sense. Learning and good work will lead you to confidence that is most important for success in anything in life,” concluded Vedad Mahmuljin.
(Source: Radiosarajevo.ba)
