“Ukraine’s IT landscape is already at a high level, and with the political commitment, openness for reforms and courage, it has the potential to continue evolving even further”, – Dragan Jeremic, EU4PFM International Key Expert on IT

We continue our interview series “Voices of Expertise”, where we spotlight EU4PFM international experts who drive transformative change in Ukraine’s Public Finance Management sector.

In this edition, we introduce our new interviewee, Dragan Jeremic, EU4PFM International Key Expert on IT, who reflects on Ukraine’s dynamic IT landscape and shares his vision for the future of technology in Ukraine.

Introduction and Background

— Could you share with us your journey into the IT field?

I’ve always been drawn to technology, maths and chemistry, and engineering specifically. This wasn’t just a passing interest; it was a path I set for myself from a very young age, despite the fact that in my family I had several medical doctors who wanted me to pursue medical career. So choosing Electrical Engineering at Belgrade University which was renowned for its excellent programme was a natural step.

While the specific technical knowledge I gained there may not be directly applicable today, the experience was invaluable in a different way. The programme introduced to me something far more important than just facts and figures – it taught me how to learn. I developed skills in data gathering, critical analysis, strategic decision making. In the IT field, which has only existed for about 70 years, the pace of change is relentless. If you stop learning for even six months, you risk becoming obsolete. This lifelong learning approach is essential for staying ahead in the dynamic IT landscape and effectively addressing complex challenges in enterprise architecture.

Connection to Ukraine

— You had more than one projects with Ukraine. Could you share your impressions from your previous experiences?

My first experience working in Ukraine was over ten years ago, when I was involved with the National Anti-Corruption Agency (NABU), which was just being established at the time. As an expert for the Council of Europe, I contributed to developing a short IT strategy for NABU’s future growth. Later, I also worked on implementing and preparing the technical specifications for one of the strategy’s key components — specifically, so called ‘e-case management system’ designed to enhance the institution’s transparency and efficiency by arranging electronic workflow for documentation related to criminal investigations.

Throughout my engagements in Ukraine, I always felt very welcomed and appreciated the readiness of decision makers to support new ideas and concepts. The e-case management system, for instance, was a relatively new concept, but it was quickly understood, embraced, and eventually implemented. For me, it’s incredibly important that the projects I work on don’t just stay on paper but are put into practice. Seeing the e-case system come to life and be used in practice was truly rewarding.

— What motivated you to become involved in the EU Public Finance Management Programme for Ukraine as an International Key Expert?

I joined the Programme exactly at a time when the russian full-scale invasion began. In situations like that, you have two choices: you can either flee or you can step up and try to make a difference. I chose the latter because I wanted to support Ukraine during this critical time. There was an urgent need to provide rapid assistance to our beneficiaries – the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine, the State Customs Service of Ukraine and the State Tax Service of Ukraine, and my expertise in ensuring high availability was particularly valuable. We were able to deliver tailored solutions to meet each beneficiary’s needs in a very short time, thus supporting stable operation of their information systems (of national importance) when the risk of physical or cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure was extremely high. I’m proud of the role our Project played in enhancing the information security of these institutions.

— Given your extensive experience working with various countries, including Ukraine, how do you approach adapting to new environments and effectively collaborating with local teams?

Adapting to new context, institutions, and teams is crucial. During my time with the Council of Europe, I engaged with quite many East European and Middle East countries. Each country requires a tailored approach. For instance, when dealing with cybersecurity and the Budapest Convention, which is a security legal framework set by the Council of Europe, it’s not enough to consider only the technological capacity of a country. Organisational and political aspects matter too, such as whether the necessary laws are in place, how well they are enforced, and the institutions and general public’s knowledge of the topic.

This requires a multidisciplinary approach to fully understand the scope of work in each country. Each country has its own unique parameters, and so there are no generic solutions which may be simply copied to another country.

— Considering your experience in Ukraine, what specific parameters or approaches do you believe are most effective in the Ukrainian context?

It’s interesting to note that in some areas, Ukraine actually has better solutions than in some places in Europe. When it comes to standardisation or ensuring interoperability with EU platforms, simply copying existing models isn’t the best approach. In some cases, doing so might be even a step backward for Ukraine.

— How do you see your role contributing to the Public Finance Management (PFM) reforms in Ukraine?

My role largely revolves around implementing a top-down approach – meaning that before supporting any direction, a decision must be well-thought at the level of IT strategy and triangulation against all relevant factors, reforms and stakeholders. So, as a first step each institution should develop a comprehensive IT strategy that outlines the ‘as is’ status and the ‘to be’ perspectives, and means to achieve them. In simple words, each institution defines what needs to be done to prepare for EU integration (data exchange, compliance), yet being still in alignment with the national laws and regulations.  

As I said, our Programme also provides emergency support to the Government of Ukraine – we focused on ensuring the high availability of systems for each of our beneficiaries. This was especially important as the full-scale war began, given the increased risk of data loss. We worked to strengthen the infrastructure of our beneficiaries to mitigate these risks. Since the start of the full-scale invasion, cybersecurity threats have escalated significantly in all areas, and EU4PFM has been instrumental in supporting our beneficiaries by building more robust IT systems capable of withstanding these cyber threats.

Work-Life Balance

— How do you manage to maintain a healthy work-life balance while contributing significantly to the Programme’s activities? Do you have any strategies or life hacks that help you find time to change the focus?

Maintaining a work-life balance is crucial for sustaining long-term productivity and well-being, especially in a rapidly evolving industry. I learned this lesson early in my career when I became the head of planning and development department for Telecom Serbia, overseeing the Internet and multimedia branches. Being responsible for providing Internet and digital television services for the entire country, and managing a team of over a hundred employees, was incredibly stressful. I realised that it was essential to recognize when I was in a stressful situation and consciously remind myself that the stress was situational, not something inherent to me. This mental shift helped me manage pressure more effectively. Additionally, engaging in regular physical activities, like playing basketball, walking, or cycling, became vital for relieving stress and maintaining balance.

— What personal philosophy or guiding principles do you apply to your work?

In the vast and ever-evolving field of IT, curiosity and commitment to achieving the best possible results are essential. It’s important to constantly explore new ideas and innovations. But equally crucial is clear and effective communication and getting connected with partners at personal level. Even the most cutting-edge solutions won’t succeed if they aren’t understood by others. That’s why I prioritise explaining my vision and goals clearly to all stakeholders, since the task of IT is to serve the business needs and so I invest into translation from ‘technology’ language to how it will improve business operations.

Beyond that, my guiding principle is to do the work which will be meaningful and have a clearly positive impact, whether for the benefit of the citizens and their wellbeing, or for the productivity of the commercial entity. Unfortunately, the trend is that IT is increasingly used with non-ethical purposes. I am against using the technologies or knowledge in a way which may do harm.

Professional Expertise

— What are some of the unique challenges you’ve faced while implementing IT and security projects in different countries?

Each IT and security project comes with its own set of pre-requisites and specific requirements. For instance, while working on national security systems in countries like Macedonia and Serbia, one of the main challenges was navigating the strict regulations around state secrecy. This required careful management of information — understanding exactly what data you were allowed to access, what could be shared, and ensuring compliance with all legal regulations. These projects demanded a deep understanding of the local legal frameworks and a careful approach to handling sensitive information.

Another example comes from my experience implementing a data centre in Ethiopia. The environmental conditions and security needs in Ethiopia were vastly different from those in Europe, requiring customised solutions that took these factors into account.

— Among the countries you’ve worked in, could you highlight a success story or a particularly rewarding experience that you are proud of?

In my time at Telecom Serbia, I introduced several pioneering technologies. For instance, we implemented a complete digital document management system in 2002, a video streaming system in 2007 — well ahead of the commercial solutions available today, — and a full business continuity data centre in 2004. These early implementations provided me with practical knowledge, which was extremely useful in my consulting career. In practice, you always encounter challenges during implementation, and these experiences taught me how to anticipate and address potential issues, enabling me to design and approach systems more effectively.

One of the most rewarding experiences in my career happened while I was working on the development of Internet access for an entire country – in Serbia. Clearly, the initiative was highly ambitious but there was a new angle which was outside the scope but triggered my action. In 2006, while rolling out Internet, I realised that children were not being properly educated on how to use the Internet safely. This concern led me to initiate a series of educational training sessions for elementary schools across Serbia, where I taught kids and their parents about responsible Internet use. At the time, this was a very new approach, and I’m proud that later it inspired other organisations to adopt similar initiatives. Eventually, this became a regular activity led by the Ministry of Telecommunications and Information Technology. This effort also introduced me to the Council of Europe, which supports the Ministry on awareness raising. When I later resigned from Telecom Serbia, I continued this work with the Council of Europe. This experience taught me that when you pursue something you believe in, you never know where it might lead or what doors it might open.

— The PFM field is rapidly evolving with the integration of technology. How is Ukraine leveraging technological advancements to modernise its procedures and systems?

In some areas, the Ukrainian governmental institutions already have advanced systems, while in others, there’s still room for growth. However, what’s most encouraging is their strong willingness to learn from European practices and then tailor those insights to create the best possible architecture and technical solutions for their needs. This approach goes beyond simply copying EU solutions; it’s about developing solutions that not only meet current needs but also set the foundation for future advancements. Ukraine’s IT landscape is already at a high level, and with the political commitment, openness for reforms and courage to pioneer new approaches, even at the most challenging time for the country, it has the potential to continue evolving even further.

— With the increasing complexity and scale of IT environments, how critical is IT consolidation for organisations, particularly in the context of Ukraine? How have you approached and managed IT consolidation projects throughout your career?

IT consolidation is a broad and often misunderstood concept, with different people having varying interpretations of it. However, it’s a crucial process that needs to be implemented step by step. The first step is to consolidate IT infrastructure into primary and secondary disaster recovery data centres that can serve all PFM institutions. This approach is much more efficient because, instead of each institution investing in its own data centres, centralised management will be organised. This means that non-IT investments, such as physical infrastructure and security measures, are focused on just these data centres, and resources like processor power, memory, and storage capacity are shared across institutions. This eliminates the need for each institution to maintain its own reserve capacity, leading to significant cost savings and efficiency gains.

Generally speaking, if IT consolidation as a reform is implemented ‘by the book’, it will have multiple advantages, for quite many technological processes could be centralised, such as management of application, license management, backup, archiving, virtualisation, help desk, monitoring of systems performance, physical and cyber security, establishing a pool of qualified personnel to manage this infrastructure, sustainability of its servicing, and unification of approaches. As a result, it may lead also to more structured and coherent governance over architecture of software solutions, budget allocations for maintenance and modernisation, optimised procurement processes, possibility for managing projects using classical methodologies, and performing high-level data analysis.

Typically, IT consolidation begins with consolidating network and storage infrastructure, followed by the development of a unified application stack that can be used across all institutions for future projects. I’ve encountered many consolidation projects throughout my career, not just at Telecom Serbia, where we designed primary and secondary data centres, and later a third data centre for external customers, but also in various other countries, both within and outside of Europe. Most recently, in 2019, I was involved in developing a strategy for government network and data centre consolidation for the IT office in Serbia.

However, IT consolidation isn’t just about technical aspects; it also requires organisational readiness. In the PFM sector, infrastructure across institutions is fairly similar, with comparable technologies and skill sets. This means you don’t need separate expert teams for each institution — instead, you can have a centralised team with broader expertise that serves all institutions. From a security standpoint, it’s also easier to maintain a high level of security across two data centres rather than a larger number.

The key to successful consolidation is a thorough analysis phase for each institution. This involves assessing the current status and defining the necessary steps to achieve consolidation. Each institution has different levels of development, so the path to achieving the overall goal will vary. Therefore, a detailed action plan must be developed for each institution to guide them through the consolidation process effectively.

— Can you describe the process of implementing IT consolidation in Ukraine? Is Ukraine making progress in this area, given the current challenges?

Ukraine is now in a very difficult situation due to war, which complicates the traditional approach to IT consolidation. In many countries, consolidation often means centralising all IT resources in one location. However, this approach poses significant risks for Ukraine at present.

Instead, Ukraine has adopted a more flexible strategy. For example, mobile data centres are being used, which are distributed across the country but meet the same high availability and technical standards as centralised systems. This distributed approach ensures that even in the face of ongoing war, the IT infrastructure remains resilient and can be integrated into a centralised system once conditions improve.

All components of this distributed system adhere to consistent security and availability standards, which aligns with the goals. This approach has been effective and is expected to continue providing positive results. Ultimately, the goal is to transition to a private cloud solution for PFM institutions, which will further enhance the efficiency and security of the IT infrastructure.

— What are the main cybersecurity challenges Ukraine faces, and how can the country address these challenges effectively?

Since the full-scale russian invasion, the cybersecurity landscape in Ukraine has dramatically changed. Cybersecurity issues now extend beyond just protecting computer systems; they have real-world impacts, such as disrupting electricity and communications, which affects both civilian life and military operations. This situation has elevated cybersecurity to a critical component of hybrid warfare.

One of the main challenges has been the increase in cyberattacks aimed at stealing data from institutions and causing data loss. To counter these threats, it is essential for institutions to implement robust data protection measures, ensure high-availability solutions, and provide continuous training for employees to minimise the risk of cybercrime.

Another significant challenge is the spread of misinformation online, which creates confusion and additional problems. Addressing this issue requires not only technical solutions but also strategies to combat false information and maintain public trust.

To overcome these challenges, a multi-faceted approach is needed:

— Looking ahead, what do you see as the future of IT in Ukraine?

Ukraine has a huge number of skilled IT experts, and the process of EU integration presents a significant opportunity for them. Rather than focusing solely on outsourcing, Ukrainian IT experts now have the chance to contribute to their country’s development directly. As Ukraine progresses towards EU accession, there will be a growing need for the implementation of new systems and technologies that align with EU standards.

It is often more advantageous to build upon existing, advanced solutions within Ukraine rather than relying on external solutions that may not fully address the country’s specific needs. By continuing to develop and refine these internal solutions, Ukraine can ensure they meet national requirements and leverage local expertise.

With government organisations being among the largest users of IT services, a strong, internally developed IT sector will support ongoing development and innovation. Overall, fostering a robust and self-sufficient IT industry will be crucial for Ukraine’s future growth and its integration into the EU.

— Are there any specific goals within the EU4PFM Project that you are particularly excited about?

We’ve already achieved significant milestones with the EU4PFM Project. Key accomplishments include ensuring high availability for all our partner institutions, developing strategies on digitalisation, and establishing clear pathways for EU interoperability and integration. These tangible results underscore the project’s impact.

One goal I’m especially excited about is the introduction of the IT system which will be used by the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine to administer the national budget planning process, – we expect to complete it by the end of 2024. This system is set to revolutionise the budgeting process, bringing substantial improvements in efficiency and accuracy.

— How are you ensuring that the IT solutions implemented under the Programme will be sustainable and continue to deliver benefits long after the Programme ends?

Sustainability is a cornerstone of our approach to IT reforms. Before initiating any project, we conduct a thorough needs assessment to ensure that sustainability is firmly addressed.

Sustainability encompasses not just technical aspects but also organisational and legal considerations. For instance, if a beneficiary lacks the capacity to maintain the new system post-project, we ensure they commit to engaging the necessary experts to support the solution. We also perform a cost-benefit analysis to validate that the project is justified and necessary, ensuring that all investments are worthwhile.

— What advice would you give to younger professionals who are looking to build a career in IT and cybersecurity?

In the ever-evolving field of IT and cybersecurity, it’s crucial to stay curious and committed to lifelong learning. Technology, including emerging areas like AI, is constantly advancing, so being open to learning and adapting is essential for long-term success.

Additionally, maintaining strong ethical standards in your professional conduct is vital. An ethical approach not only helps ensure your credibility and sustainability in the field but also contributes positively to your country and society. Choose projects and roles that align with your values and make a meaningful impact, which will foster a sense of pride and accomplishment.

While IT can be used for various purposes, including less ethical ones, it’s important to focus on using technology for the greater good. The way you choose to apply your skills defines whether your work benefits humanity or not. By prioritising positive and ethical uses of technology, you’ll build a career you can be proud of and make a difference in the world.