In Her Own Words

Irina Tkachenko: ‘I love everything that OSU has given me’

by Terry Tush

At 18, Irina Tkachenko was looking forward to her new adventure, despite never having been on an airplane before boarding the first of three flights that would take her from her hometown of Kiev, Ukraine, to Oklahoma City.

Today, the Oklahoma State University alumna holds bachelor’s degrees in management and international business and a master’s degree in international studies and is a senior account manager for Bloomberg LP, one of the world’s largest privately held financial companies. Out of her London office today, Tkachenko flies hundreds of thousands of miles a year, having traveled to nearly 40 countries since that first flight 15 years ago.

The former Cowgirl tennis player was named the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Central Region Rookie of the Year as a freshman in 2005 and was a two-time All-Big 12 honoree (2005 and 2008) during her four-year college career. Now 33, she attributes her success as a businesswoman to what she learned at OSU, both on the tennis court and in the classroom.

Until 18, I grew up in Kiev, Ukraine. I’ve played tennis since I was 7 years old. I remember like it was yesterday: the first of September, I went to the first day of school and I went to the first day to play tennis. First grade. From then on, I played. The first professional tournament I played in was when I was 13. The first money I earned was at 13 years old. I think at that time it was $500. From then on, I was just sent to all these tournaments. For the most part, I was playing in Poland because I was afraid of flying. As weird as it sounds, now I sometimes have four flights a week.

When I was going into the last grade of high school, I needed to choose what I was going to do next. Am I going to keep playing or am I going to stop and only do school? In Ukraine, you can only do one. Because my parents didn’t have the money to support me playing (professionally), and finding sponsors was too difficult, one of my dad’s students called and he was the assistant to the men’s tennis team at OSU at the time. He asked my dad, “I know you have some daughters. Would they like to come play at OSU?” I was like, “Oh, yes.”

In August 2004, I flew into Oklahoma City but didn’t realize we needed to drive to Stillwater. It was hot — extremely hot. I was happy I was on land, and I didn’t have to fly anymore. My first impression as we were driving from Oklahoma City to Stillwater was that there were no trees. Oh my gosh, where is this place? Why is it taking so long?

My freshman year was a nightmare because I thought I actually knew English, but I remember when I arrived there were girls from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, New York, and I heard their accents and realized I actually didn’t know English. Then I began school, and I could not understand anything. It was extremely frustrating.

I finished (high) school in Ukraine with excellent grades, and then I’m sitting in class at OSU and I don’t understand anything they are saying, and I’m pretty much failing everything. I actually made it through by studying constantly, often falling asleep and waking up with books in my lap. I asked my team to always correct my English, but I didn’t speak much at all the first semester. I just listened and paid attention to everybody else. Somehow after the first semester, I was speaking English like nobody’s business, and my coach (Julius Lubicz-Majewski) was laughing and saying, “Oh, I think I prefer you not knowing English.”

Right away, I knew I wanted to do management. I like working with people, and I wanted to do something business related. My parents had a store in Poland, and I remembered that I was quite good with math. Then I said I’m going to be a businesswoman, and I will someday deal with people in business. In four years, I got two bachelor’s degrees and got my master’s in international studies by the fifth year.

I had a very good experience at OSU, great professors, great support throughout my college years. Everything I could achieve now is because of the education and the extremely amazing experience at OSU, including my American family and Jeretta Nord, who is a role model to me of an independent, successful, intelligent and kind woman.

My American family is Stephen Miller, who used to teach marketing at Spears Business and who passed a few years ago, and his wife, Lynn Miller. I always felt like I was a part of their family. I still visit Lynn and we still stay in touch, and we still see each other. I’m so glad that Lynn is planning to come to my wedding in July, and Jeretta and Daryl Nord are also traveling to Ukraine to see me marry my fiancé, Ovidiu Suciu.

I had a professor at OSU, Dr. Nizam Najd, who always told me, “If you don’t get anything else from my class, it should be to have a big picture always.” I remember it every single day. When I do something, I’m always thinking about the big picture. The planning and all the strategies that I’ve been able to execute in Ukraine — this was because of the education I got at Oklahoma State.

In September of 2010, I moved back to Ukraine, and went to work for an investment bank (Phoenix Capital). I worked for Phoenix for two years, and then I moved to Foyil Securities.

One of my friends who I used to work with at Phoenix Capital was moving to London to work for Bloomberg. She said, “Wouldn’t it be amazing if you would apply as well and work with me in London?” I said no because I had an offer from a company in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. She said, “Just in case, apply.” So we went on the website and I applied. And toward the summer I interviewed with them, and then in August they asked me to fly to London for my last interview. I didn’t tell anybody in my family and when I came back from London, I got the job. In November of 2014, I moved to London.

I spent my first six months at Bloomberg in training, and then I moved into sales. I’ve actually been responsible the last four years for the Bloomberg business in Ukraine. I combine work and traveling, which I think is a dream job.

The best part of my job is that I work with people. I get to work with different teams from different departments, so that’s very educating. I love working with the clients. I love building something from scratch, the markets and developing it, bringing something new to the clients.

In the past four years, I was privileged to work with different types of organizations in Ukraine and integrate Bloomberg and its products at family offices, investment banks, corporations, the National Bank, ministry of finance, and fiscal service. It has not always been easy to convince people to implement the Bloomberg system but with persistence, good knowledge of the product, understanding of the market structure and the needs, Bloomberg’s share of the market in Ukraine is growing. For example, in foreign exchange we have about 70 percent of the market when back in 2015 it was zero. I am happy to be part of the changes that Ukraine is going through.

I became the adult I am because of my parents and my experience at OSU. If I had stayed in Ukraine, I would never be this open-minded or this well-rounded of a person, or been exposed to all the different cultures and all the different people. Now, at Bloomberg, all my friends are from different countries, and I understand that they’re different and grew up differently.

At OSU, I met a lot of different people from different countries, and I think that was the most incredible thing. I love everything that OSU has given me.