The 12th special forces brigade of the National Guard of Ukraine Azov, in collaboration with Ukraine's largest job search site Work.ua, announced the start of a recruiting campaign under the slogan "The army needs different professions."

As Sviatoslav Palamar (Kalyna), deputy commander for work with personnel of the 12th Azov special forces brigade, noted at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine, the key to the survival of personnel on the battlefield is their professionalism and motivation.

 

"In Azov, as in other military formations, in other military units, there is a need for qualified personnel. It is necessary to find a systemic communication solution that could be beneficial in defending our national interests and effectively fight on the battlefield. That's why we appealed to Banda Agency and began to create a different approach to attracting new recruits to our unit," Palamar said.
 

He emphasized that most of the military unit is not stormtroopers, but support: qualified excavator operators, drivers, diesel operators, clerks, doctors and others.

Today, the brigade is looking for hundreds of specialists in various fields: from shooters to cooks, from paramedics to drivers, from UAV operators to excavator operators. In total, the website currently contains vacancies for representatives of 28 different professions with a salary range from UAH 25,000 to UAH 125,000.

Thus, Azov initiated a recruiting campaign and invited the creative agency Banda to cooperate on a volunteer basis. The agency proposed an approach whereby each position was treated as a vacancy. Another component of the decision was the proposal to involve the Work.ua company in the project, whose website is visited by about 450,000 people daily to search for new opportunities.

Co-founder and CEO of Work.ua Artur Mikhno emphasized that for the company this is an opportunity to show that recruitment into the army can be carried out professionally and purposefully, and not because of the delivery of summonses at checkpoints.

"Due to an ineffective recruitment system, experienced specialists find themselves in the trenches, while at the same time there is no one to do high-quality work. A person must understand that the army is also a job. And the army is also an employer. There, as elsewhere, motivated and qualified people are needed. I am confident that our cooperation with Azov will be the beginning of systemic changes in military recruiting, because the Armed Forces still have a lot of hard work ahead," he said.

Recruitment in Azov will go like this: visitors to the Work.ua website will see current vacancies, for example Auto electrician, Cook or Warehouse manager. To apply for a vacancy of interest, a person needs to click the Respond button under the vacancy description on the site. If the qualifications meet the employer's expectations, an Azov recruiter contacts the candidate for an interview.

Azov explained that all recruits will undergo combat training and work under the guidance of highly professional commanders.

"I am convinced that everyone can choose the unit in which they will defend Ukraine during the war. This decision must be balanced, deliberate and principled. Azov is a unit in which you should serve, because professionalism is valued here, as is human life. And the very understanding of why we chose this path gives us inspiration for further struggle," Palamar added.

In turn, Director of Banda Agency Dmytro Adabir said that they decided to change the approach and demonstrate that the modern army consists of not only assault specialties.

"We believe that we need to look for different ways of communicating with people about recruitment into the army. The collaboration with Work.ua and the use of this brand's style in a joint campaign attracts much-needed attention," he explained.