DA alumnus Daniil Klubov on his career since graduating from MAIS 17 in 2014
My name is Daniil Klubov, I come from Saint Petersburg, Russia and I was a part of the MAIS 17 class (2012-2014). My career took off when during the second year of the DA I got an internship at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The DA Career Center, which was back then led by amazing Frau Hofer played a crucial role in helping me securing this internship, I am forever grateful to the DA for that. I spent overall around 2 years at the IAEA, first as an intern, then as a consultant and eventually as P1.
After working at the international organisation for a while I realised this wasn’t for me.
That’s when I decided to switch to the private sector. The MAIS 17 colleague who previously worked in strategy consulting encouraged me to apply, specifically to McKinsey & Company. Again, the DA helped in here: since at the time we already had 2 DA alumni working for McKinsey I could get some insider perspective from them. Professor Neudeck’s lectures also gave me an introduction into the world of economics and business, so I could then properly prepare for my interviews and succeed.
The next approx. four years I spent at McKinsey, working on the projects across various industries: high tech, telecommunications, banking, private equity. I worked on different continents, being on the projects everywhere from Dubai to London to Jamaica (I lived in Kingston almost 5 months). That was a great time, I’ve learnt a lot and had lots of fun experiences.
Yet again, 1.5 years ago I realised that I wanted something more than consulting and decided to become an entrepreneur. Since then I’ve had a few different ventures – the latest of which is Tolstoy, digital and plant-based restaurant start-up. My ambition is to build a big successful business in Europe – for Tolstoy to become #1 European plant-based restaurant chain and franchise. Recently, me and my team opened the first location at Rechte Wienzeile 1b in Vienna city center – in the 4th district, not so far from the DA :) You can read about us on our website www.wearetolstoy.com.
Overall, even though I do not work in the area of international relations anymore, I would say that the DA played a crucial role in the very beginning of my career: in helping me securing both IAEA internship offer and helping me to get an insider perspective on McKinsey. Moreover, I really enjoyed my time at the DA: the lectures and seminars were amazing and I’ve met lots of wonderful people there, who are still my very good friends after all these years. So, I would definitely recommend the MAIS program to anybody.
[December 2020]