Expert and mentor of the CASE-IN: professional weight is confirmed not by words, but by the trust of the industry

In January 2026, a new season of the International Engineering CASE-IN Championship started, an international competition system for solving engineering cases, which includes more than 300 events within the framework of the five leagues of the main season and the annual autumn cup.

Last season ended with the Autumn Cup, the results of which are of particular interest in the context of the current competition cycle. Last season, only the League of Young Professionals hosted three key final competitions - the Main Season of the League of Young Professionals, the REN Cup and the Autumn Cup, which brought together teams of active specialists from the country's leading industry companies.

The CASE-IN League of Young Professionals is considered one of the most reputable scientific and practical competitions in the engineering field, and the championship itself is being implemented with the support of the presidential platform "Russia - the Land of Opportunities", in accordance with government plans to popularize engineering professions and within the framework of the Science to Win initiative of the Decade of Science and Technology.

According to the statistics of the championship, 34% of the decisions of the teams of the League of Young Professionals were implemented in production, and 42% of the participants were promoted during the year. The expert commission of the championship is formed from among the most experienced and reputable specialists — representatives of government, public and scientific organizations, employees of leading industry companies and experts who already have experience evaluating solutions within the framework of the League of Young Professionals.

That is why the editorial board asked Dmitry Voystrochenko, a member of the judging panel of the CASE—IN 2025 championship, an industrial engineer, a specialist in the modernization of industrial enterprises and automation of complex technological processes, a reliable mentor of the Reliable Shift Foundation and one of the most prominent professionals in the modern engineering environment. Dmitry and I talked about why such sites are important for the industry, what distinguishes strong engineering expertise today, and how a professional reputation is formed outside of a single enterprise.

"SP": Dmitry, in 2025 you were invited to participate in the judging panels at the key stages of the International Engineering CASE-IN Championship, from the qualifying and semi—final stages to the finals of several leagues, including the League of Young Professionals. To an outside observer, this already looks like a stable line of professional trust. What does this mean for you personally?

— It really means a lot to me. When the invitation is repeated throughout the season and covers all the key final venues of the championship, it is perceived as a high professional honor and as a sign of confidence in your assessment by the organizers and the industry community.

If we look back to 2025 as a whole, then it really was a very systematic work within the framework of the championship: in addition to all the finals of the League of Young Professionals, there were qualifying stages, two streams of the semifinals of the Main Season, and work with the Student League. Therefore, for me it felt not like individual invitations, but as a steady professional interaction throughout the season.

In general, expert and judicial work is close to me, but it is the League of Young Professionals that I am particularly interested in. Here, current professionals from large companies and organizations present their solutions, and therefore the conversation about the quality of engineering approaches turns out to be as substantive, mature and close to real production practice as possible. For me, as a judge, this is probably the most informative and professionally interesting format.

SP: CASE-IN has long been perceived as a federal-level platform, whose results are published on the website The Russian Government and the resources of the Ministry of Education and Science. It is known that the Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak He directly calls the championship a part of the state policy of supporting engineering personnel. When the judging panel works inside a project with such a level of public and institutional attention, how different does the scale of this site feel from the inside?

— This is felt primarily at the level of the environment itself. When a platform receives such attention and unites strong participants, large employers, industry experts and serious institutional support, you realize that you are inside a truly significant professional format.

For the judicial commission, this means a higher level of responsibility. It is important here not just to evaluate the performance, but to keep the bar for a professional conversation: to understand how well the solution has really been worked out, whether it can withstand engineering testing and whether it meets the level expected from such a platform. That is why the scale of the CASE-IN is felt from the inside not as an external attribute, but as a high demand for the quality of solutions and the quality of the expertise itself.

"SP": In 2025, more than 20,000 people took part in the XIII International Engineering CASE-IN Championship. The scale of the event and the level of competition is amazing. If you take a separate league, for example, the League of Young Professionals, which you judged, then only the 42 strongest teams of companies such as Norilsk Nickel, Tatneft, Gazpromneft-MNPZ and Gazpromtrans. When a panel of judges works with such a composition of participants, what does this mean for the level of judicial work itself?

— This means that the judging panel has a very high level of responsibility. When you work with teams of this level for one season, it becomes obvious that this is no longer just a competitive format, but a serious professional environment where every performance has a certain corporate culture, production logic and a high level of internal requirements.

In such circumstances, the judge should see much more than the quality of the presentation. It is necessary to understand the depth of the solution study, its practical feasibility, technological and economic viability, and resistance to professional criticism. That is why working in such a judicial commission is always a high responsibility and a very serious level of professional conversation.

"JV": The International Engineering CASE-IN Championship includes several areas at once — a School League, a Student League, a League of young professionals, a League of working specialties and a special league. This format allows one platform to bring together future and existing specialists, employers, experts and industry tasks, that is, to actually work on the development and promotion of high standards of engineering in the country. In your opinion, what is the real contribution of CASE-IN to a professional engineering environment?

— The fact that it brings engineering assessment into a really serious professional space. Such platforms are important not only for the participants, but also for the entire industry, because they allow you to see how both young specialists and established professionals think, how ready they are for complex tasks, for responsibility for solutions and for working with real production constraints.

That is why the importance of such competitions goes far beyond the case format itself. This is already part of the country's human, professional, and engineering environment.

SP: As partners of the championship alongside major industry players such as ALROSA, SIBUR, Tatneft, «Gazprom Energoholding and Norilsk Nickel — We are also observing national partners. Ministry of Energy of Russia, Ministry of Education and Science of Russia, Rosmolodezhi, Ministry of Industry and Trade of Russia and The Russian Ministry of Labor. Does this composition of partners mean that CASE-IN is already a platform that is significant not only for individual industries, but also for the country as a whole?

— I think so. Such a composition of partners is very significant in itself. When, on the one hand, the largest industrial and energy companies find themselves in the same circuit, and on the other, federal departments and structures responsible for education, youth policy, industry and human resources development, this means that the championship is perceived on a much broader scale than just an industry competition.

This, in my opinion, is one of the strengths of CASE-IN. It connects the interests of companies, the professional community and the government personnel agenda. Therefore, its importance really goes beyond individual enterprises or individual industries.: This is already part of a broader system for the development of the engineering environment, training and professional growth of young professionals in the country.

"SP": Dmitry, as far as we know, outside of judicial work you have a strong production profile — modernization of enterprises, automation, efficiency improvement. To what extent does this practical basis determine your opinion in the judicial commission?

— Defines it very strongly. In engineering, practical experience changes the optics. When you yourself have worked with production constraints, modernization, the search for technological solutions, and the need to justify and be responsible for the result, you perceive other people's proposals differently.

Practice provides a very important thing — an inner sense of feasibility. You understand faster where the solution is really viable, and where it exists only at the conceptual level.

"SP": A few months before your participation in the final Autumn Cup of the championship, you received the international certification Lean Six Sigma Black Belt by IASSC. This is still a rare level of external verification for the Russian manufacturing market: many companies use their own line systems, but international certification of this class is extremely rare. In addition, the Black Belt in the IASSC/PeopleCert system is already a level of specialists who are proficient in the Lean Six Sigma methodology and are able to lead complex improvement projects. Do you think engineers should strive for this kind of certification? How can this affect the production staff?

— I believe that such certifications do have value, but it is important to understand their role correctly. This is not a formal attribute or an end in itself, but a tool that helps structure thinking and build a systematic approach to working with production.

Industry often has a strong practical base, but it does not always have a unified methodological framework. International standards like Lean Six Sigma provide this support: they allow you to speak the same language, correctly measure efficiency and build improvements not point-by-point, but at the level of the entire system.

If we talk about the impact on production personnel, then such certifications are gradually forming a new generation of specialist engineers who are able not only to solve local problems, but also to manage complex processes, work with data and be responsible for sustainable results.

In my opinion, this is especially important in an environment where enterprises are moving from point automation to more complex production systems. Experience is no longer enough here — it requires a systematic understanding of the processes, and such programs enhance this understanding.

"SP": In short, what distinguishes a high-level engineer today?

— The ability to combine engineering depth with practical results. Today, it is not enough just to be well versed in technology — it is important to be able to see the whole system, take into account the limitations, understand the consequences of decisions and bring them to a real effect. That, in my opinion, is what distinguishes a strong engineer.

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