Serguei Kouchnerov (born 22 June 1960 in Rahachow, Belarusian SSR) - artist, animator, director, story artist and screenwriter. He started his career as an animator and director in Kiev, Ukraine. In 1992, he was hired by Walt Disney Feature Animation as a character animator and came to the United States of America, where he currently lives and works at Illumination Entertainment.
Serguei Kouchnerov was an animator before he was a director.
The text tells us Serguei started his career as an animator and director, but it would be wrong to assume which one he did first [and it's doubtful he began doing both at the same exact moment]. It looks like the algorithm just went by word order to decide which career came first.