Kick-off meeting, 3 December 2020
The kick-off meeting of the team of DIGI WOMEN project was held on 3 December 2020. The project’s overall objective is to develop a training programme that will train experts in order to offer trainings and mentorship sessions tailored to the needs of the female entrepreneurs digitalizing their business and help them overcome the obstacles they face in the digitalization.
The project is funded by Erasmus+ Programme, Key Action 2, Strategic Partnerships, Adult Education, with Grant Agreement No. 2020-1-BG01-KA204-079272.
The purpose of the kick-off meeting was to introduce the partner organizations by sharing their relevant experiences, to present the project goals, and to revise the main project tasks and activities.
The meeting had to be held in Sofia, Bulgaria in the Institute of Entrepreneurship of the University of National and World Economy as project coordinator. Unfortunately, the kick-off meeting had to be conducted in online form.
Participants in the kick-off meeting were the heads and experts from each of the partner organizations:
Paolo Zaramella, Ria Aerts, Alberto Maistrello of the Consulenza Direzionale di Paolo Zaramella (CDPZ), Italy
Herwig Simoner of the bit management Beratung GesmbH, Austria
Apostolina Tsaltampasi and Katerina Mouratidou of the Greek Association of Women Entrepreneurs – SEGE, Greece
Vera Komarova and Zane Zeibote of the Cluster Experts Baltic Sea Region (CEBSR), Latvia
Igor Kononenko and Karina Bukrieieva of the Department of Strategic Management, National Technical University «Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute» (NTU KhPI), Ukraine
Mirela Alpeza and Danica Eterović of the CEPOR SMEs and Entrepreneurship Policy Centre, Croatia
Kostadin Kolarov, Nikolay Vankov, and Silviya Georgieva of the Institute of Entrepreneurship, University of National and World Economy (UNWE), Bulgaria
Prof. Dr. Diana Kopeva, Vice-Rector for Scientific Research Activity of UNWE, welcomed the participants and stressed the importance of the project in addressing significant challenges to female entrepreneurship. She also expressed satisfaction with the high level of partnership, which combined significant experience and expertise in all aspects of the project objectives and tasks.
Then participants introduced themselves and their institutions with emphasis on the expertise gained through completion of different projects related to the topic as well as on the networks they are active in.
Dr. Ria Aerts, member of the team of Consulenza Direzionale di Paolo Zaramella, presented the scientific background of the DIGI WOMEN project and discussed the reflections of the research findings in the project activities.
Kostadin Kolarov from the Institute of Entrepreneurship of the UNWE presented project main goals, contents and activities, target groups.
Paolo Zaramella presented in more details the structure and content of the activities needed for producing of intellectual output defined as Curriculum for training of experts to help women entrepreneurs with their digital tools needs.
The process of development of the curriculum was discussed with the active participation of all the partners.
Kostadin Kolarov did similar presentation about the second intellectual output – the Recommendation Report which is to provide advices how the curriculum will be best used.
A discussion among project partners followed up the presentations rising important questions about practical implementation of the project including cooperation with the associated partners in each country, precising the profiles of women entrepreneurs the curriculum will be target to, the next steps, time planning, “to do list”, tasks and responsibilities of the partners, as well as the organization of next meetings.
The project will be implemented into two stages until April 2022 and includes a series of multiplier events to be held in each project partner’s country and a Train the Trainers week with the participation of all partners.
