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Topic 2: Evaluation of the economic and financial position of a business in the market.
Companies face many difficulties dealing with the frequent changes in today’s economy, and company restructuring can be a short and long-term answer to maintaining company viability. With a challenging economy, in our geographical region one of the most common reasons for possible restructuring is the difficulty of keeping sales results above a financial break-even point. An additional key reason to review a business reorganization is the preparation for major growth involving new products or services. In some other cases, legal and financial reasons might dictate a restructuring alternative.
The main goal of this session is to acknowledge the participants with the indicators for determining the position of a business in the market. The most important part of restructuring lies in defining the problem and after that in postulating the solution. Regardless of the type of businesses chosen, there are ways of evaluating the competition, the factors that determine the dynamics of a particular market, the impact of regional development policies, and so on. The session will end up with the SWOT analysis for a company and the advantages it can provide. It is a simple but useful framework for analyzing an organization’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as the opportunities and threats that it is facing. It helps the company/ business to focus on the strengths and try to minimize threats. From the other side, it highlights the opportunities available and how to take the greatest possible advantage of them for the business. In any case, it should be emphasized that such analysis can help the company identify and understand key issues affecting the business, but it does not necessarily offer solutions.

Topic 3. Internet and Business- Business forms on the Internet.
This session provides the participant with knowledge about new business forms in the internet. Internet impact on society is now making economic, social, and political changes around the globe. It’s obvious a huge number of users, communities, cultures are using the internet in their daily life. It is very difficult to imagine how any business could operate during this time without the use of the internet. The development of the internet has significantly altered the day to day operations of a business; including how they communicate with each other and their audience. Information can be easily transmitted to any destination in a matter of seconds. The internet has become an essential tool for marketing and advertising. A business can present itself to customers with the use of a website or online advertisements. Many businesses now use the internet as a means of making customers aware of their current promotions. This can be very beneficial to businesses that are targeting a younger audience.

The huge development of this field enables vast new opportunities for investment and entrepreneurship even in our target region. Participants learn what are the necessary knowledge to be involved in such business, what are the legal forms of this business, how an activity is carried out in this type of business, and what is the role of banks in this process. A special place will take the discussion of matching the supply and demand for products and services that are offered in completely different distribution channels. Case “Grupon”.

Increased competition, technological changes and government regulation are among the many challenges business owners face in today’s competitive world. The business model that worked in the initial phase of operation may no longer be profitable five years after start-up. Slow or no growth, market downturns, an inefficient structure and accumulating debt are a few of the signals that company restructuring may be in its best interest. Such situation is encountered in the regions this project intends to be implemented, consequently encourages us to suggest some ways of dealing with the problem.

In order to successfully realize this step, we anticipate a promotional campaign to recognize the Elbasan women’s business community with the expected results of this project. Providing information and drawing the attention of business women on the restructuring process is the first move towards a successful set of actions to the benefit of businesses and the whole community.

In order to reach a more realistic business plan for the expansion and restructuring of selected businesses, 6 seminar / training sessions will intend to enable the executives to evaluate the current situation of their business/ company, their restructuring opportunities and to increase their management skills.

We started with the topic “Evaluation of the economic and financial position of a business in the market”

Companies face many difficulties dealing with the frequent changes in today’s economy, and company restructuring can be a short and long-term answer to maintaining company viability. With a challenging economy, in our geographical region one of the most common reasons for possible restructuring is the difficulty of keeping sales results above a financial break-even point. An additional key reason to review a business reorganization is the preparation for major growth involving new products or services. In some other cases, legal and financial reasons might dictate a restructuring alternative.

The main goal of this session is to acknowledge the participants with the indicators for determining the position of a business in the market. The most important part of restructuring lies in defining the problem and after that in postulating the solution. Regardless of the type of businesses chosen, there are ways of evaluating the competition, the factors that determine the dynamics of a particular market, the impact of regional development policies, and so on. The session will end up with the SWOT analysis for a company and the advantages it can provide. It is a simple but useful framework for analyzing an organization’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as the opportunities and threats that it is facing. It helps the company/ business to focus on the strengths and try to minimize threats.  From the other side, it highlights the opportunities available and how to take the greatest possible advantage of them for the business.  In any case, it should be emphasized that such analysis can help the company identify and understand key issues affecting the business, but it does not necessarily offer solutions.

Every business realizes its activity on a certain surface and needs a certain space, which is generally defined based on different criteria according to types businesses. In this topic, the participants learn how to classify the factors influencing this decision, how to calculate the necessary surface for some types of business, how the place relates to the functional costs, how it affects the sales promotion, and how much it affects the potential customers. Finally, the commercial area performance is analyzed for businesses that realize retail or wholesale merchandise sales for consumption products. The elements needed to evaluate the profitability of the shelf and the promotion at the selling place are also described and discussed. The above relates mainly to those activities that offer products, but also services where some material output is incorporated.

Although actually online activities are becoming highly widespread, still the place/ location is strictly related to most of the core of the activity in which generally women are involved. The point to consider is the fact that the intention of this project is to stimulate the engagement of women whose education level and information technology background and experience is relatively limited.

They trained the women on general information about regulatory issues while carrying out a business activity is a must for every business activity. This session provided participants with judicial and fiscal information, helpful to recognize the actions they need to make when deciding on the type of the activity they will perform.

They learn to determine what legal form would be most suitable for their company, forms of partnership, if required, and the costs of its establishment. At the same time, the background is provided for the initial elements of building the organizational chart of company and especially basic methodology in order to determine the requirements for employees, tools and skills. Further on, this topic serves for learning how to estimate the cost of business inside and outside the production boundaries. It informs about the business tax obligations, workplace security obligations, guarantees for environmental compliance, and the personal obligations that the entrepreneur has in a business, etc. An important part of this topic is how to find foreign partners or local investors who believe in the suggested business idea of the participant.

The HPiB team met in Tirana on December 18 and 19 for the second workshop on “Structuring opinions for qualitative participation”. The team was enriched with the participation of five Albanian young people, taking the number of participants to 17.

For the first stop of the event, participants met with Mr. Shpat Kolgega, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Education, Sport and Youth, Mrs. Dafina Peci, Executive Director, National Youth Congress, and Mr. Bledar Taho, General Director, Institute of Romani Culture in Albania. The meetings were inspirational for the young people who had the opportunity to learn more from the experiences of the guests in achieving participation.

The second stop, at the Professional College of Tirana, was focused on lectures delivered by the mentors, Orkidea and Dusan, on tools that allow for qualitative participation, and failures of technology. Participants had the opportunity to work in teams and develop the topics they will work for at the hackathon.

Four teams were created and the chosen topics cover local and regional policy issues, on which our the team members will work through the digital platform and will be finalized during the hackathon in January 2019.

The aim of this session is to help participants learning how to test a successful business idea on the desk, before starting it in the real market. This means we are in the stage that someone has an idea of entrepreneurship and will try to reveal the probability of success for this idea. By applying step by step the test methodology, participants learn who is the potential client of the suggested activity, what product or service do replace or complete this business in the market, how should/ can be presented this idea to others, and how much will the others will trust it, what are the financing needs and where to find them etc.

We live in a period when the innovation and the globalization phenomena play a crucial role in the increase of types of products and services presented and even provided in the markets all over the world. From this viewpoint, many business ideas can be based on similar products offered by competitors, while the challenge is to provide them for the targeted customers with the accepted price and in due time. From the other side, in every country there are specific needs that can be detected locally and fulfilled by solutions locally provided. Such needs can be addressed and turned in demand, taking advantage of the first provider in the market, with all the positive effects it has. This reasoning can expand the range of ideas, which can be combined with the capabilities and be transformed into realizable activities.   Consecutive analysis of the suggested activity as well as the analysis of the market demand for the product/ service, enables utilization of measurable procedures for assessing the probability of success. The topic, besides teaching participants to think as entrepreneurs, also provides the opportunity to evidence the knowledge that they have in the field and how to put them in practice. This is considered a simple method to help the decision making for establishing a business.

The Center for Comparative and International Studies(CCIS) and Qendra Mesdheu (QM) have started the trainings and advising the selected group of women to participate in the program “Development of business ideas and construction of a business plan with women in Elbasan” part of the project IPA cross boarder project Macedonia- Albania: “Development of micro-enterprises of women in the cross-border area” funded by EU Delegation In Macedonia.

Increasing the participation of women in the labor market is crucial from the economic point of view in Albania and Macedonia in order to achieve a higher employment rate in our countries, as part of a region in advancement towards the bigger continental market.

The reference to the employment policy context is also closely related to the common objectives for equality between women and men, considered geographically and politically in the European framework. Such reference provides our project with the necessary theoretical background for the assessment of the existing situation. It permits to have it as an underpinning and incites to take advantage of known and tested pathways for achievement of specific goals. We do refer to concrete actions that have been proposed for addressing several issues related to both strategies, such as the economic independence of women and equality in decision-making.

We have appraised all the initiatives, in the regional and local level, especially those social packages that have reaffirmed the importance of fostering higher participation of women. The role of European Commission remains crucial, with its policy framework highlighting that gender gaps in employment rates, as well as other gender disparities in the labor market, need to be reduced or eliminated to decrease the risk of social exclusion and poverty among women and to achieve inclusive growth.

The above introduction has been done during our trainings in Elbasan (Dec 5, and Dec 12, 2018)  with the intention to recognize the vast and most recent experiences, and additionally to adapt the suggested methods and instruments for stimulation of entrepreneurial spirit among women in Elbasan region.

Topic I – Why Do We Do a Business? What is the entrepreneur’s psychology?

This helped the participants to get acquainted with the motives that stimulate individuals to choose the “profession” of the entrepreneur. The analysis started with the main human needs in a market economy and goes on with description and explanation of the psychological factors, that usually prevent people from starting a venture. In most cases there are fear, difficult risk-taking and lack of self-esteem that become main obstacles to start a business. Consequently, it was helpful for the participants to be familiar with the psychological characteristics of entrepreneurs, understand that entrepreneurship is a process that is accomplished by applying a certain methodology, utilizing the knowledge and lived experience, through elaboration of original ideas and above all through acting and taking risk.

Topic II – Characteristics of the entrepreneur and the necessary steps to become an entrepreneur.

This topic was dedicated to five basic characteristics of the entrepreneurs. Every entrepreneur in his activity generally sets out clearly what he / she wants, who will be and how it will realize this. They are people that passionately seek out new opportunities and pursue opportunities with enormous discipline. They might focus on execution, specifically, adaptive execution and are apt to engage the energies of everyone in their domain. Many of these people are naturally born with such characteristics, while many others develop them during their activity for business development. They pursue only the very best opportunities and avoid chasing after every option.

By analyzing these elements, the participants got the understandinng that the entrepreneur himself develops together with the business, learns from his growth and feels the pleasure of what he/she is doing. Through this the individual learns what steps are necessary to undertake a venture (a business) and what are the management secrets that an entrepreneur must know in order to begin thinking as an investor.

We will continue our training program, and keep our audience aupdated

In the framework of the project “Hacking Participation in the Balkans -Innovative ways of empowering Balkans youth to impact policy making processes”, the first workshop and study visit was organised in Belgrade on 29^th and 30^th November by our partner Center for Educational Policies. The workshop and study visit was organised as a combination of meetings with policy makers on youth and regional policies as well as training sessions on topics related to youth participation.

The first visit was to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development. We had the pleasure to meet with the State Secretary of Ministry of Education, Science and Technology Development, Ana Langović Milicević and Marina Hasanović, Senior Advisor and Head of Department for Student & Pupil Standard. They talked about the educational system in Serbia, relevant achievements and challenges.  A second meeting was with Stefana Miladinović, who serves in the National Assembly of Serbia from 2014. She talked a bit about the making of the National Assembly and its history. She also talked about the legislation, decision-making process, youth participation and examples of good practice in Serbia.

The youth from Albania and Serbia then continued to Share Square Hub, a multifunctional physical space where you can share your knowledge, skills and ideas similarly to the way you do on social media. There we had workshop with two students Zvezdana Vuletić and Antonina Marin, who shared their experiences as young and proactive students in student organisations. After that we had a short visit from Vladimir Bozovic, who is President Vučić’s Advisor for regional cooperation with religious communities.

On the second day the HPiB youth visited the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where they met with Pavle Jankovic,  Head of Department for Regional Initiatives. They had an open discussion with him about participation, the true meaning of it and the tools to achieve it. The last visit was at ICT Hub, where the whole afternoon HPiB youth had lectures with our mentors Orkidea, Tijana and Dusan. Their main topics where participation, decision making process, key competencies to achieve participation, and digital participation of youth.