Skills@Work Challenge: Increasing entrepreneurial flair Special

Sofia (Bulgaria) hosted the first international finals of the Skills@Work Challenge for young entrepreneurs. The event took place on 12 March 2009 and participants from vocational schools in 10 countries came together in this joint British Council and Junior Achievement initiative encouraging the entrepreneurship spirit of the young people. JA-YE Europe represents 40 European countries in the world's largest organization in the field of entrepreneurship education (JA Worldwide). JA-YE uses hands-on experiences at all ages to help young people understand the economics of life, inspiring and preparing them for today's global economy. In partnership with thousands of business people and educators, they bring the real world to students and open their minds to their potential. The international finals organisers chose e-governance as the theme for the first Skills@Work international challenge. By developing projects to respond to the challenge the young people demonstrated their visions of civil society and services that an efficient government should be able to provide to its citizens and businesses by electronic means. The criteria for their assessment included innovation, feasibility of the idea, awareness of the business environment and presentation skills. - I have passed the first challenge held in Country Club Hotel Babe in Sopot on 26 November 2008. The second one was in Pančevo but the third challenge was the National finals held at University of New York in Belgrade on 2 March 2009. Five successful candidates were selected to represent Serbia and I was one of them to travel to Bulgaria – says Aleksandra Petronijevic, a student of First Belgrade Grammar School. She started her ’career’ in school’s company “Volcano”, the project also supported by Junior Achievement. The first prize of the international final Skills@Work Challenge – a visit to the UK for more skills and entrepreneurship development went to team that presented a system facilitating voting which includes voting over the Internet and mobile telecom networks, facilitating people with disabilities and mobility needs, representatives of public administration and parents caring for young children to take active part in elections. One of the members of the winning team was Aleksandra Petronijevic from Serbia. - The other four students were from Romania, Northern Ireland, Bulgaria and Israel. We spent four days in London visiting leading British and world companies like Google, Innocent Fruit Drinks, La Diosa, Votivation, and the famous restaurant of Jamie Oliver – Fifteen Restaurant. It is much different than in Serbia, their working places and habits are not like official businessmen but they have more freedom and have to be creative – explains Aleksandra. She is in the final year of Grammar School and her plan is to try getting scholarship for some of U.S. universities next year, so she could study business and/or entrepreneurship. - It is very hard to success in business but when I see happy faces after well done job I think it is worth of invested effort. Many things are important for success and it should be a good combination of different segments but I think the good idea is definitely starting point. After that comes good team, business plan and everything else.