Social entrepreneurship projects: To share knowledge and to be proactive

In one of our previous news, we announced that we are really looking forward to the positive and inspirational stories of individuals who are or will be involved in the activities in the scope of Erasmus + project SENTIM(Social ENTrepreneurship for IMmigrants). And we truly have experienced such stories and contributed to the creation of new ones at the event Proactive steps towards entrepreneurship.

On Wednesday morning of 13th of April the Creative Center Poligon we have welcomed the curious, enthusiastic and creative individuals. More than 50 participants were maybe persuaded by the tittle of the event or they were looking for a high-quality and varied program. In one morning the event offered an interesting round table, proaction café workshop, relaxed conversation about collaborative entrepreneurship, time for networking and delicious coffee break in cooperation with Skuhna and Poligon.

The purpose of the event was to provide additional knowledge, contacts and life stories, which were offered by the hosts at the round table. Among them was a gentleman from the Netherlands Mr Cees WM Nieboer, president of Learning Paths Europe and founder of Heroes Group, Mr Faramarz Ghobadian, a restaurant owner with Iranian fast food Fari’s Delice and Mrs Celine Isabelle Marcelle Mirbeau, whose work might be better known in the form of French croissants from the bakery La Brioche. Among other things they discussed some marketing and business questions; we listened to their stories and realization of their ideas and we laughed at their perceptions of Slovenians.

The event also provided the opportunity to develop entrepreneurial ideas and solve challenges. The process by which ideas were being developed is known as Proaction café, where people can share their ideas and challenges to the other participants, who ask questions and assist them with ideas, suggestions and feedback.

At the event we addressed the challenges such as financially stable and socially responsible photo and video production involving immigrants as the production group (Institute APIS) and also the question of the integration of immigrants into the local community and a possibility of joint crafting (Institute Tri and Institute Breja preja).

During the café we also upgraded the idea of ​​a comprehensive approach of providing touristic offer in the countryside with the Institute of ZUPR AKSA and the idea of ​​supplementing the business and marketing strategy of Skuhna. In addition, we have also tried to answer the question of how to offer the service of birth photography to Slovenians and how to create an outdoor kindergarten.

Each holder of a challenge shared his idea through the process of proaction cafe with more than 15 people and certainly gained some new information, suggestion, improvement or just a confirmation that his or her idea is worth trying. Additional information and support was provided by experienced moderators (Blanka Tacer and Andrej Juričko, STEP Institute) and mentors (Karmen Rodman, KonektOn and Tine Nagy, STEP Institute).
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We hope that participants of the event went home with positive energy and enthusiasm as did the representatives of the STEP Institute and project partners who will continue to create new opportunities for active participation of individuals and organisations in the scope of SENTIM project.