What is “First steps in business”?
“First steps in business” is an entrepreneurship seminar that aims at meeting people from the actual business world with start-up young entrepreneurs, professionals from different spheres, students, and everybody that’s willing to learn about the different challenges of starting your own business. The lectors are professionals who are successful in their spheres, who, through practical advice and personal experience, aim at inspiring confidence and transferring knowledge to beginner entrepreneurs and enthusiasts. The idea of the seminar is to be free for the participants, so that it is more accessible to a bigger part of the young people in Bulgaria.
How did it all begin?
Right upon my arrival in Bulgaria in the summer of 2013, my intensions were focused on continuing the amassing of knowledge in the sphere of business and entrepreneurship. I had already graduated terminally my MSc in “International Business” at Aston University (Birmingham, England). Even though I graduated from two of the top universities in England, I believe that the knowledge on business and entrepreneurship that universities all over the world give is insufficient for the successful start of a young entrepreneur. A starting entrepreneur needs is the opportunity to communicate with successful businessmen, draw on their experience and learn from their mistakes. That’s exactly what I needed as well, so I started looking for and participating in different seminars and events. To my great regret, such events were exceptionally rare in Plovdiv, so I had to often travel to Sofia (the Capital) instead.
At the end of 2013 I had a team meeting with the members of JCI Plovdiv. The experience gained in the past few months gave us a lot of ideas, and we decided that it would be best if we organize such a seminar in our city as well – one that is aimed at “how to successfully start a business”. Not long after that we started working hard on the organization of the event, even though we didn’t have much experience in organizing such business seminars. We invited the student organization AIESEC Plovdiv to be our partners and they gladly accepted the idea, becoming a true part of our small team.
The first free seminar “First steps in business”
The first seminar from the series “First steps in the business world” took place on the 1st March 2014 in the rector’s building of the Plovdiv University “Paisii Hilendarski”. The event was attended by about 120 people, who barely fit in the crowded lecture hall and most of them stayed till its very end. Our expectations were definitely exceeded – we even had attendees from other towns and the feedback was more than positive.
The event was divided in 7 differentiated themes, concerning start-up companies, entrepreneurship, management, HR, marketing, finance and legal matters. Among the lectors there were: one of the stars from the first season of “Kartitsata (The Mole)” on TV7 and a creator of the fashion brand “Megz“ – Miglena Kakanasheva; the experienced web designer, founder of Idit Web and creator of web platforms like Impulse.bg, TopModel.bg and Yoo.bg – Georgi Angelov, and the executive manager of publishing house “Lettera” – Dimitar Dimitrov, who shared with the participants his vision about the role of the successful manager in a company.
http://mediacafe.bg/novini/prepriemachestvo/JCI-i-AIESEC-Pyrvata-krachka-e-naj-trudna-snimki-4868
The second edition of “First steps in business”
After the successful first edition in March (2014), we got our team together again and we decided to organized the second edition of “First steps in the business world” which took place on 29th November in the hall of the Technical University – Plovdiv. The initiator of the event was, again, JCI Plovdiv, and it was held with the support of AIESEC Plovdiv, ABLE, “Mladejki glas” (Youth’s Voice) association – Plovdiv, Technical University Sofia – Plovdiv branch and Entrepreneurship center – Plovdiv. This time the format was completely focused on the entrepreneur, the qualities he/she should possess, the birth of a successful idea, as well as the gathering of a good team.
Among the guest lectors were: the economist Georgi Stoev (Industry Watch) and the IT entrepreneur Georgi Grozdev (VisComp and NET365). There were also the creator of “Vanilla Kitchen”, Vanya Ivanova, and the co-founder of “pLOVEdiv“ Simeon Todorov. A special guest was the favorite from the first edition of the seminar – the graphic designer Georgi Angelov (Idit Web), who presented his newest project GoGo.bg.
What’s coming next?
After 2 successful events, our team is planning a third seminar in Plovdiv in March 2015, but this time each dilettante and visitor will have the opportunity to propose a lector or apply for such. We hope that this event will receive strong support from the participants in the future and that we will keep on filling the auditorias and keep inviting interesting and distinguished lectors, whose successes and failures we can all get inspiration and motivation.
For more information about the forthcoming seminars you can visit our official Facebook page „Първи стъпки в бизнеса“.
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