On 30-31 May, training providers, policymakers and ETF experts celebrated good practices in training for SME internationalization, culminating in the ETF’s 2018 good practice awards ceremony in Chieri (Turin). Focused on identifying excellence in training to support SMEs to internationalise, seven training programmes were selected from a long list following an open call and a series of intensive peer reviews by SME training experts.
Presenting the awards, ETF Director Cesare Onestini congratulated the training providers for competing in the good practice call, underlining that their support to SMEs was critical to the wider drive for innovative, competitive, job-generating economies.
The awards’ ceremony followed a lively exchange between policymakers, training providers and business support organisations and European Enterprise Network, as to how the policy world stands to benefit from access to good practice. Policymakers, included national coordinators for the Small Business Act from Egypt, Georgia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turkey and Moldova, included experts from the European Commission, the European External Action Service, the EU SME Agency and OECD.
A good practice marketplace allowed policymakers to get first-hand knowledge from the each of the training providers on their work which ranged from introductory training for SMEs, to mentoring services for export managers to intensive training to sector-specific SMEs keen on exporting to the EU single market. See below:
| Country |
Training provider |
Training programme |
| ALB |
Köstinger Consulting and SME Albania |
SME Summer Academy 2017 |
| BEL |
Chamber of Commerce, Antwerp |
EU market access (agri-food) |
| ITA |
New International Business Institute |
Business Focus Europe |
| TR |
Istanbul Apparel Exporters’ Association |
Market Oriented Design Model for Istanbul Lingerie Cluster |
| TR |
Zobu Consulting |
Ex-Point (Export Mentoring Programme) |
| TR |
Izmir Chamber of Commerce |
The Footwear Design Workshop |
| IRL |
Optimum Results |
MAGNA SME Line and Middle Management Training |
ETF Good Practice in Training Laureates 2018.
The good practice marketplace allowed for policymakers to identify the training programme which most impressed them with the ‘ETF Policymakers Choice Award‘ going to the 2017 Summer Academy for SMEs (SME Albania and Koestinger Consulting).
ETF supports the European Commission with assessments of the Small Business Act in the EU’s pre-accession region, Eastern Partnership and Southern Neighbourhood regions. This includes identification, quality assurance and dissemination of good practices. The good practice peer reviews were set against the ETF Good Practice in Training Scorecard which addresses training needs analysis, training design and delivery, quality of trainers, monitoring and evaluation, as well as dissemination.
Source: The European Training Foundation (ETF)
