The Wingate project was initiated as the pandemic started, which became an extra challenge, but also a kickstart for online trainings and knowledge sharing between countries and communication with the target audiences. Kvinner in Business has the role of expertise partner, supporting the partners Hungary, Moldova, Romania and Serbia in the project, offering different services including speakers for events.

The main task is to support women to be successful in business and to make their wishes come true. It’s not just about supporting the women who already has started their own business. It also offers training to women who are currently employed, unemployed. thinking about how to start a business, how to be successful or how to grow existing business. However, the goal is to contribute to support innovative business, product and service establishment, or creating a new business model. In addition, the Wingate project is unique in offering training for those, who consider to invest in startups and women’s businesses as business angels. This will also contribute to a serious boost for the regions’ economic growth. If women acquire the skills needed to become an investor and become competitive in this area as well, a number of promising new businesses can be created this way that can achieve considerable success even when entering the international markets.

Donna Kastrati, representing KiB, shared her experiences regarding growing her business on the closing event in Budapest Hungary (before the project was formally extended).

The project has now been running for three years and here are some of the accomplishments:

  • A survey counting more than 1400 respondents. Key results:
    • Women want to develop both social/soft skills and specific professional knowledge.
    • Financial and management expertise were the most important factors, but “Thinking out of the box”, networking and possessing the right level of self-confidence and courage was considered important to obtain entrepreneurial success.
    • Barriers to start a business were the regulatory environment, constantly changing market conditions and precursory uncertainty.
  • 55 events with more than 1800 participants in four countries. Due to the pandemic and later the war Moldova has not hosted events.
  • 110 digital trainings dived into three areas: 1) How to start Your Business, 2) How to Grow your Business and 3) Business Angels. The training material consists of videos, presentations, quizzes and suggestions for additional learning.
  • An e-platform with information, articles and all the trainings- https://wingateproject.com/. All the users need to do is to sign up and they will get free access to all the materials.

 

All partners are enthusiastic and committed to provide a wide range of services to constantly grow the Wingate Community in the future. The project should have concluded in June, but we’re now proud to announce that the project is extended for five more moths. Our top priorities are:

  • Strengthen the platform with more content, better functionality and a more user-friendly interface. Recruiting users is also an important objective moving on.
  • Hosting exiting events in the four countries with strong speakers, also from Norway.
  • Involving more stakeholders and initiate broader cooperation in order to reach a larger share of the target audiences.

 

Project manager, Ágnes Puskás, and Norwegian ambassador in Hungary, Trina Skymoen, agree on the importance of the Wingate project.

If you have not already joined the Wingate platform, please do so.
We hope to see you there.

 

About the Wingate Project

The Wingate project is a collaboration between partners from Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Moldova and Norway. The goal is to create a green, competitive and inclusive entrepreneurial community in central and eastern Europe with guidance and networking for women who want to establish their own business or become investors. The project benefits from a €1,824,320 grant from Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway through the EEA and Norway Grants Fund for Regional Cooperation. From Kvinner in Business, Toril Flåskjer, Marit Silseth and Lotte Frost are associated with the project.