Executive Agency, Education, Audiovisual and Culture 100 MIRRORS, Tools for the motivation of enterprising women

Transcription

1 Executive Agency, Education, Audiovisual and Culture 100 MIRRORS, Tools for the motivation of enterprising women LLP ES-ERASMUS-ECUE

2 Final Report Public Part / / 20

3 Project information Project acronym: Project title: Project number: Sub-programme or KA: Project website: 100 MIRRORS 100 MIRRORS, Tools for the motivation of enterprising women LLP ES-ERASMUS-ECUE ERASMUS MULTILATERAL PROJECTS Reporting period: From 01/10/2011 To 30/09/2013 Report version: Final Date of preparation: 10/11/2013 Beneficiary organisation: UNIVERSIDAD DE ZARAGOZA Project coordinator: MARÍA MERCEDES BAILLO FALO Project coordinator organisation: UNIVERSIDAD DE ZARAGOZA Project coordinator telephone number: Project coordinator address: This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein / / 20

4 2008 Copyright Education, Audiovisual & Culture Executive Agency. The document may be freely copied and distributed provided that no modifications are made, that the source is acknowledged and that this copyright notice is included / / 20

5 Executive Summary The Project 100Mirrors is conceived to provide a selection among 5 European countries of 100 enterprising women who can be used as model or mentor for others women who want to create their own project or to reinforce their creative and enterprising skills. But not only, public or private entities that provide advisory services to women and call for gender equality can use the resources listed on the project website. This project aims to improve the situation by developing a website, in which 100 women entrepreneurs in the participating countries talk in first person about their experiences, skills, abilities, limitations and difficulties they had to undertake, but also how they succeeded in improving their lives being a leader in different areas, trying to share with women the spirit of entrepreneurship and self-motivation. The project is leaded by the Faculty of Social Sciences and Labour of the University of Zaragoza (Spain), with more than 100 teachers and students. It is a leader in the area in training NGO professionals interested in knowing the tools necessary to have a background in gender, highly skilled to provide advice on equality public institutions, business, foundations, etc. INDICO, educational organisation specialized training in key competences skills, together with OMEGA, associations of entrepreneur s women, form the Spanish team. La Maison de l Initiative (FR), EDRA (GR) and B&D Center (PL provide advisory services to women to enhance entrepreneurial skills or open new businesses for social inclusion. Cre8Te (UK) is business development organization with the objective to create a strong link between students and working women. The approaches used to achieve final results have been: an analysis by country and sector of state of art about workplace of women, to identify sectors where the entrepreneur sample is more precise. Quality of website and contents has been tested with an online survey where end-users and stakeholders provided comments and suggestions for improvement. Besides, all the process has been monitoring for a group of representatives of end-users and stakeholders in each of the participant countries, Quality Control Boards, with regular meetings to provide an external and objective vision to the entire process. The major results of 100Mirrors project are: (1) two research reports (contents and technical) as a starting point to design and present common indicators on women entrepreneurs, a list of women candidates to present their entrepreneurial experience and to design and implement the website and its different tools. (2) 100 cards present 100 life stories of women with interesting information to other women and people seeking motivating examples. (3) 100 video interviews with 100 women to hear her story first hand. (4) a guide which analyzes, from a gender perspective, specific barriers that women have to face, specific skills to assist in that task or general advice when undertaking a business activity. (5) A project website where to find all the information and links to social networks. (6) Several reports (testing, evaluation and exploitation) to help in project development. (7) Dissemination materials as brochures in 5 languages with project aims and partner s information and Final Conference to present 100Mirrros project and its results. The 100Mirrors website, will be available online during the following years and partners will work to update the information contained to remain a reference. There it is possible find general information about project (aims, partnership, public results); updated news related to women and entrepreneurship, access to 100Mirrors Community and other social networks / / 20

6 Table of Contents 1. PROJECT OBJECTIVES PROJECT APPROACH PROJECT OUTCOMES & RESULTS PARTNERSHIPS PLANS FOR THE FUTURE CONTRIBUTION TO EU POLICIES PROJECT MEETINGS / / 20

7 1. Project Objectives Some of general objectives developed by 100 mirrors project are: - To contribute to equality between men and women. The project provides experiences of women entrepreneurs who have created their own businesses or projects and have developed their work in the business world so dominated by men. These experiences can be consulted in 100 cards and 100 interviews into the project website. - To promote entrepreneurial spirit in general and in particular targeted towards women and their specific needs. For this reason the Guide provided has two different parts; the first part (translated into all the languages of the partnership) analyzes the situation from the genre point of view, with specific advice for women. A second part of the guide provides general information for entrepreneurship in each of the partner countries. - To analyze specific needs in the field of women entrepreneurs and thereby contribute to the innovation process in higher education. The 100 mirrors project focus on social and transversal skills. - To connect different business women, associations of women entrepreneurs, vocational training centres and higher education institutions to create an excellent environment for the exchange of opinions and needs. These objectives were met through the development of a website as a learning tool for help women with entrepreneurial concerns perceiving difficultly to develop her action project. This website provides the ability to continuously share the experiences of women from different countries, highlighting the differences and similarities in management models, entrepreneur profiles, their experiences, skills, abilities, limitations and difficulties but also how they succeeded in improving their lives being a leader in different areas. The learning materials (cards) in five languages allow end users to have good examples of women entrepreneurs not only in their own countries but also in other countries of the partnership. 100 cards of entrepreneurship women are available by country, but also by economical sectors, allowing transversal and transnational consultation. This possibility enhances the benefits of end-user learning in a Europe where it is becoming easier, and sometimes even necessary, move to another country to grow up personally and professionally. Both, main target groups and stakeholders have had their representation in the project from the beginning through the Quality Boards Groups that each partner has organised in its country. Each board group integrates representatives from target group (representatives from organisations that work with target groups and local, regional or national authorities) and one representative from educational establishments. The quality board groups have provided first hand information on end-users necessities and preferences in the design of the 100 mirrors website and its contents. Partners have contacted over 100 women entrepreneurs who have had first hand experiences of life; direct message which in some cases goes directly to the heart of the users. When the first list of set indicators for women entrepreneur profile was draw, the quality groups received a questionnaire in order to evaluate it and validate it; some changes were / / 20

8 made according to the feed-back received. The same process was used to set the economical sectors where divide the 100 entrepreneurs examples, the list with women candidates by countries or the design of the website. Other challenges for QCB were the evaluation of the contents in all languages and suggestions for the implementation of the project website and the ability to get the message out to people looking to become enterprising or an entrepreneur. Finally, groups of end-users and QCB members have tested the full website learning tool for a time in order to test the efficacy of the product developed. Through an online questionnaire or in meetings, end users and QCB have transmitted their feedback to partners. These comments, suggestions and warnings have been analyzed and taken into account, whenever it has been possible, in improving the project page and therefore, educational content that are displayed in it. During the Final Conference held in Zaragoza (September 2013) partners had the direct involvement of public institutions who work daily in counseling or training to women, combining synergies and increasing the impact on end users of the project. The impact in the groups can be estimated as: - Improving the equality in the employment - Acting as education training resource for structures that support women entering the job market. - Improving the mentoring of women into businesses. - Supporting the development of entrepreneurship among women and disseminate good examples and practices that can inspire other active women - Supporting women in social inclusion to include an integration indicator for population in need and women entrepreneurs in the field geographical diversity of the project For dissemination and valorisation purpose all partners were immerse in the task of providing a contact list of entrepreneurial organisms, entrepreneur women associations, social agents (public and private) and educational institutions where distribute project information. Even today, with the project ended, partners are holding meetings with public institutions for wider dissemination and sustainability of the project and therefore the impact / / 20

9 2. Project Approach It is important to point out that the project is characterized by a general approach which it s the final usability of the final product. All the methodologies, technical fats and ways of proceeded they all pursue the real implementation of the final product into the target group. The 100 mirrors experiences in entrepreneur want to provoke the motivation of other women to turn in enterprising active person and to carry out her project and enterprising competences. The first approach adopted by the project was the research. The project started with an analysis, by country and sector, of the situation of women in the workplace to identify the sectors in which the entrepreneur sample was more precise. At one time the technical team did some research to find the best way to present the information, analyzing the different content management systems online where static and dynamic part can live together in a single tool. The results are two research reports, available on the project website, where analysis and conclusions can be found. During the implementation of research, important dissemination activities were carried out thanks to presentation of the project to women entrepreneurs. The partners contacted several institutions and women entrepreneurs association carrying information about the 100 mirrors project and encouraging women participation as examples. 126 cards with information of women entrepreneurs were collected by partners following indicators and profiles define in Contents Research Report. Later, partners selected 100 women whose life stories would provide "mirrors" where other women could be reflected. To develop those 100 stories of life partners developed a questionnaire with different questions completed by women selected. They were asked about their studies or careers, asked to talk about difficulties they had encountered throughout her life (economic, social, family...), who gave them support, some advices to share, etc They were also requested to describe themselves, selecting adjectives or assessing what competencies were more or less important in their normal working environment. All this information was analyzed and used by partners to develop the contents of the 100 cards, validated at the same time by the women, and the Guide. For the 100 women videos, partners developed a template with several questions to implement during the interview. Each interview is filmed in the women workplace to transmit their different backgrounds. Once the contents were available in different languages on the project website, partners started the testing process. The main objectives of this activity were: validate the content available on the website and the viability of the project website from different aspects as navigability, design, interactivity, etc. The approach used by partners for this activity has been to involve directly the target project group, stakeholders, teachers and trainers, advisers, websites experts and end-users. A common online survey was created and adopted by all partners. The survey has been translated into the different languages of the partnership and distributed through contact lists and personal contacts. Using the information obtained, each partner has developed a report which has been shared; conclusions and improvement tips have been drawn, some of them already implemented in the final products. In the early months of the project a strategy for the evaluation and monitoring of the project was established and approved between the partners. On one hand an internal evaluation has been made by the partners involved in the project. This internal evaluation focuses on practical matters such as the organization of international meetings or project management (tasks undertaken by the partners, understanding of objectives, target Group, etc.). For this / / 20

10 purpose partners used one questionnaire that partners completed after each transnational meeting. Data were analyzed by the partner responsible for project evaluation and shared with all project partners for continuous improvement in project implementation. On the other hand there was an external evaluation performed by Quality Members Group. All main products were revised by the quality control groups at different stages of the project, in each of the participant countries. Different questionnaires were developed for this purpose and complimented by quality members. General feedbacks were collected and an analyzed by the partner responsible for the evaluation and shared with partners in the transnational meetings. This external approach has allowed regular contact throughout the entire project with stakeholders and target group to ensure quality in the processes and products (providing end-user feedback on the necessities and characteristics of the product contents and technical needs) and to ensure the dissemination of the product into the target group during the testing and later for the exploitation of results and the search of distributors. Reports with all this information were developed as project results. The website learning tool facilitates learning contents following the mentoring training method. The mentoring often gives a relevant qualitative level of education in aspects that wont be dealt in formal education as personal skills or capacities related to the profile job. In order to meet the requirements of the specific Group of end users, the 100 mirrors website comprises the following characteristics: (1) it is available permanently, from any computer with access to internet is possible to consult all the information included into the website. (2) It is pleasant and user friendly; the information appears in digital format what does the consultation faster but the user can also print the contents of which will facilitate its use in different moments. (3) Individual learning; it has been proved that videos can be a learning tool immediate and widespread among Internet users. Users are attracted by the contents of the interview and can increase the information on that same woman. Thanks to programmed internal searches the website can display information about similar women in their own country (economical sectors) and even in other participating countries in the project. (4) The website is interactive thanks to social networks, the 100mirrors Community and links to existing social networks as Facebook, Twiter or LinkedIn. Social networks demand from the user more activity and offers active learning through exchange of experiences. The dissemination plan has also envisaged an active participation of all the partners in dissemination events such as seminars, workshops or conferences. The events envisaged are of different kinds, either related to the field of entrepreneurship, gender and training, and in general, the project partners are participating in dissemination activities according to their professional experience. Regional or national institutions in gender or enterprising, Associations of Entrepreneurs women, Educational organizations, etc In order to ensure sustainability of the project beyond the funding period, and because of the interest that the project has aroused in public or private institutions in the different partner countries, partners have created protocols to continue to update interesting news in the website, use available contents on training and consulting sessions or contact different professionals networks to perpetuate the use of the main results of the project / / 20

11 3. Project Outcomes & Results Although the project 100mirrors has over XX final products in these lines describe those most important or accessible to the general public. Research reports. Content research and state of heart in the partners countries respect to the gender distribution in all the economical sectors. A template is distributed among all the partners to guide the partners in their research in their own countries. A common template was also produced in order to present, in a similar way, entrepreneurial women candidates as examples for the project website. The draft profile of women entrepreneur and the main information to develop for each enterprising woman was sent to validation to the Quality Board groups. After a debate during the meeting in Krakow, partners drew the indicators for the 100 women mirror and structure for didactic contents. The technical research is a comparative study of existing content management system, social media and communication tools from a technical point of view. The report compares the advantages and disadvantages of using one or another technology for the implementation of the 100 projects website and its contents. The structure of the contents and the design of the website have also described and agreed by partners after a discussion in transnational and virtual meetings. Both the researches are published in the project website (project/products) can be downloaded for free. The project website ( The website is the most important tool for project promotional repercussion. For this reason the website offers information in 5 languages (EN, ES, FR, EL and PL) about the project, the partners, partners meetings, events and some dissemination material as brochures. On the other side, the website is the display for learning contents providing a didactic description of 100 actual entrepreneur women in the world (100 cards plus 100 interviews) and a guide for entrepreneurs adapted to participant countries, news related to Women and entrepreneurship from all partners countries, links to social networks and with the 100Mirrors Community (blog and social network) as a possibility for mentoring and networking. Cards and some chapters of the Guide are available in five European languages. Thereby, the project website facilitates learning contents following the mentoring training method. The mentoring often gives a relevant qualitative level of education in aspects that wont be dealt in formal education as personal skills or capacities related to the profile job. 100 mirrors project website / / 20

12 100 women (cards and interviews). The most important learning part of the website for the motivation of enterprising women providing examples of 100 women entrepreneurs that may be useful from the point of view of end users when undertaking entrepreneurial activity. In each women card, end users can find general information about the woman and her background, experiences positives and negatives through her entrepreneur action, analysis of competition and skills and advices for an enterprising life. Users can search examples of entrepreneur s women by partners countries (France, Greece, Poland, United Kingdom and Spain) or by 10 economical sectors (Agriculture & Livestock, Industry, Politics & Governments, Bank & Finances, Culture & Sport, Voluntary sector, Services, Legislation, Science & Research and Education). There is also the ability to search content for keywords (age, immigrant, young, etc.) within the website using an internal search engine. Each card has also an interview to that 100Mirror woman, also available in 100Mirrors YouTube Channel, in her original language. An example of 100 mirrors card on A guide with the adaptation of key competences to entrepreneurship and guidance professionals has been developed by partners. Useful information obtain directly from 100mirrors women together with an analysis of the reality of women at the time of taking up activities and generic national information when starting a business can be read in different chapters of this guide, a download for free from the 100Mirrors website/home page and Tools. The 100Mirrors Community has been created as an internal social network for persons registered on it. The login is the Home page of the website and provides a collaborative platform to improve networking and collaboration between enterprising women and those seeking to start their business. So far 32 persons are registered and the number is growing; this one is as working progress result that requires a long period of time to grow, increasing the number of users and the interaction between them. Some mentoring fruitful encounters between women entrepreneurs are already occurred and more who aspire to be. Products for dissemination purpose are the brochures, available on the website project/project/results in 5 languages (EN, ES, EL, FR and PL) and printed by partners for better dissemination in seminars and conferences. Dissemination is also done in social / / 20

13 100 MIRRORS, Tools for the motivation of enterprising women networks with the creation of a facebook page, google+ page, Twiter and LinkIn profile. In September 2013, partners organized a Final Conference where the project and main results where presented but also where women 100Mirrors of Spain, Poland and Greece, shared their experiences and life stories and other women entrepreneurs presented workshops on different themes. An exhibition with photographs and a brief biography of each of the selected women 100Mirrors, in Spanish and English, were exhibited. This exhibition was an important and valued aspect than allowed, in a simple and graphic way, summarize why these women have been chosen and show their faces. 100 mirrors brochure Other final products as Testing, Evaluation or Exploitation reports, not described in this chapter, have been very useful tools to achieve the final main results. Nowadays, the 100Mirrors website has more than different visitors and has been visited more than times; with 200 likes in Facebook page, the 100Mirrors interviews have been watched more than times. More than organizations, persons or entities have been contacted to provide project information and more than 40 have a direct link to 100Mirrors project in their websites / / 20

14 4. Partnerships Formal training providers, non-formal adult education providers, SMEs and cooperatives, universities, enterprises and NGOs are represented in the different institutions integrating the partnership. They provide different perspectives but share the same objective: create a useful multilingual tool to women as a sample from the European society in the economical working sectors. In that way, the close collaboration University Enterprise is guaranteed by the partnership itself. The European added value is secured to analyze the realities of women entrepreneurs in different social and labour situations and, in different European countries. Partners make this analysis from different cultural perspectives of the countries that form the consortium. From this point of view, the consortium gives an interesting sample of our societies: North West with Scotland, North East with Poland, South with Spain and Greece and also, France as one of the reference in social evolution for the women. The international character of the partnership is structured around different axis: the importance of entrepreneurship skills to develop the ability to turn ideas into action in the partners countries and contributing to equality between men and women in business sectors. The partner s expertise brings together the following skills: expertise in gender relations, expertise in training and consultancy for entrepreneurship for women, expertise in innovation methodologies for teaching, expertise in technical innovation and expertise in services to minority groups. The whole consortium of partners comprises different expertise as entrepreneurship trainers, employment and resources for women, women's business associations, innovation in vocational training and business development centres. Besides, the partner s expertise allows working together to Universities or educational organisations (Universidad de Zaragoza e INDICO), NGOs or associations of entrepreneur s women (La Maison de l Initiative, EDRA and OMEGA), advisers for professional insertion (B&D Center) and business development Cre8Tet) experts with the objective to create a strong link between students and working women. Most of the partners have previous experiences related to the field of European projects therefore the partnership is conscious of it strong points for the project success. The characteristic of the partnership were essential for the success of the project development, implementation and final exploitation. The promoter leaded the project as representative of the educational institutions and expert in Gender relations and Social economy. Partners have associated silent partners related to women entrepreneurs associations or stakeholders. At the same time, partners have created a Quality Control Board Group with representatives of all the groups involved direct or indirectly in the group of beneficiaries. More than 100 women entrepreneurs have been involved actively during the projects activities and huge number of them have been informed about projects results and invited to be part of 100Mirros Community as for example, local, regional or national institutions in all partner s countries, women corporations and organizations, universities or networks of Women. The Consortiums comprises 7 entities of different countries as Spain, France, Poland, Greece and United Kingdom and provides diversified organizations to disseminate the project and finally reach the target group. On the other hand, these organizations also provided a big amount of users of the product of the project. The universities, training consultancies and associations in their guidance department for women and disadvantaged group will provide relevant and targeted users: students, women, women entrepreneurs, / / 20

15 associations, educational institutions, training centres and employment counsellors. Each country has representation in several areas of knowledge necessary for the project accomplishment. In turn, all partners have been reinforced their own skills through participation in the project; in addition to expanding contacts, generate new services within their organizations or to create synergies for future projects at local, national or international level / / 20

16 5. Plans for the Future Once the 100 mirrors website learning tool has been tested and evaluated by the end-users and professionals, changes have been done so that the final version of the product is finalised in order to be officially exploited, using traditional broadcast channels and existing social networks to increase the number of visits in project website, members in the 100Mirrors Community and updating news in the website. Thanks to the dissemination activities carried out by all the partners during the contact list collection, the quality and testing processes, seminars and Final Conference there is a wide public interesting in using the 100 mirrors website learning tool in order to help establish and support policies of equality in the enterprising action. Contacts have been made during the last months of the project with various public institutions like the Aragon Institute of Women, Aragon Institute of Development, Regional service for professional equal opportunities in Toulouse, Ministry for Women's Rights in France or Ministry of Agricultures Development in Greece, Chambers of Commerce, women corporations and organizations, universities, Foundation for Entrepreneurship Development, Female Business Networks, etc for further collaboration in the future, disseminating the main results of 100mirrors project and ensuring their knowledge and use by beneficiaries of the project. During the second phase of the project, the dissemination strategy accelerated. One of the key factors promoting the valorisation of the project has been the piloting and testing of the website directly by the end-users, beneficiaries and experts in gender and/or entrepreneurs. It was very gratifying to see how the testers had the same perception of the website/tool as the partnership expectations with regards to its potential. During the last two transnational meetings of the project, partners have debated and agreed a strategy to maintain the free use of the 100 mirrors website learning tool once the project is end. The 100Mirrors website will be available once the project is over and contents, as news or Social Networks will be periodically updated by partners. Partners are still negotiating with various women s networks or national institutions to share the ongoing support. The partnership agrees that the website and its contents is to be used freely by each partner for their own training purposes. The project materials belong to the partnership as a whole and can be used independently of whom was the developer by all the partners. Partners have planned to use the outcomes of the project in their daily work. Courses about Gender & Entrepreneurship using the 100 mirrors experiences (cards and videos), the Guide to promote business start up services with female clients, references of women which are useful for giving advice in entrepreneurship, opportunity for networking and establishing contacts, etc The experience has been very positive for all partners and with the compromise of maintain 100mirrors spirit alive, partners are willing to work on other projects or activities where words like women and entrepreneurship go together / / 20

17 6. Contribution to EU policies The review of the Lisbon Strategy achievements and perspectives showed the need to focus two main priorities: Growth and Employment. Make Europe a more attractive place to invest and work; raise our capacity to growth through knowledge and innovation and create more and better jobs. Also, one of the Key competences for the life long learning explains the sense of initiative and entrepreneurship as the ability to turn ideas into action. It involves creativity, innovation and risk-taking, as well as the ability to plan and manage projects in order to achieve objectives. The individual is aware of the context of his/her work and is able to seize opportunities that arise. It is the foundation for acquiring more specific skills and knowledge needed by those establishing or contributing to social or commercial activity. This should include awareness of ethical values and promote good governance. This project wants to prove a real cooperation between the world of work and higher education areas, with the participation from both sides. The 100 mirrors project, by connecting associations of women entrepreneurs and businesswomen and a higher education institution, creates an excellent environment for the exchange of opinions and needs. The 100Mirrors project show in a direct way methods followed by women to start an entrepreneurship project, the difficulties encountered and their ratings on key competencies that should be. Providing experiences of women entrepreneurs who have created their own activity and have developed their job in a business world so dominated by men. Motivating and encouraging young women with the experiences of other women entrepreneurs so that those with entrepreneurial spirit have the tools to develop their idea and start their own activity. In this way to may increase the presence of women in the business world where the percentage of men is significantly higher than women. The tools developed by the 100 mirrors project are contributing to equality between men and women, following the main specific priorities in the Strategic Plan for Equal Opportunities In the second Axis of Economic Participation are: promote the employability, job quality and equity salaries for women; ensure equal opportunities between women and men and encourage actions of corporate social responsibility; promoting women's economic enterprise; analyze and measure the economic participation of women and men. In May 2013 the Erasmus Project 100Mirrors was presented in Sevres, France, at the Centre international d études pédagogiques during the European Conference of Bologna Experts Professional Integration and Employability as a good practice in the contribution to EU policies / / 20

18 7. Project meetings First project meeting in Zaragoza, November First working session Second project meeting in Krakow, April 2012, important decisions were taken in the meeting / / 20

19 Third project meeting in Athens, September 2012 Forth project meeting in Toulouse, April 2013 Fifth project meeting in Zaragoza, September 2013, project presentation during Final Conference / / 20

20