At the 5th Women's Entrepreneurship Conference, organised by members of the Regional Council of Entrepreneurial Women and Female Entrepreneurs operating within ŠGZ and with substantial support from the Štajerska Chamber of Commerce, an important topic was highlighted that is not discussed much in our business world. The conference highlighted the ups and downs that are an integral part of business success. Failure is not a tragedy and should not lead to thoughts of personal incompetence, they wrote in the conference invitation. "Women, who are already less courageous in choosing the entrepreneurial path, are even more afraid of failure and take it even more tragically," they further wrote in the substantive starting points and highlighted the importance of perseverance, resilience and self-confidence, without which it is impossible to be successful in the business world. The support of the social environment, cooperation and networking are also important. It is important that we do not condemn a female entrepreneur who has once "slipped", but support and encourage her to start anew. Can we do that? Can we say – you did not succeed once, but next time you will?
The main theme of the conference attracted a record number of entrepreneurial women and female entrepreneurs, over 200 participants and over 40 exhibitors. The Women's Entrepreneurship Conference is not just a conference in the classical sense of the word, as it is traditionally accompanied by individually conducted conversations with individuals who openly talk about their life story and experiences, as well as a trade fair event where female entrepreneurs present and offer their products and services for business cooperation. The conference workshop also discussed tools for good trade fair presentation, and this year's novelty included so-called B2B short business meetings with female entrepreneurs from neighbouring Austria. This year's conference was indeed the first truly international one, with Štajerska female entrepreneurs being joined by female entrepreneurs from Austria who are participating in the cross-border RegioWin project within the Interreg SI-AT programme, and it was held in cooperation with SPIRIT Slovenia.
The opening speaker at this year's conference was certainly an entrepreneurial woman who proves with her life story that it is possible to overcome many obstacles with inner energy. Viktorija Potočnik, politician, member of parliament, mayor of Ljubljana, today director of Pionirski dom, spoke openly about obstacles as well as prejudices and stereotypes that constantly accompany and hinder us. Three other Slovenian female entrepreneurs also presented their stories and spoke openly about the problems that accompanied them through life: Alenka Iskra, director of the social enterprise Kooperativa Dame, Katja Šilec, director of Avtohiša Petovia Avto, mag. Romana Fišer, director of Marifarm, and three female entrepreneurs from Austria: mag. Martina M. Linzer, GS gain&sustain, Regina Rauch – Krainer, director of TLS Reisekultur, mag. Angela Picej-Müller, director of APM Hausverwaltungs Service.
The opening address was given by mag. Aleksandra Podgornik, director of ŠGZ, and mag. Vida Perko, principal of Academia Institute of Technology Maribor and president of the Regional Council of Business Women and Female Entrepreneurs.
The attendees were also greeted by the representative of the Directorate for Internationalisation, Entrepreneurship and Technology at MGRT, Mr Jernej Tovšak.
Source: Academia (24. 10. 2017). Fotografije: arhiv Academie.
This English summary was produced automatically from the Slovenian report and is pending editorial review. Slovenska različica