PIVARA SKOPJE’S EDUCATIONAL CENTER & ITS YOUTH DEVELOPMENT ROLE

Great companies manage to operate in challenging environments by knowing how to make the best of every occasion and opportunity. Their success is based on promoting an organizational mindset of turning threats into opportunities and solutions. A company’s success is complete only when it gets something in return. In Pivara Skopje, for over 90 years we are sharing our success with our community and we continually invest in shaping a better future.

One of the best practices of Pivara Skopje related to community engagement is our Educational Center. The Center was established back in 1997 and it has continued to grow and develop for 18 consecutive years. Over the years, its role and scope have also evolved.

The establishment of the Center was led by the internal needs of the company for developing our employees’ skills in different areas. Many of today’s managers at different leadership layers in Pivara Skopje have undergone through various development programs run by this Center. For each newly hired employee, it was also important to go through an induction program run by the Center for infusing basic business skills for a couple of months  and to get a relevant intro about Pivara’s business. Back in 2001, I was one of those newly hired employees, when Pivara had me at hello. The induction program was an amazing opportunity for a fresh starter like me to get acquainted with Pivara’s story, to learn about the key functions in the organization and to start practicing project management, communication and organizational skills.

In time, the Educational Center also opened its capacities to external audience. Some of the external participants were identified as potential talents and were later on recruited by Pivara Skopje.

Today, our Educational center is a member of the European Council for Business Education with headquarters in Genève. The main objective of the Educational Center is to ensure our community engagement through providing key managerial skills for the external audience while the internal development needs for Pivara Skopje’s employees are now covered by other functions like the Human Resources and Commercial Capability.

In order to provide the best possible youth development services, our Educational center partners for 18 years with Motiva, a highly professional and competent company for business education. The activity of the Educational Center is channeled through a training program, called “Training for Young Managers,” designed for young people willing to develop their managerial skills. One round of the program usually takes around 2 months. In fact, the program helps unemployed overcome barriers to employment. It also aims at assisting freshly recruited people by other employers in the country to develop and to adapt fast and effectively to their business environments. This is done by providing a business access, entrepreneurial skills, and basic financial literacy to all of them. The training also instills confidence, self-worth and provides connections with relevant mentors. Based on this training program, we encourage entrepreneurial culture in the country and we empower youth to take the future into their own hands.

The results of the activity of our Educational Center resonate perfectly with its objectives.

• Till present day, >3.500 young people have turned uncertainty into positive belief and completed the program with inspiration and hopes for better future;
• The Educational Center contributes to decreasing unemployment rate: out of the 3.500, >80% of the participants are now employed;
• Based on the program, we help unleash entrepreneurial potential of women. More than 2/3 of the participants in this program are women;
• We provide to children w/o parents reasons to believe. Till now, we have had more than 300 participants coming from the Association of Children Without Parents (non-paying category);
• The best students from the Faculties of Economics and Mechanical Engineering at the State University and AISEC members are also a non-paying category;
• Remaining participants pay only a symbolic participation fee. The rest is funded by Pivara Skopje;
• We execute annual programs for our Key Customers to provide them with free of charge participation in the program for their employees (aimed at developing business skills with focus on communications and sales);
• The program has inspired app. 4% of the participants to start up own businesses which they successfully manage today;
• We inspire our leaders to volunteer through lecturing. Top managers from Pivara Skopje are continually involved in deliver lectures on volunteering basis;
• The Center has developed a strong network of experts and partnerships to deliver the program – in addition to our consistent and continual partnership with Motiva, we have managed to establish partnership relations with other entities, like the Association for Children Without Parents, the State University, specifically the Faculty of Economics and the Faculty for Mechanical Engineering, as well as the student organization AISEC;
• We support the development of strong, active and competent leaders that our country requires. We invite the most distinguished lecturers from media, different faculties, leading representatives of the business, ambassadors and other diplomatic representatives, representatives of different governmental bodies and ministries and other Institutions to give their lectures.

In 2011, Pivara Skopje’s Educational Center won the highest national award in the area of community trust: “Investing in the Community Award” for the project ”Training for Young Managers”, in a competition of 59 projects submitted by the most successful companies in the country. This award was co-financed by the European Union and implemented by the Ministry of Economy in partnership with the Macedonian Development Foundation, the Macedonian Chamber of Commerce and the “Connect” Association.

In Pivara Skopje, we continually strive to change the world for the better. One person at a time, we make a difference.