This is a short document we have compiled with our project partners in order to present briefly some “Success Quotes“ that are stemming from our work with NEETs in our countries.
It is divided in two sections: the first describing briefly selected “success stories” as our NEETs present them; the second, offers a different dimension of “success” which relates to the opportunities that the trust based partnership approach – the core idea that our project builds upon – offered to our PPs to develop meaningful interventions and increase their outreach territorially and within new sub-group of NEETs.
(Kindly note that, we work to improve our reporting on this qualitative developments – see for instance the additional document in which Micro offers a more detailed description of what is briefly “quoted” in section 2 here).
Success stories
ANKA:
Panagiotis Demis is an IT University graduate, coming from Argos a town in Southern Greece. He participated in the JavaScript programming language training program delivered by the Development Agency of Karditsa (ANKA), under “Young Entrepreneurs Succeed” project; then he benefitted by the personalized coaching service for employment seekers, designed by ANKA especially for NEETs participating in the project. Through this service, Panagiotis developed an integrated employment action plan.
Following the plan, Panagiotis was hired in a large software firm specialized in banking sector, fulfilling his initial ambition: To start a career in the software development.
For more see Panagiotis’ interview here: https://youngentrepreneurssucceed.com/story/panagiotis-demis/
Autoocupació:
Autoocupacio travels us to the story of Aida Ferrers, who very vividly describes how she benefited from her collaboration to the project. Her collaboration with Auto brought clarity and realism to her ideas, taught her how to value strengths and “neutralize” weaknesses, and drove her to start-up her sweet “enjoy desserts” project. Aida’s story is a valuable paradigm of how “success stories” can encourage NEETs to reach out to such support services; as aida puts it “no one should take this path alone”!
For more on Aida’s story see here: https://youngentrepreneurssucceed.com/story/aida-ferrers/
Microfinanza:
Microfinanza introduces us to Michela Tondelli, from Parma Italy, a very committed person, with a deep passion about communication, social media and marketing.
Michela has been supported by Microfinanza in a personalized coaching and mentoring path, targeted to strenghten her hard and soft skills, and providing her with the instruments to approach in a more efficient and effective way the labour market.
Michela was a NEET. With her mentor, she analyzed several options for her career, and found a vocational training to attend in order to keep on learning.
For more on Michela’s story see here: https://youngentrepreneurssucceed.com/story/michela-tondelli/
YBP
Piotrek and Oskar walks us through their experience and collaboration with YBP, which helped them “to turn a chaotic idea to a structured plan”. Their work with our partner organization made them understand that they are not alone in a world full of challenges, and how they can benefit in order to know what to focus on, and see their future plan and activities under new perspectives. Piotr and Oscar prove in practice that with the proper support, the creativity of young people has indeed no limits.
For more on their story see here: https://youngentrepreneurssucceed.com/story/piotrek-sus-oskar-kwitek/
Update on selected Trust-based Partnership Model developments:
ANKA discusses briefly the multi-faceted impact their TbPM offered to adjust to the new realities and increase their outreach both territorially as well as to new and vulnerable sub-groups of NEETs:
As regards the TbPM development, ANKA responded to the COVID-19 crisis three-way: By transferring services online- by expanding to the main urban centers of Greece- by expanding to new target groups of NEETs. Through this approach, a brand-new online mentoring service has been introduced. Specifically, collaborating with the partners of our TbPM we accessed mentors all over Greece, ready to provide mentoring support to NEETs. In total, 27 new mentors have been engaged during this period, building a new mentors’ community in the Greek context. Moreover, the constant increase of the NEETs refugees highlighted the need for employment/entrepreneurship services towards this target-group. Through the TbPM, ANKA is ready to access NEETs refugees and support their integration in the Greek labour market and society. To conclude, the TbPM approach proves to be a valuable tool to engage new partners, access new target groups and offer new services to the NEETs populations.
Implemented by: ANKA
Autoocupacio focuses in its description to the opportunities their TbPM offered to build and sustain a wide network aiming at tackling challenges of their NEETs in the region:
The trust based partnership model, implemented within the Young Entrepreneurs Succeed project and funded by the EEA & Norway Grants Youth Employment Fund, has enabled Autoocupació to lead a collective impact initiative, by engaging public and private actors, such as the regional government, a local network of 50 city councils, big corporates and more than 400 volunteers, to work together, and also develop and scale an integrated services portfolio in order to both support undeserved young entrepreneurs and create sustainable businesses and jobs all over the region.
Implemented by: Autoocupacio
Microfinanza on the other hand, opted for a brief presentation of the potential their TbPM has proved to have in addressing the needs of NEETs and explain how and why they intend to expand it in their future steps:
Starting from all the lessons learned, there is the need to broaden the partnership, to expand in different regions, and exploit synergies with national programmes, and other entities. We are gathering positive feedback in terms of proactivity, self-efficacy, and jobs found. Still, there is so much to be done. Different regions and beneficiaries display different needs and deserve different services. That’s key to widen the extent, and deepen the analysis and assessment of territorial features, to come up with a more and more efficient and effective model.
Implemented by: Microfinanza
Finally, Youth Business Poland sheds light to the importance of trans-national cooperation between implementation and expertise partners, which boosted their capacity to increase their territorial expansion as well as to enhance the mix of services offered to their NEET groups:
Participation in the project and the development of our TbP model supported our activities and our service offers to our NEET group. Thanks to participation in the programme, we succeeded in reaching NEETs, who benefit from workshops and e-learning. We contributed training and workshops to people who mostly (90%) were from the Mazovian regions. Currently, over 60% of people are from other regions. We have set numerous partnerships with employment offices and organizations supporting entrepreneurs. Thanks to this, we can provide support for young people entering the labour market as employees or self-employed. A significant role of the TbP model was the combination of mentorship, financing and cross-sector cooperation. Critical for its success and further improvement is the support of partners from other countries.
Implemented by: Youth Business Poland
