The FINANCIAL — Sliced political and economical relations with Russia opened a new window to Georgia in European and US markets. Stimulated with international relations Georgia began preparing for a new Euro-Atlantic space. The first behaviour rules to business companies were given by the School of Economics of Ilia Chavchavadze Tbilisi State University with the partnership of consulting company SAI GLOBAL and the Education and Economic Development Project of the University of Limerick (Ireland).
The project under the name “Business and New Challenges – Economic Development in Accelerated Integration Conditions” includes two basic links: the first is helping Georgian small and medium size companies find new markets and the other one, sharing skills of acting and retaining businesses during post-war time.
“The idea was born because of the situation which took place in Georgia several weeks ago. Two tendencies have emerged at the post-conflict stage: the first is a final refusal to consider the Russian market perspective and the other one – new chances to aspire towards stable western markets under the new circumstances of possible integration of Georgia into a democratic world. We decided to train the representatives of ongoing and start-up business in order to freely adapt to these circumstances. The training program includes topics relating to the management practice of companies. It aims at the rapid and smooth transition of companies to European and American management standards,” Gigi Tevzadze, Rector of Ilia Chavchavadze Tbilisi State University told The FINANCIAL.
According to Prof. Dimitri Japaridze, Director of the Business School of Ilia Chavchavadze State University, “In wartime most of the business people were sceptical about continuing work as usual. We decided to make some inquiries and to act according to respondents’ answers. Most of the companies felt isolated and were trying to make decisions individually. During the first days there was a weak echo from the international community and we couldn’t tolerate the increase in scepticism. Soon, after the isolation stopped, we saw that Western countries would render enormous support and western markets provide liberal trade mechanisms for Georgian goods and services.”
Speeding-up the integration process, which opens new horizons for business, offers supplementary opportunity on one hand, and on the other, appeals for high quality, corresponding to fundamental requirements of international markets.
“The results of our research are revealing the readiness of companies to improve the quality and standards of their strategic and operational managements, their attempts in obtaining adequate information about the latest trends on global markets,” Dimitri Japaridze added.
Ilia Chavchavadze State University has a long history of collaborating with consulting company SAI Global and University of Limerick.
SAI Global, the world wide consulting company, has been working in Georgia for three years. The dominant course of its work is: basing the system of international standards management and certification.
“We present the worldwide organization IQNENT and have already certificated about 40 companies with ISO certificates. One of our main jobs is preparing staff. The ruling standards won’t be fulfilled in organizations without comfortable qualifications,” Mikheil Batiashvili, international expert of consulting company, SAI Global, announced.
Advice from the professors of Limerick University is much valued, as Ireland is one of the best examples of a country which overcame a serious crisis in a short period of time.
“Proceeding from their history, Ireland has special experience of planning and developing business and can teach us much. It was a poor country which turned into a rich one in a very short time. Ireland, especially the Shannon region, can be considered a success story for the whole world. Most important is that they focus their attention on a micro level,” Dimitri Japaridze declared.
Different companies responded to the voluntary initiation of the academic sector: trade, construction, service, and media companies. Ten companies are presented in the first group.
“Small companies are not improved much. We can say that they are still at an embryonic stage. The last three-four years were a period of reformation of the economic system. A lot of work was done on the macro level and during this time, no special accent was put on small business. About 65-70% of national production comes from large business,” Dimitri Japaridze stated.
The first lecture for representatives of small business was devoted to risk management.
“The cases we discuss in lectures are connected with crisis management. With direct connection of our company, it comes from ruling standards, including the ruling system, or how we must rule staff, organize sales and so on. All these standards spread in international theory and written on paper must be removed in practice. Our company is oriented on practical work. This is our dominant direction. At seminars we discuss the concrete examples of ruling risks, so companies can prevail against their own risks in the future. Managing risks is a process with its private rules of identification, estimation and collaboration of insurance plans. We didn’t mean to give them concrete advice, only skills of competence for dominating their own risks. We teach them to base the management of ruling risks in their own companies, which is common in the world economy and is the best way of recovering from a crisis situation. These methods are successfully utilized not only in the business sector, but also in the military, state and energy sectors,” Mikheil Batiashvili reported.
The theory of business behaviour in a crisis situation is taken from foreign countries’ experiences. Maybe Georgian companies only have experience of doing business in a peaceful environment; they don’t have any experience of doing business in a conflict or post-conflict period.
“Post-conflict management advice is not typical for Georgian consulting companies. They didn’t have such experience. And our exposure which we share with companies is taken from the examples of Western countries. SAI Global is doing advice for both Western and Georgian cases on how to develop business in a time of crisis. Georgian business has never been as developed as it was before the conflict period. Today there are lots of healthy, competitive companies which are functioning on international management standards. At the present moment in Georgia we are assisting not only native companies but also international brands,” Batiashvili reveals.
In a pre Euro-Atlantic way SAI Global is already planning to make provision for staff being in demand on the world market.
“Foreseeing our current market’s demands, we already planned to carry out special courses connected with professions which have become more and more demanded in Georgia. For example: the sales specialist, director of a factory, purchase specialist. There is no education place where men can get skills in for these specific positions. Some organizations have joined and started work on this project. The demands of the above mentioned activities made it obvious that we must think of mobilization of our work team fluently. Integration in European space will increase demand on high qualified staff as well as on organizations. Because European integration doesn’t mean that someone will do your work and carry you. We had a lot to do. Especially when we talk about introduction of our services and products on the European market, there are such sharply formatted rules in the business sector that any company not able to keep up with modern tendencies won’t survive. Our initiative is oriented at getting free support to every company, be it private, commercial or state,” Mikheil Batiashvili added.
The support of Georgian micro sector companies won’t stop after this project. The initiators are already thinking of getting consulting support to small business in the regions, which will also be provided for free.
Dimitri Japaridze: “For the support of regional business a great job was done by donor organizations. At first we’ll try to make if with our own resources and if we do not find ourselves in a position to completely satisfy the demand, then we’ll have to ask for donors’ help. Actually we’re not in an environment to just focus on our corporate gain, we’d rather concentrate our efforts on broader issues that meet the requirements of small and medium size companies in a post conflict period.”
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