On Tuesday 7-th February we had a special guest. Natalia Chernyshova-Melnik – a professional journalist, editor and translator, Member of St.Petersburg and Leningradskyi region Journalist union. Among her main interests – the Russian history and some people who constitute its glory. Natalia wrote books about the great princes of the Romanov family.

We had a chance to listen to the facts about Mikhail and Konstantin Romanov, Sergey Dyagilev, which are not widely publicized or told about. Natalia’s animated speech caught everybody’s attention. It’s  always very exciting to listen to somebody really enthusiastic about what they are doing. Many of us plunged into the discussion of the Russian history for the whole evening afterwards.
 

Here are the links to Natalia’s books, where from you can get lots of valuable information about her characters:

http://www.ozon.ru/context/detail/id/4083788/
http://www.labirint.ru/books/194816/
http://gvardiya.ru/shop/books/zh_z_l/520

20-th December 2011

If you think that starting business in Russia is difficult, just compare it with the situation abroad. To succeed, of course, it’s most important to understand what kind of business you are going to do, why your product or service would appeal to the customers.

You might think that a prosperous business should satisfy every customer, but why not to focus on a narrow group of people who would be happy with what you provide to them? And, most of all, who would be loyal to you?

Being in small business is challenging but rewarding. It’s a great opportunity for self-development because you are involved with various functions at the same time. As well as for collecting direct feedback being in constant contact with your customer gradually developing the sense of your market.

Stan Jacox, an experienced American entrepreneur, shared his viewpoints on having a small business. Afterwards the participants discussed their business ideas and the market feasibility of these ideas. Stan gave his comments and recommendations on how these ideas could be developed and improved.

Before starting your small business consider the following issues:

• Find a need that is known to the market but not filled
• Assess your personal skills
• Assess negative indicators for your business
• Decide on how to rationally deal with routine functions
• Determine what business you are in, think of the emotional part of your offer
• Find out what customer problem you are solving
• Define who are your customers
• Get involved with your industry
• Form cooperative relationships with suppliers, competitors, special interest groups, etc.
• Keep the organization simple
• Find your niche on the market

Having considered these issues you raise your chances to become successful to a great extent.

Stealing

What are you thinking about when you take a pen or other stationery from your workplace for your personal use?
Borrowing, getting even, stealing, how can this be called? How to make a company, country, society, our world in general, a safer place? This kind of controversial, ethical questions we tried to give an answer and elaborate on at the meeting on Tuesday 6 Dec with our guest-speaker Lisette Breukink, a Dutch business lady.

We don't usually discuss the question of stealing and anti-theft systems in reference to business and our society. This is why it was even more challenging and exciting to produce some insights on the topic.

Did you know that according to general statistics it's mostly about the inner damage from the staff that companies get, then different kinds of robbery from the outside? Or, for example, that people don't hesitate to take (borrow/steal) a can of Coke from their fridge in the student house but won't do the same with a dollar note, because there are more clear agreements about money than about taking a drink from your pal?

It's obvious that we had little time to get deeper in the topic, but our discussion definitely made us think and re-estimate the ethics about stealing we face almost every day. Next year we are looking forward to get back to this phenomenon, reveal new interesting points, uncover pitfalls and produce more insights.

We welcome your feedback in our group www.vkontakte.ru/encc_ru

Recommended literature:

The future of work. Tom Malone
Predictably irrational. Dan Ariely

Gutenberg vs. Zuckerberg era

It is easy to notice that the reality (even better to say "virtuality") we live in has dramatically changed in the last decade. As any change, this brought drawbacks as well as benefits.

Sergey Mitrofanov, (specialty: marketing, sales, starting new companies and business development in Russia; currently CEO Brandflight Moscow, a board member of the Medinge group) shared with us his viewpoint on the changes happening in the way the information flows nowadays, taking into account the development of IT technologies, social media andvarious gadgets.

Thanks to Sergey we generated many ideas on advantages and disadvantages of living in this new age for different stakeholder groups, such as Business, Media and Family. You can have a look at the brief overview of our discussion here . You are welcome to elaborate further on the topic in our group www.vkontakte.ru/encc_ru

And here is the presentation to boost your idea-generating process

We are looking forward to your feedback, be active:)

Polina

PR: myths and reality

On 8-th November we had a chance to plunge into the world of PR and communications and to feel what’s it like to be a PR manager.

The guest-speaker, Natalia Penkina, a consultant and business coach with 10-year experience in communications, promotion and branding, gave a presentation on what PR is and what are the daily tasks of a PR manager.

After such an energetic start we split into small teams to solve business cases carefully prepared by Natalia. Somebody might have faced such task for the first time but every team managed to deliver an interesting presentation of the solution they proposed. The teams were able to consult with Natalia during their preparation as well as get at the end a structured feedback on the efficiency and effectiveness of their solution.

In one of the books on PR (100% PR (Gorkina, Mamontov, Mann) -recommend reading it) I came across a concise definition: "PR is to inform, educate and be trusted". Such functions imply that doing PR is a responsible task, it’s difficult to overestimate the power of communications. During our discussion we also raised the question of ethics which makes one appreciate the complexity of a PR –manager’s work even more.

Well-organised, smooth communications is the basis of successful and enjoyable life. Whether you are an entrepreneur, salesman, PR/ HR/ marketing manager or any other type of manager, or a technical specialist, you’ll find a chance to use some of your PR skills.

Already got hooked on PR topic? You can get more information from Natalia (www.NataliaPenkina.com).

We are also eager to hear your feedback on the meeting. If you have some thoughts you’d like to share, please, send us a message encc.ru@gmail.com or post it in our group vkontakte.ru/encc_ru.

Recommended films on the topic:
• Gerry McGuire
• Wag the dog
• Absolute power (series)

Polina