Entrepreneurship around the world creats jobs. Joining forces across cultures and disciplines further enhances the success in the development and implementation of business ideas. This study week came into being after having built a team, which shared the vision of such an intercultural entrepreneurship-week. 13 startup-teams from North Macedonia connected with 23 teams of Swiss master-students, majoring in “business development and promotion”. It was the goal to maximize the input and output regarding each business case. At the end of the week, Saturday May 11 afternoon, each team presented their tangible uplift- and implementation-plan, based on this joint week – and hence, the output was awesome. At the beginning of this week, the startups did not quite imagine what the potential impact of such a week could be. However, some startups stated, that the students were pushing them out of their comfort-zone – and this for the good. Both nations benefited from the cross-cultural collaborations – the Swiss better learned how to improvise – and the Macedonians learned about Swiss habits. The implementation plan was the key-output of the week. Each startup got a clear and sharp timeline about the what, how and when. This roadmap was discussed and reflected in each team. During and after the final presentations at the end of the weeks, the good vibrations could be felt – good in the sense of “wow – let’s catch the momentum and do it”. In any case this week has been a true win-win for all of those who were involved – thank you to all of the colleges in Skopje who helped making this a success.

Please check KAPITAL, for more information about the participating startups.