Southeast Europe Regional Capacity Building Workshop

In recent years impressive changes have been made to the corporate governance framework of Southeast European countries, nevertheless substantial challenges remain to be tackled due to the poor oversight of boards and the lack of director training capacity. Improving director professionalism is a key to implementing better corporate governance practices, improving corporate performance and attracting capital.

To help build director training capacity in the region; IFC Advisory Services for Southern Europe and the Global Corporate Governance Forum with the support of the European Confederation of Director Associations (ecoDa), organized a two-day regional workshop on “Setting up Sustainable Director Training Organizations” in Belgrade, Serbia on February 18 and 19, 2009 at the Zira Hotel. The workshop was designed for organizations that aim to set up or develop their director training capacity.

The regional workshop was based on the Forum’s Toolkit on Building Directors Training Organizations which can be downloaded from the Forum’s website:
www.gcgf.org/ifcext/cgf.nsf/Content/Toolkits

The objectives of the workshop were to:

• Walk the participants through the process of starting-up sustainable Institute providing quality training for directors and advocating good Corporate Governance.
• Provide the participants with a step by step approach and a variety of mechanisms that can help them achieve self-sufficiency through quality services.
• Offer information on targeting, attracting, and retaining members and marketing the services of the institute.
• Review approaches to director training and curricula development.

The participants at this workshop are from Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia, Bosnia & Herzegovina and Bulgaria.

The Private Sector Advisory Group (PSAG) members Mr. Patrick Zurstrassen, President of The Directors’ Office, Luxembourg and Mr. Olli Virtanen, Secretary General of the Finnish Association of Professional Board Members shared their knowledge and expertise during the workshop. Mr. Miles Templeman, Director General, The UK Institute of Directors, and Chairman of ecoDa also took part at the workshop. The experience of the Croatian and Slovenian Institutes of Directors was presented as well.

Please click here to see the agenda.

Presentations:

Day 1:
1. Director Training in Southeast Europe, Leonardo F. Peklar, Socius Consulting Inc.

2. Institutes of Directors and their Role: Lessons Learned from Luxembourg, Patrick Zurstrassen, The Directors Office, Luxembourg and Member of the IFC GCGF Private Sector Advisory Group

3. Key Milestones in Developing an Institute of Directors, Olli V. Virtanen, The Finnish Association of Professional Board Members and Member of the IFC GCGF Private Sector Advisory Group

4. Lessons Learned from Slovenia, Irena Prijović, Secretary General of the Slovene Association of Supervisory Board Member

5. The Role of ecoDa, Miles Templeman, Director General, The UK Institute of Directors, and Chairman of the European Confederation of Director Associations (ecoDa)

Day2:
1. Reaching out and Developing a Membership base, Leonardo F. Peklar, Socius Consulting Inc.

2. Lessons Learned from Croatia, Presentation by prof. Marijan Cingula, Chairman of the Croatian Association of Certified Members of Supervisory Boards

3. Lessons Learned from Finland, Olli V. Virtanen, The Finnish Association of Professional Board Members and Member of the IFC GCGF’s Private Sector Advisory Group

4. Participants Opinions

For speakers bio, please click here.

For more information on the SECA IOD workshop, please contact Marie-Laurence Guy @ mguy@ifc.org