tools for learning and development of entrepreneurial competencies

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IV. EUROPEN NETWORK The global network of practice firms consists of more than 42 countries and thousands of such firms. The international network of practice firms is called Europen (used in Europe) and International PEN (used outside Europe). Since 1997, all national networks of business practice firms were linked through international EUROPEN / Pen international network that facilitates business transactions between firms in practice worldwide. International Network also promotes further development of the concept of globally business practice and creates a variety of training tools. Traditional trade with companies is an essential component of this concept, marketing firms practice interacting in a closed economy under specific and strict commercial principles. Figure 3. The Web page of EUROPEN network Advantages of deploying educational activities in practice firm: - The activity is organized by teams; - The work process is more important that the final result of the economic process and for this reason the bad results or incorrect decision are valuable for the student’s experience; all the situations can have more simulated solutions and from the didactical point of view a virtual company or practice firm with more problems are better for learning and understanding real-life situations; - The learning process is more structured; - The students have to take a greater responsibility; - In the practice firm, participation of each member must to be comparable and the volume of work must to be the same. 4.1 Business Strategy Games Business Strategy Games or game simulation is the most widely distributed and used computer game for the strategic management market and it is used in all business schools worldwide. An example of simulation using this product the authors present the sports shoe industry, which covers a significant geographic area and a market with a global character. Each company in the industry network is managed by a team of student-players that compete against other teams.
Participation in a simulated company also calls for most varied decisions. The company manages factories and players must do their work, commit workforce and ensure wages, monitor expenditure distribution and stock control, decide on capital expenditure, leading marketing and sales campaigns, have a proper site and present their company, make projections on sales revenue, taking into account exchange rate fluctuations, interest rates and stock market developments. Strategic options that companies are adopting have the most varied extensive and intensive nature. Depending on the end result, given the high or low profits, they may choose to change prices, higher quality services, choose a serial or limited production line, opt for an extensive network of sales or reduce costs on advertising. The market shares of each company are based on how it has considered each attribute of the product and the volume of competitive effort in the company's efforts comparing to competing firms. Demand conditions, prices and wage rates vary from one geographical area to another. All these issues are likely to create a stimulating environment for action and decision in a virtual business environment, as close to the actual real market action. Figure 4. Business strategy game Web page 4.2 Using modern technologies in the training firms’ activity Information and communication technologies (ICT) caused changes in all fields of society, including the educational process. Applications of ICT can’t be excluded from the activity of training firms. Since the creation or acquisition of a company, participants access the Web page at ROCT (Romanian Office for Training Companies) http://www.roct.ro/ to download information, procedures, registration form requested to continue the company's activities, other legal process, virtual settlements, organizing events and communicate with the Training Firms‘ Center. For networking with other training firms from Romania or abroad, participants use electronic communication. Applications and multimedia presentations can be a valuable marketing tool. To this aim, students use: • Multimedia applications to create presentations: PowerPoint, IrfanView; • Web technologies to create dynamic Web pages; • Applications to create catalogs of products, promotional brochures, advertising flyers, billboards: Microsoft Office Word, Publisher, Adobe Photoshop. To create a virtual store they use specialized software like Fshop4, Eshop-Fast, Web technologies like HTML, PHP and dedicated applications such as Microsoft FrontPage.
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Page 5: Differentiation criteria Accomplish

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