DiSPLAY - Digital Serious Play for Youth Business Ideas Development

Timespan: 01/01/2023 – 31/12/2024

Call:Erasmus+ (KA2 – Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices – Capacity Building in the field of Youth)

Donor:European Union / ERASMUS+ Programme

Applicant:Fifty-Fifty (Greece)

Tags2023, display, entrepreneurship, intercultural dialogue, LDA Mostar, youth, youthengagement

DiSPLAY - Digital Serious Play for Youth Business Ideas Development

Name: DiSPLAY – Digital Serious Play for Youth Business Ideas Development

Timespan: 01/01/2023 – 31/12/2024

Donor: European Union / ERASMUS+ Programme

Call: ERASMUS-YOUTH-2022-CB

Budget: 375.050,00 EUR

Applicant: Fifty-Fifty(Greece)

Partners: LDA Mostar (Bosnia and Herzegovina), CYA – Capital Youth Association Liechtenstein (Liechtenstein), Marketing Gate (North Macedonia), LDA Kosovo (Kosovo), Association for Social Economy and Lifelong Learning – ASEL RO (Romania), entar za podršku lokalnog i regionalnog razvoja- CEP (Montenegro), Economic Intelligence Center- EIC (Albania).

Description: The level of youth unemployment is alarmingly high in the several EU Member States, with rates of over 50% recorded in many EU Member States from 2019 until today. Considering the potential of entrepreneurs to create employment and sustainable growth, promoting youth entrepreneurship, and making Europe more entrepreneur #friendly has recently become a priority on the EU policy agenda. However, research has shown that among young people the wish to become an entrepreneur, and their assessment of its feasibility, is lower in EU Member States than in comparable and emerging economies. DiSPLAY is looking to introduce a new methodology for evaluating and testing youth business ideas; the use of digital LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®. These innovative means offers a series of methods & tools to help future youth entrepreneurs to evaluate and develop an idea. Using digital LEGO® bricks, CANVAS, design, critical thinking and other tools, youth will follow a procedure enabling them to better know themselves and their teams and to develop an entrepreneurship project. With core element the digital transformation, the project supports the purposeful use of digital technologies and serious plays in youth business ideas development.

Aims of the project: DiSPLAY aims at motivating youth to stimulate their social entrepreneurship, creativity, innovation & transversal skills. Through the promotion of intercultural dialogue, DiSPLAY encourage an open and respectful exchange of views on youth entrepreneurship between individuals and groups involved who come from different cultures and foresees a deeper understanding of the different perceptions.

The overall aim of this project is to open employability opportunities and build up the entrepreneurial capacities of youth and youth workers from Europe, third countries associated with the Programme and Western Balkans that are required with innovative tools, resilient management & a solid sense of their ethical boundaries.

The project’s main aims are:

Monetization of digital assets for a business organization in EU, third countries associated to the Programme and Western Balkans.
Strategic overview for deployment of new technology within a business.
New opportunities for fan engagement brought on by the digital era.
Forecast and evaluate new digital trends in the business ecosystem.
Strengthen integrity- and values-based in the EU.
Strengthen the recovery and the crisis resilience of the entrepreneurship sector during and in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Support a sustainable and evidence-based policy.
Ensure, through cross-sectoral cooperation, the awareness of other EU policy domains of the important contribution that youth entrepreneurship can make to Europe’s socially and environmentally sustainable growth, digitalization as well as recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and future resilience, as well as to achieve the SDGs.

The main objective: the main objective of the project is the consortium that will be created to promote democracy, rule of law and values that are certain, as partner countries from different social and economic backgrounds are ready to exchange good practices and share values.

The projects specific objectives are:

introduce digital LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® into youth work,
help young people transform their ideas into successful businesses by empowering them with entrepreneurial skills and competences, including direct and indirect job creation and the development of human capital and new skills through intercultural dialogue,
break the social stereotype that young people are generally low-income professionals who struggle to make it through and most of the times face even social marginalization,
empower youth who are both talented & passionate for entrepreneurship and they wish they could make a living out of them.

Target Groups: Project Partner Organisations, Youth workers, youth/young people, NGOs, workers of NGOs from other sectors, European Commission. Business & volunteering operators, volunteering associations, policymakers and local authorities, and stakeholders (all the participants in the business & volunteering, including service providers, and civil society).

Project Results:

Research Report and Data Report : Research on existing tools, methods and skills existing tools, methods and skills on how to use the Educational Methodology through Digital LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® and on the needs and conditions of employment and youth entrepreneurship conducted at national level in 8 countries. A Report on methods used in the data collection will be also produced.
Methodology Handbook e-Guide (e-book) : A clear inventory Methodology Handbook e-Guide (e-book) of existing tools, methods and skills on how to use the Educational methodology through Digital LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® & Good practices.
Open Educational Platform : A dedicated online Open Educational Platform which will track the progress of the project, bringing videos, pictures and descriptions of the work, news aboutnew engagement tools, FAQs, and the activities carried out the summit events in the project planning.

Project Activities:

Seminar in Triesen, Liechtenstein: This Seminar will help partner organizations to develop a new training plan to teach youth workers how to use the tools and methodologies to evaluate youth entrepreneurship ideas with the use of LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®. Training on the following topics: a) Motivation 3.0 (autonomy,mastery and purpose), b) Self-knowledge:inner motivations, strengths and values, c) Teamwork: interpersonal communication, conflict solving, leadership, etc., d) Information literacy, e) Business Model Canvas, f) LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY®, g) Sustainability, ethics and social innovation, h) Business creation, i) Internationalisation, j) Communication and formal presentations.
Local Workshops: Youth Workers Graduates from the Seminar will hold training sessions on new tools for young entrepreneurs who did not attend the trainings. Each partner invites a minimum of 50 young entrepreneurs from their country to a workshop training on the new tools, they will document this workshop with sign-up sheets stating the name of the person and their organization, and satisfaction questionnaires, as part of the project activity reporting to CYA.
Study Visit in Mostar, Bosnia & Herzegovina: The Study Visit is aiming to create a MOOC programme that will integrate the main concepts developed in the Seminar and will guide the participants through a self-learning process starting from the design of a business idea, its development, its improvement and its evaluation. Together with the MOOC, participants receive a Business Model Canvas and a small set of LEGO® bricks to build their own models and ideas. This on-line course is freely available with the form of an Open Educational Resource. The main aim of the MOOC is to provide Youth with the skills that are valuable for the labour market and also provide a valuable tool to Youth Workers to use in their trainings. Before the Study Visit each partner is assigned with the task to work on MOOC content, creation of educational material and be ready to work on its development. Discussion and brainstorming will take place, Workshop on MOOC break down, improvement, amendment and brainstorming for the creation of the final MOOC content. Group reflection and networking meeting with local NGOs, authorities and any other interested organisation to the project idea.
Online Seminar through the MOOC: Each partner will conduct an open 2-hour seminar through the MOOC.
Job Shadowing in Herceg Novi, Montenegro: The Job Shadowing will give the EU-based youth workers a unique experience of youth entrepreneurship in a very different environment, round out their professional development while improving their understanding of the Western Balkan context and vice versa, Western Balkan youth workers to become familiar with Youth Working in EU. Youth workers will follow CeP staff in their work during 8 days: Witnessing youth work process in the field; interviews, recording observations in cultural differences in youth work.
Blended Training Activity in Thessaloniki, Greece: The blended Training Activity is “DiSPLAY Resources Hands-On Training” will be organised in Thessaloniki, Greece, with the participation of 2 youth workers and 4 youth to provide practical training on the resources produced within the project, as well as bring together youth workers and youth. During the 5-day training youth workers along with youth will be working on the resources developed withing the project (Methodology Handbook e-Guide (e book), Open Educational platform MOOC). Youth workers will have the opportunity to apply the knowledge gained from the previous learning activities to the youth participants, interact with the youth participants and practically evaluate the resources developed.