Global Entrepreneurship Week Celebrations at the Faculty of Economics

On November 19, 2024, the 17th edition of Global Entrepreneurship Week was celebrated at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Gdańsk. The aim of this global celebration of entrepreneurship, which has been taking place since 2008 and involves millions of people around the world, is to inspire and support people who want to start a business and develop entrepreneurial skills and attitudes.

It is worth emphasizing that the initiators of Global Entrepreneurship Week were: British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the Make Your Mark organization and the Kauffman Foundation, while the Faculty of Economics of the University of Gdańsk has been a partner in the celebrations of this international project for almost a decade, offering participants: students, high school students and other invited guests, numerous events, including many interesting lectures and workshops.

During this year's Global Entrepreneurship Week, a large audience gathered at the Faculty of Economics listened to lectures on both the legal and financial aspects of business activity, issues related to consumer safety, market traps and the fight for customers among Polish food discounters.

The day began with a "banking" meeting. Participants in the lecture entitled Instruments of Financing International Trade, conducted by representatives of ING Bank Śląski S.A., learned about, among other things, the issue of bank guarantees, collection and letters of credit, and also learned about the fundamental differences between financial and operational leasing. During the meeting, it was possible to familiarize ourselves with many practical cases from life, and we also learned how to finance many ordinary and extraordinary goals.

Then, Mr. Michał Kotlarz, a lawyer from the Gdańsk Entrepreneurship Incubator STARTER, in a lecture entitled Legal Basics in Business, presented the procedure for registering a business in Poland and the basic tax and insurance obligations of a person running a business. It was a very educational experience.

The next item on the agenda of this year's Global Entrepreneurship Week at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Gdańsk was the conference entitled Everything for Sale.

During the conference, members of the International Finance Research Group (KNFM) and the START-UP Entrepreneurship Research Group presented the results of their research on the operations of food discount stores in Poland and answered numerous questions from the audience. Among the papers presented at the conference were topics from the front pages of newspapers and advertisements, including Discount Stores on the Marketing Battlefield (paper presented by Alicja Dudziak from KNFM), Battle for Pennies: How Do Discount Stores Lower Their Prices? (paper presented by Marietta Studzińska, Wiktoria Przybylska and Dominik Chomczyk from KNFM), Cheap Shopping, Expensive Ecology (paper presented by Maja Orłowska and Julia Zarzecka from the START-UP Entrepreneurship Research Group).

This was not the end of the attractions that the organizers had planned for the participants of this year's edition of Global Entrepreneurship Week. The audience gathered in auditorium D also had the opportunity to listen to an extremely interesting lecture entitled Different faces of phishing, delivered by a graduate of our University - Bartosz Radziewicz, and a speech entitled From persona to business, or the backstage of using a personal brand to run an unregistered business, delivered by Iwo Laskowski, a member of the START-UP Entrepreneurship Scientific Club. The culmination of the day's events and, as it were, their "cherry on the cake" was an evening online lecture, delivered by dr hab. Anna Maria Nikodemska-Wołowik, prof. UG, entitled Rational, not emotional shopping: how to defend yourself against manipulation and avoid market traps?

During the lecture, among other things, the traps and manipulation techniques to which consumers are exposed and the threats resulting from excessive consumption were presented.

Thanking everyone, including students and lecturers, teachers and pupils for their numerous and active participation in this year's Global Entrepreneurship Week celebrations, we would like to invite everyone to next year's event now.

On behalf of Organising Committee of the Global Entrepreneurship Week Celebrations at Faculty of Economics UG: dr Magdalena Markiewicz and dr Ewa Ignaciuk