Regional Meeting of Business Leaders Fora from Central and Eastern European Countries

On October 15-16, 2001 the Prince of Wales International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF) held a Regional Round-up Meeting in Prague with participants from the Bulgarian, Czech and Hungarian Business Leaders Fora (BLF), and representatives from IBLF London, Russia and Poland. The objective of the meeting was to share experience and ideas, as well as to discuss the approach and the development of future regional programmes.

The session on sharing experience was extremely useful in terms of learning what the others are doing and what their positive experience is. Generally, BLF activities are focused on promoting the idea of Social Corporate Responsibility (CSR), transferring managerial skills and dealing with environmental issues.

The session on working with members was presented by Mr Aidan Davy, Director Corporate services, IBLF London. He made an overview on how IBLF works with members. The main message was about developing practical engagement strategies and better ways of communication with members.

IBLF's new communication strategy was presented by Ms Nancy Waldfeir-Field, Director of Communications, IBLF London. She also spoke about the development of IBLF worldwide network and the upcoming creation of a IBLF Intranet accessible for all BLF members.

The session on the future regional programmes and fundraising opportunities was based on the assumption to rationalise the experience and to ensure better programme development tools. Areas of common interest for all BLFs were discussed and one of them was the development of the successful Bulgarian Code of Business Ethics into a regional programme.