On 17th April Business Women Association (BWA) organized the general meeting which brought over the half of BWA members together. The meeting was attended by a guest – Lithuanian financier, lecturer, scientist Gitanas Nausėda, who is currently preparing for the presidential election. An interesting discussion was developed on the business topics.
The Chairman of the Board dr. Dalia Foigt-Norvaišienė presented the Association‘s report of 2018, the accountant of the Association Sonata Stanislovaitienė presented the financial activity of 2018 and the budget of 2019.
In 2018 the Association organized more than 30 events, some of which took place in member companies. The Board of the Association gathered 19 times, solved membership issues, planned events, searched for decisions on important issues for the Association.
Director of the Association Skaidra Vaicekauskienė presented vision, goals, tasks and strategic directions of 2019.
Election of the new Board took place during the meeting. Prior to the election, the members of the association – dr. Dalia Foigt-Norvaišienė, members Ilma Miliūtė-Žilienė, Svetlana Zilinskienė and Ana Zlotkovska – were thanked for their membership of the Board for 3 years. Jurgita Jociuvienė, Edita Karvelienė, Jūratė Kasperavičienė, Alma Ziziliauskienė and Ana Zlotkovska were elected to the new Board.
While voting took place, the members of the Association had an excellent opportunity to listen to the insights of cyber security by the rapporteur Marius Pareščius.
Event photographer Mykolas Bartkevičius.
The beginning of the year is the right time for changes and new challenges. On 21st January, 2019, at the Business Women‘s Association‘s meeting „Changes and Visions“ there was announced that Skaidra Vaicekauskienė became director of the organization.
For the past two years the association was led by Rima Ingstad who did a great job for the association. According to the Chairman of the Board, Dalia Foigt-Norvaišienė, „Rima Ingstad, who is also one of the founders of the association, was a very diligent, she did not spare time and effort working for the members of the association. Thanks to her communication skills, Rima brought together a large community of business women, organized not only business and management events, but also took care of the emotional education of the members of the association.“
Skaidra Vaicekauskienė is director of ITMC, a public institution that organizes training. She has been a very active member since the establishment of the Business Women‘s Association and has recently been elected to the Board of the association. Skaidra appreciates her appoitment to lead the Business Women‘s Association as a great confidence in her professionalism and competence. She promised not to spare her personal strength for the future growth of the association and the development of activities for the benefit of all its members and highlighted the importance of each member: „We are ambitious, entrepreneurial women, but at the same time we know how to share. We have beautiful goals and I believe we will achieve them together.“
During the meeting „Changes and Visions“ Chairman of the Board Dalia Foigt-Norvaišienė presented the possible directions of activities of 2019, which were discussed in the extended meetings of the Board and the founders.
With a great involvement, the members of BWA discussed how they now assume the mission of the association and its further goals as the association started counting for the fourth year of its activity, and its membership reached 140. Many ideas and suggestions have been raised in the working groups, which are going to turn into the strategy of activities with the specific action plans in the near future.
Special thanks to our member Genovaitė Dudėnienė for the new, cozy space for our meeting and a warm welcoming at Hotel Vilnia’s restaurant.
On December 7-9, 2018, by the invitation of the International Women’s Forum, a delegation from the BWA (Business Women’s Association) was represented in Warsaw, with nine members of the association – the founders and business leaders. Women attended the International Conference on Entrepreneurship, Creativity, Innovation: the Role of Women, which was dedicated to the 25th anniversary of the International Women’s Forum this year at the International MFK (Międzynarodowe Forum Kobiet).
On the 13th anniversary of the Lithuanian “Product of the Year” competition, organized by the Lithuanian Confederation of Industrialists (LPK), the best products was presented to the Government on the festive event. We are glad and congratulate Lauras Kaziukoniene, a member of the Lithuanian Business Women’s Association, on receiving the “Lithuanian Product of the Year” gold medal for the Supergarden Advent Calendar!
Lithuanian Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Crafts recently was electing the Best Businessman of Lithuania. This honorouble award was given to the member of the Business Women’s Association Jurate Kasperaviciene, director of “Laurema” UAB. (more…)
The member of the Business Women’s Association, Director General of pharmaceutical production company “Aconitum” UAB Rima Balanaskiene, was among the nominees who claimed to be the winner of the “European Women’s Innovation” Award. (more…)
On May 25-26 members of Business Women’s association participated in the thirst Asia-European Meeting ASEM) on “Women’s economic empowerment: equal opportunities in the world”. The conference was organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, together with the Social Security and Labor and the Ministry of Mykolas Romeris University.
Patron of the Conference was Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite. The event partners – the European Institute for Gender Equality and the Business Women’s Association. Read more about the conference here>
On December 12, 2016 the director and one of the founders of the Business Women’s Association Vaida Balčiūnienė, who had been in charge since establishment of the organization in the end of 2015, handed the management over to Rima Ingstad, her peer founder and member of the board.
The change was announced during the Christmas event of the Association, with presence of around 40 members. Passing the management on, Vaida Balčiūnienė said: „I believe that in organizations like our association, the rotation of management is necessary. Each of us is unique – by her skills, mindset and gained individual experience… And I truly believe that Rima‘s organizational skills, contacts with various Lithuanian and foreign organizations is exactly what will help The Business Women‘s Association grow further and achieve its goals.“
Although the first year was nothing but easy, yet interesting it was indeed! It was time when we were learning – to stand up, to make first steps, to speak up, to get to know the world around us and to try understanding our place in it.
The founder of the Association and the chairwoman of the Board dr. Dalia Foigt-Norvaišienė on behalf of all members thanked Mrs Vaida Balčiūnienė for what has been accomplished and expressed her belief that the second year of the existence of Association will be even more interesting.
The plans for 2017 include strengthening contacts with various Lithuanian state institutions, establishing cooperation with other non-governmental organizations which encourage entrepreneurship, developing and maintaining partnership with similar business women’s organizations abroad. According to dr. D.Foigt-Norvaišienė, all this will be done in order to assist the members of association to develop business, dicover new successful business development directions and markets, overcome everyday challenges…Moreover, the association will strive to improve business image in general and raise awareness of our organization‘s goals, mission and vision.
The Board sets ambitious goals to the new director: increase public awareness of organization, establish effective relations with media channels, encourage communication among members as well as unite broader community of businesswomen, support their cooperation, seek for funding of association in order to gain wider possibilities for achieving organizational goals.
The newly appointed director Rima Ingstad said: „I have a lot of will and energy to do the work for the association. Although the role of Director of Association is a significant professional and personal challenge for me, I will contribute with all my skills, knowledge and contacts to persuade businesswomen it is worth participating in the activity of association.
Both the newly appointed Director of the Business Women‘s Association Rima Ingstad and the Board expect members to actively contribute to the organizational activity during the next year – participation in work groups, proposing new activity forms, ideas on how to develop member-to-member support and incourage women and youth enterpreneurship in general.
We wish all members of the Business Women‘s Association a lot of new ideas, meaningful work and success in business for 2017! Have a warm and cozy festive season!
On October 13-16, 2016 members of the Polish business and science women‘s association „International Women‘s Forum“ visited Lithuania. They were seeking for cooperation with the Lithuanian organizations and new business contacts in our country. The event was organized by the Embassy of Poland, Polish Institute of Vilnius and Business Women‘s Association. The event consisted of a business forum, business meetings and a cultural programme.
On October 14 BWA organized an official business forum, which was sponsored by the Embassy of Poland. Members of the forum were greeted by the First Counsellor of The Embassy of Poland Ms. Maria Slebioda and the Head of the Ethnic Minorities Department of the Government Ms. Vida Montvydaitė.
The Head of the Trade and Investment Promotion Section at the Embassy of Poland, Mr. Krzysztof Januszkiewizc shared useful information on business conditions in Lithuania and Poland, in particular on setting up a new business and requirement for activity. Rūta Skyrienė (Investors‘ Forum), Giedrė Švedienė (Lithuanian Confederation of Industrialists) and Rasa Bagdonienė (Enterprise Lithuania) shared best practice with participants of the forum and invited Polish business women to invest into Lithuania and cooperate with the Lithuanian business women. Business women of Poland and Lithuania told about their start in business, presented their products and services. The event was closed by individual meetings between business women of Lithuania and Poland, during which they have discussed potential opportunities for cooperation.
BWA members Dalia Foigt-Norvaišienė, Rima Ingstad, Vaiva Tylienė and BWA President Inga Nausėdienė participated in the meeting with BWA Estonia members – the President Anu Vilks and a member and former President Riina Piigli.
BWA Estonia is the organization which unites women in business and management for 24 years already. It is a member of BPW International (International Federation of Business and Professional Women), which was established 80 years ago and operates in 95 countries through 5 continents.
The Estonian guests presented the activity of their organization with around 100 members. In Estonia BWA is best known for the Women of the Year event and “Equal pay” initiative which aims to minimize the differences in pay of men and women.