Mentoring program for Latvia rural women entrepreneurs

Women in Latvia who want to start the entrepreneurship face many economic and social obstacles. The lack of support, information and knowledge can be considered as main problems of women, mainly rural women to foster entrepreneurship in Latvia regions. Different kinds of measures need to be taken and new models created to encourage and help women who want to become entrepreneurs and also to support women entrepreneurs from the beginning – and especially during the first (and often the most difficult) times of entrepreneurship. One of the most effective solutions in knowledge transfer among entrepreneurs is mentoring.

The mentoring program in Latvia started on Autumn 2004 in the framework of INTERREG III B program. The target group of the project is women who want to start a business and women who already are entrepreneurs. They can be female employers, unemployed women or young women due to leave school in the near future.  In order o get into project they have to have good business ideas, and they have to be strongly motivated to develop themselves and their business.  Mentoring by this project is based on voluntary, unpaid personal support provided by actively operating experienced women entrepreneurs, the mentors, to starting entrepreneurs, the actors. The mentoring model implemented in Latvia builds on the practical needs of the newly established female entrepreneurs.

Main tasks of mentoring program in Latvia:

•          To help the Mentees to develop their business related goals;

•          To get the entrepreneurs into active women entrepreneurs’ network and to start cooperation with each other;

•          To ensure sustainability of enterprise in starting phase;

•          To provide professional guidance, new knowledge;

•          To exchange experiences, to avoid some mistakes.

Mentoring pairs and groups are already selected and formed in all Latvia regions: 10 pairs and 2 groups in Zemgale, 5 pairs and 1 group in Vidzeme, 3 pairs in Latgale and 3 pairs in Kurzeme. Special training and common coaching and networking events for Mentors and Mentees during a year have been provided.

There are developed data basis of existing and potential mentors and mentees.  There are collected questionnaires of Mentors/Mentees. 100 questionnaires of existing and potential Mentees and 60 questionnaires of existing and potential Mentors of all regions of Latvia – Zemgale, Vidzeme, Kurzeme, Latgale were collected and analyzed. The respondents represent and show the their interest in different branches of entrepreneurship – production and sales of agriculture products, craft services, food industry, rural tourism, project management, savings and loans, retail trade, etc. 

The respondents mainly were rural women aged from 30 – 50 years. 35 women of 40 potential Mentors already have their rural farming or business, mainly in production sector, services and trade. The forms of entrepreneurship for both Mentors and Mentees mostly are small farms, small limited liability companies or individual enterprises. Overall, the potential and existing women in the research believed that business ownership had a positive impact on their personal lives. Throughout the course of the study, approximately three-quarters the all respondents – Mentors and Mentees reported a positive impact on their self-confidence and personal lives. Furthermore, approximately half of these women reported that business ownership had a positive impact on their economic situation.

Currently we are developing the mentoring manual in the framework of FEM project. This manual is prepared in order to help those after FEM project to start and successfully run mentoring among women micro entrepreneurs.  The manual gives support and concrete advice to them who plan and are running mentoring projects, especially the co-ordinators and others involved in mentoring process.