First Online Stakeholder Academy

February – October 2023

ADD BLUE TO YOUR STRATEGY!

Stakeholder Academy aims to provide the insights and tools to bridge that difficult gap between the traditional development of strategy based on continuous improvement and innovative approach based on emerging blue economies.

Our mission

is to help you to identify hidden traps, useful contacts, valuable literature, emerging technologies, and professional networks of reputable international experts. We are confident that you will solidify your ability to generate valuable strategic insights as well as strengthen your executive capability to monetize.

 

Benefits for participants

Discover market opportunities.

Gain new insights about the hidden barriers to strategic execution and how to overcome them as you navigate blue economies

Acquire a deep understanding of how to get results from future strategic initiatives

Join a network of professionals with a similar mindset.

Make new friends with great reputation in academia and business.

Format

Stakeholder Academy aims to provide the insights and tools to bridge that difficult gap between the traditional development of strategy based on continuous improvement and innovative approach based on emerging blue economies.

To make the program as practical as possible, the participants will receive guidance and feedback from seasoned investors and experts. Consequently, participants will be able to pitch their ideas and attract seed money for real-life scenarios.

Last but not least, the academy provides a ready-made support network in the form of fellow participants who walked this path before.

Format

Pivotal theme

Come with a strategy challenge… and leave with an action plan that delivers results.

Relevance

Our latest research shows that companies tend to program their strategy and budgets based on a company’s historical performance and market trends. While it is not a bad idea to build on historical analysis, it is becoming more and more critical to identify new and significant potential opportunities, not just a marginal 5-10% squeeze on efficiency. Our conversations with business leaders indicate growing pressure to discover new market opportunities and compete successfully. As a result, business organizations have to engage in active boundary-spanning and bridging organizations’ internal networks with external sources of information.

Academy programme

*Each Online session starts at 13:00 CET/14:00 EET and continues 4 hours

February 22th

Online

Vaidotas Levickis
Vaidotas Levickis

Session 1.1 – Stakeholder Academy kick off session. Course overview and project team setup.

As the first step to form the transnational learning space, the session will prioritize proper introduction of participants, their professional background, motivations for the course. In addition, the facilitator will present course structure, teaching formats and expected outcomes. To increase the attractiveness of LLL among adult learners, the latter part of the first module will deliver a concise in depth overview of the Blue Economy and emerging market opportunities. One of the objectives is to stimulate interest in the Blue Economy and create opportunities for the participants to collaborate so they are ready for the Investors’ challenge.

February 23th

Online

Andrius Sutnikas
Andrius Sutnikas

Session 1.2 – Introduction to Blue Economy. Focus on present and future market opportunities.

As the first step to form the transnational learning space, the session will prioritize proper introduction of participants, their professional background, motivations for the course. In addition, the facilitator will present course structure, teaching formats and expected outcomes. To increase the attractiveness of LLL among adult learners, the latter part of the first module will deliver a concise in depth overview of the Blue Economy and emerging market opportunities. One of the objectives is to stimulate interest in the Blue Economy and create opportunities for the participants to collaborate so they are ready for the Investors’ challenge.

March 8th & 9th

Online

Matthew Spaniol
Matthew Spaniol

Session 2 – Blue growth foresight: scenarios for innovation & business Strategy.

In the second module, Dr. Spaniol will revisit some of the challenges to the transition to a sustainable blue economy and introduce strategic foresight as a means to unlock solutions and overcome these challenges. We’ll open the toolbox of strategic foresight and collaborate in online workspaces together to chart the pathways for development into the future.

1. Develop a sense of the challenges of sustainable blue economy
2. Get practical hands-on experience with the tools of strategic foresight
3. Learn how to future-proof your organization and projects

March 29th & 30th

Online

Edita Kemzūraitė
Edita Kemzūraitė

Session 3 – Blue growth change initiation: project management Blue economy: innovation and project management

Market insight and knowledge are more likely to generate value if there is a practical pathway to implementation. Project management discipline continuous to emerge and shape the world of work medium. It is known that good intentions take to hell but how about the alternative way? This session will explore project management principles that help to befriend undisciplined imagination and channel it to actionable workflow. By the end of the session, the participants will be ready to proceed into subject areas stemming from specific industries.

May 10th & 11th

Online

Jeronimo Chirivella
Jeronimo Chirivella

Session 4 – Blue Biotechnology. Opportunities and challenges.

This module is dedicated to the quest for potential market opportunities in Blue Bioeconomy industries. The session will give understanding of the following knowledge areas: Blue bioeconomy potential, EU Blue Growth strategy and Blue biotechnology market overview. The instructor will tell about the uses of marine biotechnology products: energy, food and feeding, bioinspired material, medicine, bioremediation. The participants will learn about marine organisms used in biotechnology as well as cultivation and storage modes. The teams will be introduced to information about identification of novel compounds, screening of marine-derived extracts, exploring biological activities and functions. And to finish the module, the participants will be able to investigate the value chain of marine biotechnology development: from idea to market.

May 31st & June 1st

Online

Laszlo Puczko
Laszlo Puczko

Session 5 – Sea and Coastal Tourism. Ideas shaping the industry.

Module 5 guides through one of the newest growth sectors in tourism industry. The course will explore coastal activity as it related to tourism and wellness. The participants will be able to gain in-depth knowledge about tourism phenomenon, determinants, growth drivers and trends based on facts and figures. In addition, the instructor will present health tourism service development process models. Our project teams will have plenty of opportunities to pick out less-capital intensive ideas for their culminating projects.

June 28th & 29th

Online

Kang-Ki Lee
Kang-Ki Lee

Session 6 – Energy. New frontiers for blue economy. Breakthrough technologies in Blue economy. Overview.

A crunch for affordable energy has never been so acute given geopolitical and climate tensions. The course instructor will introduce the group to various ground breaking energy generating technologies. Although it is hard to predict what technologies will take the center of the stage and deserve investment of money and attention, it is critically important to know about the development of the sector. Will there be interesting business opportunities? This module completes learning activities related to the specific Blue Economy disciplines and market sectors.

September 13th & 14th

Online

Oana Luca
Oana Luca

Session 7 – Smart city

The course provides an overview of the smart city perspective accompanied by practical examples.

Day 1: Introduction to smart cities concepts and principles (Smart People, Smart Living, Smart Environment, Smart Economy, Smart Governance, Smart Mobility). The ecosystem of smart cities. Opportunities and risks of smart cities. Initiatives and projects in smart cities.

Day 2: Making a smart city: co-creation of vision and strategy. Case examples from Amsterdam, Barcelona, Wien.

October 9th & 10th

Live. Klaipeda

Vaidotas Levickis
Vaidotas Levickis

Pre-conference event for International Blue Economy conference.

The last module is a festive culmination of the program. It is a practical hands on workshop designed to help the participants apply their knowledge and receive feedback from the experienced investors. The participants will work on pitch deck presentations and deliver them live.

Requirements for the participants

Stakeholders Academy determines a goal to form an actively performing network of talents that would create a synergy for the future developed projects. Therefore, the course will provide not only the knowledge, but also the skills of participatory cooperation, team work, presentation of ideas.

To apply for the course, the following qualifications are necessary:

Affiliation with an EU-CONEXUS partner university (as a researcher, staff member, or alumni) or a business or public institution

Strong proficiency in English

Effective communication skills

Relevant research or job experience in solving business or societal problems

Interest or work in the field of SmUCS

Speakers

Vaidotas Levickis

Vaidotas Levickis

Vaidotas Levickis co-founded “Priority Projects,” which helps project-based organizations implement strategies. With nearly 20 years of experience, he has worked on creating high-performance teams and continuous improvement initiatives. He and his colleagues received the 1st place ECIE 2015 Teaching Innovation and Entrepreneurship Excellence Award in Bologna, Italy, and has worked in several countries, including France, Germany, the Netherlands, Finland, Russia and the USA.

Andrius Sutnikas

Andrius Sutnikas

Coordinator of Lithuanian Maritime Cluster and development manager of Klaipeda Science and Technology Park. For more than 10 years Andrius gained and shared his experience in various international projects, establishing clusters and competence centres, supporting initiatives that contribute to the development of the blue economy, such as the Blue Growth Leaders Academy programme. A.Sutnikas is an internationally recognized expert in the field of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and speaker at industry events.

Matthew Spaniol

Matthew Spaniol

Matthew Spaniol is a research fellow at Aarhus University. His Ph.D., Scenario Planning in Practice was undertaken with the support of Danske Maritime, a Danish organization that represents the maritime industry. He specializes in futures studies and foresight methods, including scenario planning, innovation forecasting, and business war gaming. His research can be found here. And you can see recordings of past presentations here. He is from the USA and has been living in Denmark since 2005.

Edita Kemzūraitė

Edita Kemzūraitė

PMP, PMO-CP, GPM-b – Co-founder and Head of Content of the PM & PMO Conference and Project Management United. Modern and sustainable project management as well as corporate sustainability are Edita’s area of interests and research. Focusing on bringing the valuable content to the BRIDGE Conference on Sustainability as a leading topic around Projectized-Digitized-Connected ideas. In addition to that she is taking Sustainability Ambassador’s role at her company connecting the colleagues and partners around the globe to discuss about the importance of acting Together Towards Tomorrow.

Jeronimo Chirivella

Jeronimo Chirivella

Prof. Chirivella holds a PhD in Fish Parasitology and has 10+ years of experience in fish farming. He teaches Aquaculture and Aquatic Animal Health in Marine Science and Veterinary Medicine at Valencia Catholic University. He is in charge of developing the Veterinary Medicine study program and leads a research team of university researchers and veterinarians in fish farming.

Laszlo Puczko

Laszlo Puczko

Laszlo Puczko has 25 years of experience in destination and product development, marketing, and impact assessment. He was a manager at KPMG, advising on over 100 projects. He presents at international conferences on topics like competitive product development and travel’s role in wellbeing. Puczko is a trainer of marketing and product development and has written benchmark books and articles. He holds a PhD in the Environmental Impacts of Tourism from Budapest University of Economics and is a Certified Management Consultant (CMC) and Past President of the Association of Tourism Consultants in Hungary.

Kang-Ki Lee

Kang-Ki Lee

Senior VP at AVL List GmbH in Austria, responsible for High-Power Systems business, and Managing Director of AVL Zöllner Marine GmbH in Germany & China. Holds an MSc in mechanical engineering and completed executive management courses at Seoul National University, MAN Group, and Said Business School (Oxford Univ.). Previously served as president of MAN Diesel & Turbo Korea Ltd and EVP of Daewoo SEC (Shipbuilding). Research interests include ICE P&E, Decarbonization & Alternative Fuels, CCS, and Future Technology of Logistics & Transportation. Currently vice-chair of CIMAC GHG Strategy Group, Go-LNG (Baltic Sea), Kormarine Committee.

Oana Luca

Oana Luca

Oana Luca is a professor with over 25 years of experience at the Technical University of Civil Engineering Bucharest. She has led and participated in various projects related to urban and regional development, health, human capital, procurement, waste management, sustainable transport and mobility, and sustainable energy. She has also developed guidelines, handbooks, and manuals for communities. Oana is an urban mobility auditor and expert evaluator for infrastructure and research development and innovation projects.