STIMULATING AND SUPPORTING NEW BUSINESS IN IRELAND

TRAINING FOR CREATIVITY - New website launched to assist SME's

By James Donlon, June 18, 2007

The TRACTORS (TRaining MAterial in Creativity and InnovaTion for EurOpean R&D Organizations & SMEs) Project has recently launched its new website to assist SMEs to train for creativity… www.train4creativity.eu

Creativity management has gained much ground as a strategic choice both in the academic and in the business community. The TRACTORS project specifically aims to set the boundaries and define the role of all sciences involved in Creativity and Innovation Management and to provide a certified training process and curricula, combining tools and practices from several sciences. In addition the project intends to provide target groups and potential users with a fully documented training material in Creativity and Innovation (C&I).

Fundamental results are a handbook in C&I Management (provided in 6 languages), a C&I Self-Audit tool and a portal for training in C&I with an electronic curriculum covering all relevant issues and a comprehensive training e-platform including a big selection of models, practices as well as tools from several related sciences. The website will also include an electronic library providing numerous academic articles and case studies in creativity management provided by practitioners and business consultants.

Concerning transfer of the results to potential users, it is crucial to stress that there are large networks that all projects partners belong to and that they have access in many companies, universities, schools and associations.

In addition to WESTBIC, the other partners on the TRACTORS project are – LABEIN (Spain), Thessaloniki Technology Park Management & Development Corporation S.A (Greece), ATLANTIS Consulting S.A (Greece), University of Western Macedonia (Greece), Firenze Tecnologia Special Agency of the Florence Chamber of Commerce (Italy), Kaunas University of Technology Regional Business Incubator (Lithuania) and MERIG – Multidisciplinary European Research Institute Graz (Austria).

The TRACTORS project is financed by European Funds through the framework of Leonardo Da Vinci (LdV) programme.

For further information on the programme please contact:

Aideen Brennan
WESTBIC
LYIT BDC
Port Road
Letterkenny
Co. Donegal

Tel: +353 74 91 86770
Fax: +353 74 91 86771
Email: abrennan@westbic.ie