UP&DOWN

Written by: Monika Mudranincová

PEOPLE UP

Photo: Matt Writtle		Petr Vochozka The director of Illusion Softworks, a computer game producer, was named “Entrepreneur of the Year” in the competition called Zavináč 2002, which was held by The Czech Internet Academy Association. The award showed the academy’s appreciation for Vochozka’s success on the local and international market.
Photo: Vlad. Weiss		Gabriel Berdár The CEO of the Czech and Slovak branches of Dell won the tender that was recently held to find a new CEO for Český Telecom. Berdár’s main task in his new post will be to prepare the firm for privatization.
Photo: René Jakl		Jan Hřebejk This noted film director’s new “retro” film Pupendo became the most successful Czech film of all time, by box-office numbers. In the first week after its opening, 108,000 viewers saw the film, resulting in sales that reached a record CZK 11.9 million.

PEOPLE DOWN

Photo: ČTK		Jiří Šedivý As a chairman of the Housing & Construction administration board, the former Czech army general bet on the wrong horse.The government decided to annul the contract for a highway from Lipník to Ostrava, and the police are investigating possible corruption related to this case.
Photo: ČTK		Martin Muchka The Radio and Television Council chairman was called off from his post, along with the other Council members. The MPs believe that the Council is to blame for the CZK 10 billion fine that this country must pay for TV Nova’s failed arbitration.
Photo: Foto archiv		Radomír Lašák The CEO of eBanka has had his share of problems. The bank ended 2002 with losses of CZK 250.1 million, while the previous year it ended with CZK 6,4 million profit. The negative result was caused by lower revenues in the first half of the year and the decline of interest rates.

Photo: Libuše Rudinská

Vendula Mráčková: Youth has the green light
“We teach children how to do business,” says Vendula Mráčková (28), the director of Junior Achievement Czech Republic, a non-profit organization. Some time ago she left her positions teaching in a kindergarten and at the British International School, striking out on a new career course. She managed to conjoin her love of children with a new challenge, becoming first the marketing director and later the director of the educational organization, which traces back in time to 1919. “At that time American businessmen knew that school graduates had problems finding direction in ordinary life, so they founded a sort of school as a game, where children learned to do business through practical examples and discussions,” Mráčková explains. In 1992 the Junior Achievement program was established in the Czech Republic, thanks to the shoe magnate Tomáš Baťa, who was famed for his “Baťa Work Schools”.
In the course of ten years 160,000 elementary and secondary school children have completed these courses. Mráčková sees the undeniable advantages of this program in the fact that Junior Achievement children are taught by means of an entertaining, interactive method, deducing answers to questions themselves. Secondary school students even establish and manage real firms, and they have to resolve financial cash flows, marketing issues, and personal conflicts. “Mr. Baťa is the greatest driving force,” Mráčková says respectfully. “Even in his nineties he has energy to pass on to others, and he never refuses to meet with students to share his practical experience.” The director, who relies on a team of only five people, reveals her goal: “We want to awaken business sense in children, to teach them independence. If we can do that, I’ll be satisfied.”

	Photo: Libuše Rudinská

Leo Crlík: Czech Euromanager
AT FIRST GLANCE Leo Crlík looks like many of his university peers. But this modest, optimistic young man from Otrokovice has already achieved success the like of which they can only dream of. Last year he received the prestigious Euromanager title in the largest international management simulation competition, in which both students and professionals with practical experience vied. According to the organizer, the British consulting firm Recruitment International, over 260,000 entrants took part in this simulation game, which has a tradition dating back 24 years. Last year was the first time the Czech Republic participated, which made it all the more surprising that Czechs won the world final in Paris. Crlík attributes his team’s global success to its more audacious and aggressive approach to the management of the virtual firm than that shown by the other teams, including those made up of professional managers.
Does Crlík think that Czech college students are comparable with their western counterparts? “This is a highly individual matter relating to one’s motivation to actively concern oneself with practice while still a student,” he responds frankly. That could be, as he already has practical experience with PricewaterhouseCoopers. He completed his high school education in the US and he speaks three major languages, and in order to broaden his horizons he has traveled through most of the world. When he graduates from the Czech University of Technology and the Institute of Economics, he would like to work at optimizing corporate management. The Euromanager title should open many doors for him, because according to Recruitment International, one of the competition’s main goals is mediating contacts between employers and potential employees. Now companies must decide how to make use of these young prospects.