Up and Running for Business: The L’viv Institute of Management Celebrates Ten Year Anniversary

L’viv and Partner Tennessee State Gear Up for Internship Program in the Fall

Ukraine Comes to TSU....from left to right, Galen Hull (TSU), Ikbal Chouwdhury (Lincoln), Ihor Nykolyn (LIM), Sharon Thach (TSU), Felix Edoho (Lincoln), and Petro Yanytsky

LIM, founded in 1990 by professors from L’viv State University, was one the first private educational institutions in Ukraine to introduce a system of training for those entrepreneurs who would take the lead in guiding Ukraine during this period. A large part of this training involves cooperative work with international organizations as well with Western universities and business schools.

"We put strong emphasis on students’ exchange and acquiring international experience, as it becomes the criteria for broadening their understanding of business development in the world," wrote LIM’s Executive Director Petro Yanits’kiy in an e-mail from L’viv. "Two hundred of our MBA students recently went to the US for an internship program. And in 2000, with the ALO grant and the financial support of USAID, LIM established a long-term relationship with Tennessee State University (TSU) and Lincoln University (LU)" in Missouri.

The celebration will include the official opening of the new premises and a meeting of LIM’s Supervisory Council. In addition to LIM’s international partners, among those invited for the event are representatives of national and local governments, international organizations; local businesses, and LIM alumni. This gathering will also give the partners the opportunity to finalize plans for the business internship program that will begin in the fall of 2001.

The partnership between LIM, TSU and LU has two primary objectives: enhancing management training capabilities in each institution and promoting private sector relations between firms in Western Ukraine and Tennessee and Missouri. The partners have been working steadily to achieve the first objective through faculty exchanges among the three institutions. Bringing private sector representatives together from the Ukraine and US has been in the planning stages for several months, and will culminate this fall with the visit of Ukrainian businessmen and women to Tennessee and Missouri for the internship program. The internships will involve Ukrainians who are either owners or senior managers. They are looking to see how business is managed in the U.S., and also are exploring the possibility of joint ventures and representation for U.S. firms in Eastern Europe.

"The most challenging aspect of our partnership lies ahead: the exchange of business persons from Western Ukraine to the U.S. for short-term management training, and internships with local firms in the same sector," said TSU project director Galen Hull. "For this activity, our partner institutions have begun working through our Chambers of Commerce and alumni associations to identify appropriate matches. It is critical to U.S. policy objectives that efforts be made to build free market institutions in Ukraine; we believe that Western Ukraine can lead the way and that we can help them do so."

In January 2001, Yanits’kiy and Ihor Nykolyn, LIM’s Director of International Relations, visited Tennessee and Missouri for the first partnership exchange to the US. They met with the Nashville Area and the Brentwood Chambers of Commerce in Middle Tennessee and the Chamber of Commerce in Jefferson City, Missouri. In Tennessee, Yanits’kiy and Nykolyn also met with a few local Ukrainian business people and visited two business incubator facilities, which house a number of small, start-up firms, and provides administrative, communications, and technical support to its "incubatees."

"Our facility here at TSU is 12 years old and includes a wide range of companies, from processing of tea cakes, to hot sauce, to consulting services for hi-tech firms," said Hull. "Another facility in suburban Brentwood is a very upscale building that accommodates firms that are in some cases very well established but need a branch office.".

Western Ukraine, whose major city is L'viv, has been considered by the U.S. Department of Commerce as a relatively bright spot in an otherwise bleak Ukrainian economy. Border crossings with neighboring Poland and Slovakia have been opened in recent years, leading to significantly increased international trade. For the internship program, the partners plan to identify sectors and industries where there may be a common business interest between businesses in Western Ukraine and the U.S. The initial short list includes health care management, one of the major industries in the Nashville area, and a Ukrainian dental care firm. Tourism and convention center management, also a major sector in Nashville, may have a Ukrainian management consulting firm as a partner. Other industries on the list include banking, transportation, music and entertainment