The project is proposed to follow an existing Erasmus+ project led by Budapest Business School and Funded by the Hungarian National Agency TRUST ME – http://www.trust-me-project.eu/index.php/en/ and a former Erasmus+ project led by the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology and funded by the Luxembourg National Agency (CERTI4TRAIN - https://sites.google.com/site/certi4train/. TRUST ME developed skillcards and blended learning materials for potential SME business mentors. CERTI4TRAIN produced an ISO 17024 compliant certification scheme for trainers participating in dual mode trainings. Budapest Business School and its partners wish to further develop the mentioned projects refining, developing and integrating the results of the TRUST ME and CERTI4TRAIN projects to provide SMEs with a mechanism to access internationally certified, standardised mentoring services on offer. In addition, the project aligns the business mentoring activity with sectors of strategic importance to the local economy. This innovative project combines different levels of mentoring support for SMEs in different phases of the growth and development cycle. It provides an integrative framework that can be used to benchmark and develop the skills levels of mentors (from novice to expert). The framework is sensitive to the needs of leaders in a range of SMEs including those in early start-up, transition or growth phases of development. The project promotes university-business partnerships through the development of intelligence to enable business mentors to operate in prioritised regional sectors. By developing progression pathways (a certification scheme) for business mentors and moving towards international certification of business mentoring the project will help to overcome a lack of information on standards that are one of the most significant barriers to SME engagement across the EU.
MentorCert project is an organic follow-up of two previous initiatives: TRUST ME was a curriculum development project of Budapest Business School with the major outcomes of skill card and competency framework and blended learning materials for future SME business mentors; CERTI4TRAIN produced an ISO 17024 compliant certification scheme for trainers of dual mode trainings. The first main objective of the new project was to extend the general results of TRUST ME towards specialisation of mentors to support SMEs in different stages of their development and to operate in different industrial sectors. The second main objective, through the marriage of the experiences of the two foregoing projects was to elaborate a certification scheme defining standards for different levels of mentoring and starting the process leading to internationally certified, standardised mentoring of SMEs. The partnership was composed of four universities from two old EU member countries and from two less old ones, of a private company operating mentor networks in several countries and finally of a Foundation experienced in certification of crafts and professions. The activities were the compilation of state of art analyses in the selected vertical and horizontal sectors (4+4) together with the mentor level assessment based on the theory and practice; the development of training materials with methodology collection (8 per country) and case studies (4+4 per sector) on the prioritised profiles of SMEs needing mentoring and on the ongoing mentoring practices; piloting the trainings; elaboration of the mentor certification scheme with criteria of business mentor assessment; the dissemination of the results; the conceptualisation of the follow-up activities and a strict quality monitoring. The main results are the new curricula embedded into the curriculum systems of the university partners, the strengthened university – business contacts through the intensive pilot trainings and through the dissemination activities. In addition, an important result is the certification scheme and the start of the certification procedure in cooperation with the European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC). This ISO 17024 compliant certification will be carried out individually partner by partner. The longer term benefit will be the development of national SME mentor networks and their cross national integration.