Invited as guest speaker on behalf of SELENA (the Association of Women Entrepreneurs in Bulgaria), Bev Hurley, YTKO's Chief Executive and Founder of the Enterprising Women network, addressed an international audience at the Second International Forum of Women Entrepreneurs in Bulgaria.

The Forum set out to provide a platform for high-level dialogue between businesswomen across Europe to exchange and deepen mutual understanding, to explore cooperation and to contribute to common development supporting women’s business interests throughout the continent. Through these annual meetings, SELENA hopes to develop and strengthen the business relations between women entrepreneurs within European countries, in order to foster all-around cooperation and strategic partnerships.

The two-day conference of workshops, trade meetings and breakout sessions helped to develop and consolidate operational partnerships between women, across politics and business, thus helping to promote socioeconomic prosperity and the development of each country through increased participation of women.

Through collaboration, SELENA aspire to raise awareness of these issues to important stakeholders to strengthen the entrepreneurial culture among women and to activate local, national and European networks and develop enterprise competitiveness.

Drawing on many years’ experience as an entrepreneur, Bev brought to the table examples of best practice support for women entrepreneurs, demonstrating the success of the 8000-strong Enterprising Women community, and the UK’s 2nd women’s business centre in Peterborough, recognised as UK best practice by the European WINNET8 programme promoting gender equality.