What should have been Coordinators’ Meeting 2020 is now a Series of Online Sessions  

Regional representatives from our constituency responsible for capacity development and involved in strategic management of human resources within their institutions are CEF Coordinators. Every two years we meet and exchange ideas and good practices, and how they could be part of the CEF learning program. This year we have transformed our gathering to a series of online sessions, delivered in cooperation with Coordinators as co-designers, while the series of online events will be available to wider audience. This year we also add another group of people closely related to the CEF – the coordinators for Economic Reform programs who are the main partners in implementation of the project Fiscal Implications of Structural Reforms, funded by the European Union.

The online sessions address issues that have come into a sharper focus in the past months of unprecedented shock for individuals and organizations. This is the last in the series of 4 virtual sessions. After tackling the topics of Personal and Organizational Resilience, Communications, and Leadership in Times of Crisis, we conclude with Organizational Learning in Times of Crisis.

About the event

Organizational learning is an expansive and diverse field with influences that can be felt from sociology, psychology, philosophy, business management, and many others disciplines. It is commonly described as a process of developing, retaining, and transferring knowledge within an organization.

The organizational learning occurs as a result of experience and with a system and environment that absorbs lessons learned and adapts to changes. At the CEF we like to describe this process as capturing, packaging and sharing the organizational knowledge as an essential part of the change and growth.

In times of crisis, organizational learning becomes even more complex . The need to learn, unlearn and re-learn is often the highest and reflects on individual, community and organizational level. The crisis can disconnect the system of organizational learning or accelerate it, with many adaptations along the way.

What will you learn

We will start with reflecting on the key learning points on the personal and organizational resilience, communication, and leadership in times of crisis based on the first three webinars.

By sharing how CEF as an organization organizes internal learning regularly and particularly amidst the COVID crises we will enter into the topic of How was Learning Affected by the Pandemics and Leading the Changes.

We will continue with how the process of understanding and leading the changes goes forward and how this leads to a vision and learning for a new future. We will capture together what kind of knowledge became more important in participating institutions through the Covid-19 pandemic, and discuss the role of organizational learning to obtain it while dealing with changes. We will also explore how informal networking and communities of practice can serve as powerful vehicles for organizational learning when times get tough.

We will close the webinar series with an overview of discussion highlights and inspirations for new activities or topics that they have brought us.

The online session will be held in English, in a form of a discussion and some interactive elements, where active participant engagement is expected.

Who should attend

The online session is designed for employees working in the area of organizational culture, leadership, inclusion, diversity, wellbeing and implementing changes and may be working in human resources departments or other parts of ministries, central banks and other public sector institutions.

Your contributions to the event will be needed and welcomed, so your active engagement will be welcome during the virtual session.

Faculty

Mugur Tolici, Head of Human Resources Management, National Bank of Romania

Mugur has gained a significant experience in central banking activities, during the more than 20 year career in the National Bank of Romania, in the fields including monetary policy, economic research, cash issuance and processing and human resources. Since 2011, he is the Human Resources Director of the National Bank of Romania. He has led a major transformation project aimed at creating and implementing a people management system based on the best HR practices, suited to organization’s needs and culture, and ready to address the challenges of a continuously changing environment.

Mugur has a rich academic experience as lecturer at the Bucharest University of Economic Studies and National University of Political Studies and Public Administration. Mr Tolici holds a degree in banking and finance, and a PhD in economics. For one year (2018-2019) he worked for the International Monetary Fund in Washington DC as a Senior Adviser for the Executive Director (Dutch-Belgium Constituency) representing Romania and North Macedonia.

Harry Meintassis, Leadership Strategist and Executive Coach

Harry is a Leadership Strategist and Executive Coach – he partners with leaders to transform organisations and maximise their human potential. His mission is to help leaders, organizations and communities to create a brighter future together. Harry has led numerous transformation projects in strategy, leadership development, organizational effectiveness and managing change.  During the last 25 years, he has held senior roles with leading advisory firms in Ernst & Young, Hay Group and Korn Ferry. Today, he is coaching leaders to navigate change and build high performance organizations and talent systems. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from University of Athens, Greece; an MBA from the University of Birmingham, UK, and a Master’s Degree in International Relations (Distinction) from University of Athens. He is an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Bankers in the UK.

Natasha Ilijeva Acevska, Senior Program Officer, CEF

Natasha has over ten years of experience in facilitating regional cooperation among public officials in SEE. An economist, she has upgraded her education in the fields of sociology and EU affairs. Her interests are design of public policies in multi-level governance setting, intergovernmental fiscal relations and EU integration of the Western Balkans and Turkey. Public institutions that base their functioning on trust,  networking and knowledge sharing is the most recent area of her interest.

Ana Frangež Kerševan, Senior Partnership Officer, CEF

Ana has over fifteen years of experience in running international projects in SE Europe as well as in design and leading numerous learning sessions. Being responsible for methodological design and delivery of trainings of tutors, conferences, CEF governance and high level events and CEF outreach program, she also focusses on supporting localization activities and advising on project management aspects. She is driven by how learning works and what environment inspires learning. She believes in the power of experiential learning and her passion is exploring new ways to powerfully present ideas to different groups of audience.

Indicative Agenda

Time	Topic
10:30 – 10:50	Overview of 2020 Coordinators Webinar Series Quiz for reflecting on the past sessions – Ana Frangež Kerševan, CEF Learning culture at the CEF – Natasha Ilijeva Acevska, CEF
10:50 – 11:50	How was learning affected by the pandemics and leading the changes Accepting the changes – Mugur Tolici, National Bank of Romania Learning for a new future – Harry Meintassis, Leadership Strategist Exchange of ideas, roundtable, Q&A
11:50– 12:00	Conclusions, final insights: Mugur Tolici, Harry Meintassis, Ana Frangež Kerševan, Natasha Ilijeva Acevska

Partners

This learning initiative was supported by: