On 11 – 12 March 2019, we conducted a train-the-trainers instructor workshop for compliance professionals from major companies in North Macedonia. The workshop took place in Skopje and was hosted by KONEKT, the secretariat of the United Nations Global Compact Local Network, as well as the Center for Civil Communications.

Based on a draft good practice training, Sven Biermann and Sebastian Wegner discussed with the participants on how to best increase awareness of SMEs on what is corruption; why preventive measures should be established; and how these measures should look like and can be implemented by the companies.

The workshop was attended by major company representatives from different sectors operating in North Macedonia, incl. Telekom, Sparkasse, Alkaloid, EVN, GD Granit Interworks and Pliva.

The train-the-trainers program is part of the project “Enhance Integrity and Reduce Corruption in State and Private Business Sector” (funded by the European Union) will strengthen civil society’s impact on decreasing corruption in the business sector by improving transparency, accountability and integrity of state-owned enterprises and increasing private sector’s participation in the fight against corruption.

It seeks to assist companies in developing and implementing effective anti-corruption ethics & compliance programs. Major companies with established compliance systems become trainers and support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with little experience in countering corruption by transferring their knowledge and experiences.

Under its integrity initiatives, the HUMBOLDT-VIADRINA partners with KONEKT to establish the concept and implementation plan for the train-the-trainers program, establish the training for SMEs jointly with the compliance professionals as well as to support the first pilot trainings given my experiences professionals to SMEs.