Group responsible for free time activity in Brussels during the course project found out the most engaging activity in the world of business – NETWORKING. This post will give you deeper understanding of domestic and local traditional way to have after-work including networking at the same place.
Members of the group responsible for organizing a free time activity, decided to participate networking event in the middle of the hearth in Brussels – Place de Luxembourg. Which has got actually later on abbreviation to PLUX. Place is considered as the center of the European Parliament at Luxembourg Square in Brussels. You could have heard local people talking about – Let’s meet at Plux or Let’s plux tonight. Within Luxembourg square there are six bars or so called pubs where all the networking activities are happening every Thursday starting at 06.00pm.
PLUX and networking
In general it is impossible to book a table at PLUX on Thursday’s evenings as the place is so crowded most of the time. We were really keen to find out if that is true or just a rumour. We wanted to participate at PLUX and make it happen for the first time in HAMK history visiting Brussels. Based upon the feedback we received, we satisfied both lectures and students visiting Brussels with us. After visiting the first pub when we asked for a table reservation for 25 people, the local waitress just kindly laughed at us and said: „there are no bookings allowed on Thursday’s as the demand for the visiting such a networking after work is incredible.“ However we did not give up and continually proceed in the negotiation with second pub called Ginette Bar and ended up with a table reservation for 25 people.
However, this may sound that learning by doing is a way to develop your soft skills but we had chance to implement some of the advises during the Exploring European Markets module in collaboration with lecturers we learnt how to define typology of people and how to implement our negotiation skills towards various types of people. We convinced waitress in Ginette bar and they were highly looking forward for us to visit the place on Thursday evening. Afterwards it turned into real networking as the upcoming exchange student from HAMK’s partner university in Brussels came and got in touch with us before the student will start the exchange period abroad in Valkeakoski at HAMK. Secondly, also lecturer from the partner university joined us and the whole group visiting Brussels had very diligent interaction with lecturer and if things will go smoothly we can expect guest visit from lecturer in the second semester of academic year 2019/20.
Ginette Bar
Ginette is a place which offer range of organic beers based and developed in Belgium by local experts who love to live life to the max or in other words living life on the edge. Ginette is a typical for serving multiple range of craft and organic drinks such as beers, wines, juices and soft drinks as well. If we stop at the beverage theme for a while, we can not forget to mention the national food of Belgium which is „French“ Fries with various selection of Belgium sauces. We had a chance to try those at the Ginette Bar while networking with our partner university people.
LAW of Brussels Project visit.
Brussels Project is part of the Exploring European Markets module and we highly recommend this module for all the students interested in International Business as the chance to enhance your career in such city as Belgium which is pretty multi-national and multi-cultural city. This place will give the possibility and opportunity to explore career perspectives and grow the professional network. Beside this course there are courses which will support the knowledge and skills part in enhancing the international career perspective for business students.
Yours Sincerely,
Filip Lestan, Arber Dallku, Miska Helin
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