MFG European Reporter -

COO of Beyond A Strategy Mona Pearl gave the keynote at Heidelberg Innovation Forum 2010 live from Chicago. Actually she were supposed to travel to Heidelberg, but because of Iceland’s volcano caused the huge cloud of ash her flight was not possible. We streamed her speech live from Chicago. Thanks again, Mona, for getting-up that early to give your inspiring keynote!

In advance we had the chance to interview Mona Pearl on the phone. In this interview she gave some background info on her biography, her view on success and the three steps which are important to become a successful entrepreneur.

Read the full interview with Mona Pearl (pdf)

Our European Project VoicE has been rewarded with the European eDemocracy Award . The prize has been assigned in the contest of the World eDemocracy Forum, which took place from 22th to 23th October in Paris. Each year the Forum hosts international experts, which for two days debates on topics related to politic in Internet and partecipative democracy.

The Politech Institute of Brussels recognizes each year the best international citizen communication’s projects, assigning a prize in five different categories. The project VoicE, realized by the MFG Baden-Württemberg togheter with 8 European partners , has been awarded in the category “Online-Democracy”.

VoicE offers background information on the topic of consumer protection within the EU as well as EU legislation and the European institutions. Using state-of-the-art communication tools like blogs and online forums, the platform facilitates a constructive dialogue between citizens and their elected representatives at EU leveL. Within the two regional platforms VoiceS (www.bw-voice.eu and www.voice.gva.es), citizens can thus directly contact the MEPs from their local region, ask relevant questions and voice their opinions. Politicians have an opportunity to react immediately to citizens’ proposals, answer queries and position themselves in the area of consumer protection.VoicE allows them to listen to their voters’ concerns and learn more about their expectations of European politics.

The software Gov2DemOSS used by the Project VoicE has also been recognised as Good Practice in the framework of the 4th European eGovernment Awards 2009 and thus been rewarded with the EU Good Practice label 2009.