WITH BUSINESS INNOVATIONS TO SUCCESS!

                        Productive Idea Competition 2009

Junior Chamber International Finland arranges the Productive Idea competition for the 31st time this year. The project has an honourable history with long traditions: it started from Turku Junior Chamber of Commerce that organised the competition for the first time as a local competition in 1977. Already the next year, the competition was organised nationwide as also Kauppalehti, the most longstanding partner, joined the project. This year other partners in the competition are Ministry of Trade and Industry, Finnish Industry Investment Ltd, Federation of Finnish Enterprises, The Central Chamber of Commerce of Finland, The Association for Finnish Work and Tamro Finland.

Proposals for the competition

A Productive Idea may be a product, service, production method, operations model, concept or business idea which improves business environment either in public or private sector. The idea, in other words the competition proposal, must be in productive use and it may be up to three years old. The proposals will be evaluated based on their innovative aspect and novelty, productivity and economical importance, possibilities for success, and impact on the community. An idea that has been rewarded either on national or international level cannot participate in the competition.

Categories

There are two categories in the competition:

1. Enterprises – reward will be granted on national level to one productive idea in business environment.
2. Community – reward will be granted to one community initiated productive idea which concretely improves entrepreneurship.

In addition, an idea that improves rural or scarcely populated area's productivity may be submitted. An idea can only be submitted to one of the above mentioned categories. Additionally, the local chapters of Junior Chamber Finland reward ideas on a regional level. Organisers may also grant certificates of merit according to their own consideration.

How to apply for Productive Idea ?

The competition will be declared open on April 18, in JCI Finland National Convention. The competition closes on May 31, and all applications must be submitted by that date.

Submitting an application to the competition must be done on a specified form which can be found from this website. The filled forms are delivered by e-mail to the regional manager in whose region the enterprise or community is located, and also to address:

tuottavaidea (at) jci.fi

The proposer of the idea may come from different region than the idea. The regional managers can assist in filling the forms if needed.

All the proposals of both categories will first be judged in the regional juries (10 pcs) that will select the best ideas for the national jury. The final winners of the competition are selected by the national jury that is composed of organisers of the competition as well as high level experts in business and industrial life and public sector.

All proposals will be treated with utmost confidentiality and no information is given to outsiders. No classified information on awared ideas will be published to avoid any kind of harm to the idea or business. 

Announcing the winners

The winning ideas will be announced and awarded in an Awards Ceremony in the JCI Finland National Convention on October .The Productive Idea competition is highly respected and traditionally the winners have got plenty of publicity in Kauppalehti and in other medias. In best cases, the positive publicity gained by winning the competition has been incredibly valuable to the winner and carried on bringing success for many years.