21 YEARS DOWN MEMORY LANE, by Sander Wennekers, 15 March 2013
While I am travelling back down memory lane, my personal copy of The European Observatory for SMEs First Annual Report 1993 is lying in front of me for inspiration. It is the very first report written by the then just founded and quite small European Network for SME Research ENSR (12 partners).
I have kept no written archives of this period, but it must have been early in 1992 that Joop Vianen and Rob van der Horst established the ENSR and asked me, as EIM’s head of SME policy research, to join the team for the prospective European Observatory for SMEs project. Which I gladly did, as it sounded challenging and adventurous. Only writing the proposal was already an almost heroic feat in itself. I remember vividly how we worked all night at Italiëlaan, Zoetermeer to complete the proposal that had to be delivered in Brussels that very day. And the excitement when it turned out that we had gained the contract from DG XXIII. I also remember quite well how this victory was celebrated with champagne on EIM’s roof top terrace.
After celebrations we got started immediately as there was a tight time schedule. A major task for EIM as the main contractor of the first report was to coordinate the joint effort of all participating ENSR partners. So it was decided that Rob and myself, as the project coordinators (together with Joop Vianen), would personally visit all partners to exchange views and to explain the rules of the game. We first visited several partner institutes together, to get going and to make sure that we would tell the same story everywhere. This joint part of our trip included among others visits to IKEI in San Sebastian and ESRI in Dublin. I also remember that after we split up, it was my assignment to visit among others IFM in Bonn, SME Centre of Warwick University, and BocconiUniversity in Milan. The trip as a whole was a very exciting mission, and it gave Rob and me quite the ‘today is Tuesday, this must be Spain’ experience.
After this ‘inception mission’ it was another great experience to contribute to the research and to help coordinate the contributions of the partners. We worked until late hours regularly. Particularly during the final stages when we worked together with native speaker Stephen Creigh-Tyte, and also when we received a ‘late call’ from the EC to produce an additional chapter about the impact of the Internal Market. This latter activity, I remember, involved an ad hoc meeting with several partners at Schiphol Airport. Mind you, if I’m not mistaken, in 1992 we still had to do without Internet, e-mail and cell phones. In retrospect it is amazing how we managed to coordinate the project through fax, fixed phones, old-fashioned postal services and occasional meetings.
Another memory is how Rob discovered that DG XXIII Director-General Mr. Von Moltke, who was personally quite interested in the Observatory project, would be giving a speech somewhere in the Netherlands. We decided to attend the occasion in order to create an opportunity to have an informal conversation with our major client. This actually worked out quite well.
Altogether I have been involved in writing and coordinating the first three Observatory reports, before moving on to other challenges. However, the Observatory project remains one of my most inspiring and exciting research memories. And this is no doubt to a great extent also thanks to the perfect cooperation with Rob.
FAREWELL ENSR, by Joop Vianen, 8 March 2013
When I left EIM and ENSR end 1996 I was so sure that you would be a good and successful successor in the Chair and you were, more than that. At that time 19 partners from all EU member states participated in ENSR and as an effective and efficient network four Observatories were produced and quite some European wide research projects or projects in member state carried out. Then it was your turn to lead and manage the network and to follow the European integration and expansion process by selecting new partners either to replace old partners or to represent new member states and beyond, sometimes even before the acceptation has been officially approved. Apart from your successful diplomacy to acquire the following editions of the Observatory you also proved to be an excellent marketeer of the powerhouse of ENSR, that led to new fields of operation of the Network and of EIM and later Panteia.
As we share the moment of retirement, there is a certain hidden need to look back in history, which really is neither my favorite activity nor yours, I prefer to look ahead and to find out where to go or how to contribute to constructive changes.
But… at this occasion let my memories go back to the very beginning of ENSR: really a fantastic venture, induced by the fast European integration process in the early nineties (1992!) and the aggressive international expansion of our competitors in research and consultancy, remind NEI/Ecorys and the merging consultancy world. So strategically we, as EIM had to move across borders and it was with this mission that I visited David Storey in Birmingham first and second Gunter Kaiser from the IFM in Bonn to convince that collaboration among the institutes focusing on SMEs was fundamental to arrive at a strong research base for the European Enterprise policy. Backed with their support I continued visiting candidate institutes for the network and selected partners from all twelve member states at that time in a very short period and then we organized the first network meeting in Zoetermeer in 1991. From that moment being together in a constructive, very enthusiastic and highly qualified network the lobby for financial support started, by collaborating intensively with Heinrich von Moltke, DG XXIII, and later DG Enterprise and with several members of the European Parliament. We managed to convince them to get a general overview of the SME sector like the State of Small Business, which was, as I noticed in the US, a strong policy tool which was needed in the EU as well. I remember our visits to EU conferences, like Avignon, Strasbourg and Berlin to promote our vision and to get political and financial support. All these efforts were successful and in 1993, two years after the establishment of ENSR, the first Observatory with a breakthrough in knowledge on the state of the art of SMEs in the EC could be launched.
It was great working together with you to get the ENSR operational with the Observatory as key product, being prolonged for many years in which you and your team proved that the knowledge of the ENSR is indispensable for the EU policy for Entrepreneurship, SME ‘s and the private sector in general.
You did a fantastic job by guiding ENSR with great flexibility and diplomacy to collaborate productively during so many years now: a great and precious legacy. I am convinced that the future will need such a network and I hope your efforts will be continued by as such good successor as you have been for me.
Back to the future: I wish you a nice change of life from the ever busy-role of director of ENSR to an ever joyful life primarily with your family and also other relations. Looking forward to meet you again.