american investor september 2011

COVER STORY:

American

InvestorSEPTEMBER 2011Vol. XXI, No. 7 • ISSN 1506-3240

© American Chamber of Commerce in Poland 2011 www.amcham.pl

Is this sustainable?To maintain its global edge, outsourcing in Polandmust become more competence-intensive

Focus:AmCham Membership Survey

Antenna SoftwareChevron Upstream Europe

Executive chef Gavin BaxterMBA programs in Poland

Photo pages:Events in Wrocław,Kraków and KatowiceMonthly MeetingCEO ForumFourth of July picnic

Experts:Deloitte

Łaszczuk & PartnersSalans

Monthly Meeting:US Ambassador Lee Feinstein

MONTHLY MEETING

Opening a new chapter Polish-American relations have entered newareas beyond energy and defense—with a huge contribution from theAmerican business community in Poland, p. 20

CEO FORUM

Business as unusual Innovation is the key to getting ahead and stayingahead when times are tough, p. 22

FOCUS

Getting better all the time AmCham continues to improve its efforts tomeet the needs of its members, p. 24

A new chef in town In a world where the restaurant business is driven bytaste and economy, Gavin Baxter has the right balance of experience toembrace the two domains with quality and confidence, p. 26

Mastering a degree in business administration Insiders explain the op-tions for earning an MBA in Poland and offer tips on how to manage thedecision-making process, p. 28

Exploring for business American Investor’s Tomasz Ćwiok talks withJohn P. Claussen, Country Manager for Poland at Chevron Upstream Eu-rope, about Chevron Polska Energy Resources Sp. z o.o., an energy com-pany which recently joined AmCham, and its prospects in Poland, p. 29

Growth on the radar American Investor’s Tomasz Ćwiok talks with An-tenna Software managers James Hemmer, President & CEO, and MarkWatson, EVP and General Manager, shortly after Antenna announced thecreation of a technology center in Kraków, p. 30

EXPERTS

The problem of grounded flights The liability of air carriers for the con-sequences of unforeseeable events resulting in flight cancellations, p. 31

Follow the path of world leaders Innovation in business is understood inmany different ways, but there are some solid indicators to stick to, p. 32

Catching up with reality Product placement has finally become legal inPoland, conditions notwithstanding, p. 33

EVENTS

Sharing diverse approaches to CSR, p. 34 Science and money meet inWrocław, p. 35 Golfing to help children in need, p. 35 Reinforcing busi-ness ties in Katowice, p. 36 Business Mixer out of town, p. 37 Once ayear at the Ambassador’s place, p. 38 Innovation at the top, p. 39 Cele-brating America’s independence, p. 40

DEPARTMENTS

Newsline, p. 2, Agenda, p. 8, Content summaries in Polish, p. 44, Guideto AmCham Committees, p. 45.

SEPTEMBER 2011 AMERICAN INVESTOR 1

what’s on

www.amcham.plYour online guide to AmCham activities To maintain its global edge,

outsourcing in Poland mustbecome more competence-intensive, page 16.

Other useful sites

US Chamber of Commerce

http://www.uschamber.comAmerican Chamber of Commerce

to the European Union

http://www.amchameu.beAmChams in Europe

http://www.amchamseurope.com

COVER STORY:American

InvestorSEPTEMBER 2011 Vol. XXI, No. 7

Calendar

By clicking on red links in the Calen-

dar you may visit photo coverage ofour past events. Blue links will takeyou to the announcements of upcom-ing events.

Download this magazine!

American Investor is available in full asa pdf for download from the www.am-cham.pl website. Go to "About Us" inthe horizontal menu, and chooseAmerican Investor Magazine fromthe pop-up menu. You can downloadpast issues of American Investor dat-ing back to October 2010.

Policy Watch

Intelligence: For AmCham positionpapers, policy statements, official let-ters to government ministers and re-search papers, visit the Advocacy linkon the horizontal menu to downloadthe latest AmCham position papers.

Regions

AmCham may be closer than youthink. Apart from Warsaw, AmChamhas two regional branches which areactive all year long and offer many ex-citing opportunities to interface with regional business leaders and politi-cians. To find out more about our ac-tivities in Kraków and the region ofsouthern Poland, and Wrocław, go toRegions in the horizontal menu bar,and pick your region of interest.

Events

AmCham Monthly Meetings are one ofthe flagship events organized by thechamber. While American Investor cov-ers each Monthly Meeting exten-sively, including full-page pictorials,you can search through picturearchives of past events that includenever previously printed material. Justgo to Events and Activities, pickMonthly Meetings and scroll down forlinks to archived events.

AmCham online

Is this sustainable?

2 AMERICAN INVESTOR SEPTEMBER 2011

BOARD OFDIRECTORS

The American Chamber of Commerce in Poland

SPONSORS

Joseph Wancer – DeloitteChairman

Judith Y. Gliniecki – Wierzbowski EvershedsVice Chair

richard lada – TelestoVice Chairman

peter kaY – KPMG PolskaSecretary

stan popoW – FinacorpTreasurer

Tony HoushAPCO Worldwide

Paul FogoMiller Canfield

Piotr JuchaMcDonald’s

Thomas KolajaAlvarez and Marsal

Robert L. KońskiKulczyk Investments

John LynchLynka

Mac RaczkiewiczEx officio

Roman RewaldEx officio

Anna SienkoIBM

AmCham Auditor:

YOUR AMCHAM


MEMBERS

NewslineNews from AmCham and its members

3M3M has placed second in the BestGlobal Green Brands ranking by the In-terbrand consultancy. Interbrand stud-ied environmental compliance data fromover 3,000 companies and selected the50 best-performing brands. Consumeropinions from 10 major markets, suchas the US, Germany, India and Japan,were also reflected in the ranking. 3Mwas credited for its pioneering programPollution Prevention Pays (dating from1975), as well as its consistency in im-plementing eco-friendly programs. Inone such program in Poland, 3M man-aged to cut waste production and en-ergy and water consumption by 20%over 5 years.

In other news, 3M was named Leaderof Sustainable Development in a com-petition organized by PwC and the Pol-ish edition of Forbes, aimed at identify-ing best practices in sustainable devel-opment and building companies’ long-term value.

AmCham CommitteesAs it has accomplished its goals for thetime being, the AmCham Telecom Com-mittee has been suspended until a newagenda is formed. The Telecom Com-mittee created a platform under the Am-Cham umbrella for the exchange ofmembers’ ideas and views on trends inthe telecommunications sector inPoland. The committee’s main achieve-ment was the publication of a report ontelecom infrastructure in 2008, whichfound Poland slipping behind othercountries in the EU. The report gained alot of attention from the public followingthe press conference presenting the re-port, hosted jointly by AmCham and theFrench and German chambers of com-merce in Poland. The committee wasmost recently co-chaired by JarosławRoszkowski from Crowley Data Polandand Piotr Muszyński from Telekomu-nikacja Polska.

Meanwhile, the AmCham Tax Commit-tee and the AmCham Financial ServicesCommittee, which share many syner-gies, have merged to form the AmChamTax & Financial Services Committee.The new committee is co-chaired byPiotr Bartuzi from Bank BPH and An-drew Hope, an individual member.

AmCham Council The AmCham Council, represented byAmCham Board Member Paul Fogo andAmCham Executive Director DorotaDabrowski, met in Katowice in May withMayor Piotr Uszok and representativesof the business community in the area,including AmCham member companiesand selected non-members. The USgovernment was represented by ConsulGeneral Allen Greenberg and ConsulAaron Daviet from the US Consulate inKraków.

Opening the meeting, Mayor Uszok

said that Katowice is very happy with its coop-eration with AmCham on many conferences,which are important for business in the region.Uszok discussed the scope of infrastructureprojects undertaken by Katowice to emerge asa modern city with a good environment for in-ternational business.

Paweł Tynel, a senior manager at Ernst &Young, gave a presentation about Katowice’sstrengths for investors. He praised the workethic of staff in Katowice and Upper Silesia.

Marcin Nowak from Capgemini discussedexamples of the effectiveness of the work per-formed by staff at Capgemini’s Katowice of-fice.

David Gibson, president of project man-agement company Fluor, said that workforceturnover at the Fluor location in Gliwice ismuch lower than in such locations as Delhi,where Fluor also has operations, because staffin Upper Silesia tend to progress within thecompany instead of leaving after a few yearsof experience.

Andrzej Korpak of General Motors Manu-facturing Poland stressed that there is a hugetalent pool available in Upper Silesia, thanks tothe quality education offered to students in thearea. He noted that while there is room for im-provement in such aspects as managerialskills, almost all university graduates are nowfluent in English.

AmCham ResearchAmCham did a study of competencies andskills required from IT employees in Poland.The study, conducted in March, was designedto identify the IT areas where American com-panies in Poland will have the greatest recruit-ment needs going forward.

The report revealed that database adminis-tration is the area where IT staff are mostsought-after (identified by 63% of respon-dents), followed by mobile solutions and qual-ity testing (53% each), business intelligenceand user support (47% each), and eCom-merce/Web 2.0 and LAN/WAN networks (42%each).

Among IT tools and programming environ-ments, the most popular include programsfrom the C, C# and C++ and Java andJavascript families (63% each), followed bySQL (58%), and ASP and ASP.net and NETand XML (42% each). The most popular data-base used by American companies operatingin Poland is Microsoft SQL (68%). Other popu-lar databases include MySQL (53%), Oracle(37%) and PostgresSQL (26%).

Leading American IT companies operatingin Poland who took part in the project wereCisco, Dell, HP, IBM, Intel and Microsoft.

AmCham Policy Watch AmCham has taken initiative to improve publicprocurement procedures in Poland. Our expertworking group, which includes Jolanta Ja-worska and Aleksandra Gawrońska-Muchaof IBM, Hubert Tański of CMS CameronMcKenna, Jan Węglarz and Dariusz Rulski ofFluor, and Marta Pawlak of AmCham, has de-veloped a catalogue of best public procure-ment practices. The catalogue is based on in-formation gained from our members and indi-

cates problems with public procurement pro-cedures in Poland and their consequences,and recommended solutions.

AmCham submitted its catalogue of bestpublic procurement practices to the Presi-dent’s Chancellery, the Friendly State Extraor-dinary Commission and the Ministry of Health,which conducts numerous tenders involvinginnovative e-government projects.

Additionally, as a result of AmCham’s lobby-ing efforts, the issue of using price as the maincriterion when evaluating an offer in a publicprocurement tender is currently on the agendaof the Friendly State commission. The com-mission recently accepted a proposal thatwould amend the Public Procurement Law byintroducing a legal safe-harbor mechanismthat allows for selection of an offer taking non-price criteria into consideration when evaluat-ing an offer, such as quality, technical parame-ters, and the deadline by which the goods orservices will be provided. Subsequently, thecommission submitted the legislative proposalto the Parliament for further action.

AmCham USAThe US Chamber of Commerce and the Manu-facturers Alliance/MAPI announced that theyhave established a joint initiative to advanceawareness in the policy community about theimportance of manufacturing to continuingprosperity and economic growth.

“The chamber is in a unique position to tellthe story of US manufacturing to policymakersat all levels of the government, as well as tothe entire business community,” said ThomasJ. Donohue, president and CEO of the USChamber of Commerce. “This is the beginningof a great collaboration, and together we canplay an important role in helping create a moreconducive environment for America’s manu-facturers.”

Stephen Gold, president and CEO of MAPI,said, “The manufacturing sector plays a vitalrole in boosting economic growth, and weneed to get our message out to as wide an au-dience as possible. The chamber offers abroad network and is a credible partner toshare the story on how manufacturing can cre-ate jobs and economic growth.”

The new initiative will include several com-ponents, including a research paper fromMAPI each year for chamber members focus-

Baker & McKenzieDorota Dubyk of Baker& McKenzie has qualifiedas a legal adviser. Shespecializes in banking andfinance law. Dubyk joinedBaker & McKenzie in 2007with 10 years of profes-sional experience. Sheholds degrees from theWarsaw School of Eco-nomics and the Polish Academy of Sciences.

Piotr Rawski, a partner atBaker & McKenzie, has be-come the head of the firm’slabor law practice in War-saw. Rawski has 15 yearsof experience in labor lawand commercial law, aswell as M&A and corporatefinancial realignment pro-cedures. Rawski has beenrecommended by Cham-bers Europe, the Legal 500 and PLC Which Lawyer?

Bartosz Romanowskiof Baker & McKenzie hasqualified as a legal ad-viser. He specializes incorporate law, business in-surance, civil law andM&A. Romanowski is agraduate of the Universityof Warsaw.

Ireneusz Stolarski hasbecome an internationalpartner at Baker & McKen-zie, as head of the bankingand finance practice in theWarsaw office. He special-izes in M&A, high-risk in-vestments, and insolvencylaw. Stolarski has been rec-ommended by ChambersEurope, the Legal 500 and PLC Which Lawyer?

Bristol-Myers Squibb PolandGianluigi Lisi has beenappointed general man-ager of Bristol-MyersSquibb Poland. Lisi joinedBristol-Myers Squibb in1999. He has 26 years ofexperience in the pharma-ceutical industry, 18 ofwhich have been on inter-national assignments.

AcxiomAgnieszka Jaworska hasjoined Acxiom, the databasemarketing company, as an ex-pert and product manager tohelp Acxiom tailor its servicesto suit client marketing strate-gies. Jaworska will providestrategic advice on productdevelopment and manage re-lations with partners, agencies and media.

Members on the move

Members on the move

ing on the state of manufacturing in the US,underlying challenges and possible solutions,and annual symposia co-hosted by the cham-ber and MAPI featuring panel discussions oftop experts who will cover the topics high-lighted in the research papers. The first sym-posium is expected to be held this fall at theWashington headquarters of the US Chamberof Commerce.

MAPI also said it will make available muchof its previously member-only research to sen-ior-level AmCham executives.

AmCham WrocławAmCham in Wrocław, in cooperation with thePolish-German Chamber of Industry and Com-merce, the British Polish Chamber of Com-merce and the Scandinavian-Polish Chamberof Commerce, held a joint workshop on corpo-rate social responsibility in June. The mainbusiness partner of the event was IBM, whichhosted the event at its Wrocław delivery cen-ter.

The meeting in Wrocław was designed to in-troduce skill-based volunteering, which is oneof the major areas of CSR, as well as to high-light cooperation between private companiesand the public administration in CSR initiativesand provide examples of best practices inCSR used by international companies.

Over 50 invitees, including Deputy Governorof Lower Silesia Ilona Antoniszyn-Klik, AnnaPanasiuk from the Ministry of Labor and So-cial Policy, and representatives of Polish andinternational companies, shared the opportu-nity to discuss various approaches to CSRpolicy in local and multinational enterprisesoperating in Poland. The main businessspeakers at the event were from IBM,Siemens, Kraft Foods and Volvo. Guests alsolearned about the government’s preparationsfor the European Year of Volunteering, which isbeing coordinated in Poland by the Ministry ofLabor and Social Policy.

In other news, in June AmCham Wrocławhosted a breakfast meeting for member com-panies in Wrocław, which was a perfect oppor-tunity for face time with Prof. Jerzy Langer,Foreign Secretary of Academia Europaea andformer Deputy Minister of Science and HigherEducation. Langer is also a science and inno-vation adviser to the Mayor of Wrocław.

The European Commission recently pub-lished a Green Book on R&D and innovation,which launched a public debate devoted tothe need for a common strategy and bettersynergy in the “knowledge triangle” (research,education and innovation), to create newmechanisms and better coordination of financ-ing for R&D and innovation projects.

At the event Prof. Langer spoke about fi-nancing large-scale R&D initiatives using EUfunds and introduced the early stages of theconcept of Wrocław Research Centre EIT+,the institute’s current activities and its futuredevelopment plans. He pointed out that thecenter’s current budget of about PLN 700 mil-lion may be boosted thanks to a redefined co-hesion policy, earmarking up to 20% of struc-tural funds (instead the current 5%) for thebest pro-innovation projects in less-developedregions of the EU.

Baker & McKenzieLaw firm Baker & McKenzie generated record-high per-partner profit of USD 1.2 million in thefinancial year that end on June 30, 2011. With atotal of USD 2.27 billion in global earnings, thelaw firm saw its best financial performance inhistory. The most profit-generating offices werein Latin America, Asia/Pacific, the UK and theUS.

In other news, Baker & McKenzie advisedOvostar Union NV, a dairy producer with opera-


American

Investor

© American Chamber of Commerce in Poland 2011. All rights reserved.

American Investor is the official publication of the Ameri-can Chamber of Commerce in Poland. It is a voice for for-eign investors and the business community in Poland.The magazine strives to keep our members and otherreaders up to date by following chamber news and report-ing on the leading trends in business and policy.

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Cushman & WakefieldAleksander Loster hasbeen named a senior sur-veyor in the Capital MarketsGroup at C&W. Losterearned a law degree atAdam Mickiewicz Universityand business degrees at thePoznań University of Eco-nomics, Szczecin Universityof Technology, and SheffieldHallam University. He joinedC&W in 2002.

Anita Rajchelt has beennamed an associate at Cush-man & Wakefield. She joinedC&W in 2000 and worked forsix years as a property man-ager in C&W’s Asset Man-agement Department. In 2007she joined the Capital Mar-kets Group as a senior sur-veyor. She holds a businessdegree from the University ofŁódź.

Aneta Rogowicz-Gała hasbeen named deputy head ofC&W’s Asset ManagementDepartment. She is a gradu-ate of the Warsaw School ofEconomics and SheffieldHallam University. Rogowicz-Gała joined Cushman &Wakefield in 2004.

CB Richard EllisPiotr Śliż has been promotedto associate director in theCBRE Valuation Department. His primary focus is on valua-tion of commercial and resi-dential properties. He gradu-ated from the Silesian Univer-sity of Technology in Gliwice.He is a member of the RoyalInstitution of Chartered Surveyors and a licensed ap-praiser in Poland.

Kamil Tyszkiewicz hasjoined the Warsaw OfficeTeam of CBRE as a seniorproperty negotiator.Tyszkiewicz earned a jointlaw degree from the Univer-sity of Warsaw and the Uni-versity of Florida and com-pleted further studies in realestate.

Mariusz Wiśniewski hasbeen appointed senior prop-erty negotiator in the OfficeAgency Team of CB RichardEllis in Gdańsk, where he willfocus on leasing office prop-erties in the Tricity area.Wiśniewski holds a degree inforeign affairs from the Uni-versity of Gdańsk.

Members on the moveMembers on the move

tions in Ukraine, in its IPO on the Warsaw StockExchange. Ovostar sold 25% of its shares for atotal of PLN 93 million.

Other companies from Ukraine that Baker &McKenzie has advised on recent IPOs in War-saw include battery manufacturer Westa, whichsold 25% of its shares for PLN 130 million, andCoal Energy SA, the third-largest coal producerin Ukraine, which sold 25% of its shares for PLN225 million.

Baker & McKenzie partner MałgorzataPietrzak-Paciorek, who heads the real estatepractice in Warsaw, has been named “Best inReal Estate in Europe” in the annual Women inBusiness Law Awards from Euromoney LegalMedia Group.

BoeingBoeing has completed flight tests of the 787-8Dreamliner, equipped with Rolls-Royce engines.The tests are required to obtain flight certifica-tion. Thanks to new technologies such as com-posite materials and additional electronic sys-tems, the latest Dreamliner is more fuel-efficientand complies with the toughest environmentalstandards in the industry. By the end of 2Q2011, Boeing’s order backlog stood at USD 323billion—over four times the company’s revenueprojections for 2011.

CB Richard EllisCommercial property services company CBREhas been included on the Fortune 500 list of thelargest US-based companies for the fourthstraight year. CBRE is the only commercial realestate services firm to be included in the For-tune 500 list.

The Fortune 500 ranks US-based companiesby total revenue. CB Richard Ellis was ranked440th.

CBRE was also recognized as the No. 6provider of outsourcing services across all in-dustries, according to the annual Global Out-sourcing 100 released by the International As-sociation of Outsourcing Professionals. This isthe highest ranking for any commercial real es-tate services firm on the 2011 list.

Warsaw was ranked as the 5th-most attractivebusiness location across all emerging marketsin a study by CBRE. Business Footprints, pub-lished in August, compares the office presenceof 280 major companies across 101 countriesand 232 cities. Of the 30 most popular com-pany office locations, 17 are in emerging mar-kets.

Overall Warsaw ranked as the 12th-most pop-ular business location, behind New York (11th)and Paris (10th). The study also revealed thatmany cities in emerging markets are attractinga similar number of international office occu-piers as established business centers.

In other news, CBRE has bought Euro MallCentre Management, a specialist in the man-agement of shopping centers and malls acrossCentral & Eastern Europe. Founded in 2002,EMCM offers property and asset managementservices in the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithua-nia, Poland and Slovakia. Its clients include In-vesco, ING Real Estate Investment Manage-ment, and Carpathian Asset Management.EMCM manages over 40 properties, with over658,000 sq m and over 2,400 tenants.

Chadbourne & ParkeDorota Szubielska, a partner at Chadbourne &Parke’s Warsaw office, was honored as LegalAdviser of the Year 2011 by the National Coun-cil of Legal Advisers. The award was granted forthe first time in the history of the Polish legal ad-visers’ bar association.

CiscoNew trends are emerging in cybercrime, ashackers gradually abandon spam as a meansof attacking companies and prepare attacks tai-lored to specific corporate targets. A Cisco Se-curity Intelligence Operations study shows thatcybercrime tends to focus on hand-pickedusers or user groups, and focuses on the theftof intellectual property. Cisco said that as a re-sult, the number of spam e-mails dropped from300 billion a day in June 2010 to 40 billion aday in June 2011.

Another report, the Cisco Visual NetworkingIndex 2010–2015, has found that the number ofdevices connected to the Internet will reach 15billion by 2015—twice Earth’s human popula-tion. Meanwhile, online traffic is expected toquadruple between 2010 and 2015.

Cisco has released new hardware for Wi-FiInternet access to crowds at sport arenas. Wi-FiCisco Connected Stadium is available to venueoperators as well as phone companies. It sup-ports heavy-duty wireless connectivity to enablethousands of users in one area to access appli-cations online at the same time from theirsmartphones. The system is built aroundAironet 3500p hardware, which supports the

work of access hot spots.In the Cisco Networking Academy, three

Polish participants in the NetRiders networkengineering competition, held online in June,made it to the top 10: Maciej Deryng ofWrocław University of Technology (4th), RafałKlupa of the School of Banking and Manage-ment in Kraków (6th), and Gabriel Szuter ofthe Institute of IT Technologies in Wrocław(7th). There were 150 contestants in NetRid-ers, from 49 countries.

Cushman & Wakefield

Commercial real estate expert Cushman &Wakefield has represented three tenants inrecent office leases in Kraków. The AcademicBusiness Incubators Foundation, a networkof institutions to support and advance entre-preneurship, has become a new tenant at theM65 Meduza office building (pictured above).The same building is now home to PanoramaFinansów, a lease service provider. M65Meduza, delivered in 2009, is a 9-story build-ing with 4,600 sq m of office space.

Amer Sports Poland, the distributor of Sa-lomon products in Poland, has leased officespace at Etiuda, a 5-story Class A officebuilding in Kraków.

C&W advised Mark-7, a wholesaler of foodproducts, on a tenant contract at the MARRBusiness Park in Kraków, where Mark-7 willoccupy over 1,700 sq m of warehouse, officeand social space.

C&W also represented TPA Horwath, a taxconsultancy, in its lease of 700 sq m at Mu-rawa Office Park in Poznań, with a further 200sq m in 2013.

In sale transactions, C&W advised privateequity firm Rotaria in its acquisition of theAlma office building in Warsaw from InvescoReal Estate. Alma is a fully leased property ofabout 6,000 sq m.

Offices have taken the lead among com-mercial property markets in Europe in 2Q2011, against retail and at the expense of pe-ripheral markets, according to a market up-date published by C&W in July. The reportfound that investment activity in Europe’scommercial property markets slowed in the2nd quarter, with EUR 26.2 billion traded,11.5% less than in 1Q 2011. The office sectorsaw its share of activity rise from 36% in 1Q2011 to 46% in 2Q 2011, with trading up 10%,compared to declines of 35% for retail and46% for industrial.

Enterprise InvestorsFor the 10th consecutive year, private equityand venture capital fund Enterprise Investorshas announced the Ventura 2010 awards for itsbest managers and companies.

The Most Dynamic Company title went toKruk, the largest receivables management com-pany in Poland and Romania. In 2010, Kruk’ssales increased by 28% and its net profit by64%.

AVG Technologies, an Internet security soft-ware producer with 110 million users world-wide, won the award for Most Efficient Com-pany. AVG outperformed its rivals with a 28%net profit margin and an EBITDA to total assetsratio of 48%. AVG’s cooperation with the mostpopular web browser, Google, was recognizedas the Event of the Year and won AVG its sec-ond Ventura for 2010.

Manager of the Year was Krzysztof Kawalec,the president of Magellan, a financial institutionlisted in Warsaw which serves the medical sec-tor in Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

General Electric GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy has signed a letterof intent with Energoprojekt Warszawa, a proj-ect management company specializing in theenergy sector, for potential cooperation in theconstruction of GEH nuclear reactors. The dealcomes as PGE, the Polish energy companybuilding Poland’s first nuclear power plant, islooking at GEH technology to use for the proj-ect. GEH employs over 10,000 people inPoland.

Eight students from universities in Polandwere among 32 students who received scholar-ship in the 8th edition of the Scholars-LeadersProgram, conducted by the GE Foundation andthe Institute of International Education. Alongwith financial aid in the form of EUR 3,000 eachfor the next two years, the winners will partici-pate in the GE Foundation’s Leadership Devel-opment Program as well as volunteer pro-grams.

Hilton Warsaw

The Hilton Warsaw Hotel & Convention Centrehas been named Reliable Employer 2010 byRzecz o Biznesie, a Katowice-based organiza-tion promoting high standards in business. TheHilton Warsaw offers a variety of employee mo-tivation programs to support the everyday work

of the staff, including English languagecourses. One of the programs involves informalface time with the hotel’s general manager foremployees at all levels to share views and ex-change ideas.

Hewlett-PackardCosts related to cybercrime increased 56% thisyear, HP announced in its 2nd annual Cost ofCybercrime study. The study, compiled by thePonemon Institute, compared costs shoulderedby private companies and public institutions inthe US due to after-crash data retrieval andcomputer threat scanning in June 2010 andJune 2011. One of the findings is that the aver-age time for solving problems after a cyber at-tack was 18 days, while the average cost for fix-ing problems was USD 416,000.

HP has launched Always On personalizedtechnical support, which adjusts the extent ofthe assistance to the individual needs of HP’scustomers and partners. Part of the service isan application which enables Always On to beused on mobile devices. HP said that the newservice will boost customer satisfaction and in-crease the efficiency of HP’s technical support.

A new platform from HP, Vertica AnalyticsSystem, which is derived from the HP conver-gent system architecture, was made availableto customers in June. It enables much fasterdata input compared to older-generationrecord-based systems. The new platformboosts the cost efficiency of IT systems forcompanies.

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Sheraton SopotTomasz Szyszka has beenappointed sales and market-ing director of the SheratonSopot Hotel, ConferenceCenter & Spa. His responsi-bilities will include handlingsales strategy and coordinat-ing marketing and PR.Szyszka has 10 years of ex-perience in the hospitality in-dustry. He graduated fromthe University of Business in Wrocław.

KPMGThe number of luxury brands that are availablefrom authorized retailers in Poland increasedof over 8 percentage points from mid-2010 tomid-2011, according to a report by consul-tancy KPMG on the luxury goods market inPoland. The growth of luxury brands in Polishretail reflects the growing affluence of Polishsociety. Out of 200 brands identified as “lux-ury” by KPMG, 61% are now available directlyfrom retailers in Poland. Hi-tech goods havethe largest representation, with 86% of all lux-ury brands in this sector sold in Poland. Theleast-developed sector is luxury hotels, withonly 34% of luxury brands present on the Pol-ish market.

In other news, Poland and other CEE coun-tries improved their rate of corporate fraud dis-covery in 2009–2010, according to KPMG’sFighting Fraud report. The improvement is aresult of tougher financial controls imple-mented by companies to weather the negativeeffects of the economic crisis, and improved fi-nancial risk management. Of the respondentsin the KPMG survey, 48% said they invested inimproving their internal control mechanisms,while 43% said they will continue such invest-ments in the next two years. Despite compa-nies’ stricter measures to protect their finan-cials, KPMG noted a rise in leaks or theft ofconfidential information, with 45% of respon-dents affected by this problem.

Kulczyk Investments Kulczyk Oil Ventures, a unit of the Kulczyk In-vestments holding company, has opened anew commercial well in the Olgovskoye gasfield in Ukraine. The O-14 well is the third welldrilled in the Olgovskoye field since the com-pany acquired its interest in KUB-Gas in June2010. It is part of a larger development pro-gram for KUB-Gas assets through 2011 and2012.

ManpowerEmployers in Poland anticipate a steady hiringpace, with more than 20% expecting to in-crease staffing levels, HR specialist Manpowerreported in the Manpower Employment Out-look Survey released in July. Polish employersacross all industry sectors and all regions re-ported positive hiring intentions for 3Q 2011, asignificant increase from 2Q 2011. Of the 751employers surveyed, 22% anticipated addingto their workforce in 3Q 2011, while 8% planreductions and 67% expect no change.

When it comes to industry sectors, employ-ers in construction had the most optimistic hir-ing plans, followed by mining & quarrying andhotels & restaurants. Hiring intentions, al-though not as optimistic, were also signaledby the finance, insurance, real estate and busi-ness services sectors.

Poland’s outlook remains one of the mostoptimistic out of the 21 countries surveyed inEurope, the Middle East and Africa, trailingTurkey and Romania but even with Bulgaria.

Norton RoseLaw firm Norton Rose Piotr Strawa and Part-ners has advised energy company Vattenfall in

its sale of over 99% of the shares in UpperSilesia Energy Company, the largest electricityprovider in Upper Silesia, to Tauron Polska En-ergia for PLN 4.6 billion. The firm also repre-sented Vattenfall in the sale of Vattenfall HeatPoland, with power and heat generating plantsin Pruszków, Siekierki and Żerań and heatingplants in Kętrzyn and Wola, to the state-ownedgas company PGNiG for PLN 3 billion.

Orco GroupLa Rotisserie Restaurant at the MamaisonHotel Le Regina in Warsaw, owned by OrcoGroup, has been shortlisted as the onlyrestaurant from Poland by Dining Guide, aHungarian trade magazine, in its ranking ofCentral & Eastern Europe’s Top 10 Restau-rants. The restaurants on the list will competefor the magazine’s CEE Food Award. Winnerswill be announced at the end of the year.

La Rotisserie Restaurant was shortlisted forchef Paweł Oszczyk’s signature cuisine andwine pairings.

Earlier, La Rotisserie received the Hermesaward from Polish HoReCa trade magazinesPoradnik Handlowca and Poradnik Restaura-

tora, in the hotel restaurants category.

PanattoniWarehouse and industrial space developerPanattoni Europe has commenced a numberof built-to-suit projects in Poland. A 17,600 sqm facility for Faurecja, an automotive pro-ducer, is under construction at the Kostrzyn-Słubice Special Economic Zone in GorzówWielkopolski. A 11,165 sq m project is underconstruction at Panattoni Park Gliwice I forfood distributor Nagel-Group. In Rogoźnicaand Wola Cicha, part of Euro-Park Mielec,Panattoni has completed a built-to-suit facilityfor household appliances manufacturer ZelmerSA. Food producer Danone has commis-sioned a 13,600 sq m built-to-suit facility atPanattoni Park Święcice.

In new leases, Arteria Document Solutions,a back-office processes outsourcing company,has leased 2,500 sq m at Panattoni Park Gli-wice II. At Panattoni Park Łódź East, Paul Hart-mann Polska has renewed its lease for 5,230sq m in the park’s first building and signed anew lease for 2,000 sq m in the new thirdbuilding. In central Poland, Panattoni ParkStryów has been fully let, following the addi-tion of two new tenants, automotive glass pro-ducer Saint-Gobain Sekurit HanGlas, which

leased 4,400 sq m, and investment groupCVBC Investment Holding AG, which leased2,650 sq m.

PM Group

Civil engineers and architects from PM Grouphave been commissioned to oversee construc-tion of a new office building which will serve asthe headquarters for the Wałbrzych SpecialEconomic Zone (pictured). PM Group, whichdesigned the project, is cooperating with gen-eral contractor Eiffage Budownictwo Mitex. Theproject is scheduled for delivery in September2012.

Another construction project under PMGroup’s supervision is underway at 3M’s Euro-pean Production Center in Wrocław, with twonew production facilities built by PM Group,from which 3M will supply products for theauto, air and space industries.

PM Group is also supervising construction ofa building designed by the AA studio for theAmerican School of Warsaw in Konstancin-Jeziorna. The 6,000 sq m building will meetLEED ecological certification standards and willbe delivered by June 2012.

In cooperation with design studio Alter Polis,TPS Consult and Ernst & Young, PM Group pre-pared a study to project the optimal develop-ment of the Gdańsk airport through 2035.Gdańsk Lech Wałęsa Airport, Poland’s 4th-largest, currently serves 2.2 million passengersa year.

PwCThe Warsaw Stock Exchange generated thelargest number of initial public offerings in 2Q2011 of any exchange in Europe, but it has along way to go to match the London Stock Ex-change when it comes to the total value ofIPOs, according to the IPO Watch Europe re-port published in July by consulting firm PwC.

With 55 IPOs, including 13 on the main mar-

ket and 42 on the secondary market NewCon-nect, the WSE saw the highest number of newcompany listings ever.

The LSE generated 77% of the total value ofall IPOs in Europe in the 2nd quarter, thanks toIPOs of commodities firm Glencore and oil andgas company Vallares, together valued at EUR8.0 billion, when the entire IPO market in Eu-rope was worth EUR 13.4 billion.

Deutsche Börse generated the 2nd-largestvalue of IPOs in 2Q 2011, at EUR 959 million,followed by Warsaw at EUR 600 million.

According to a PwC report on executive com-pensation at the largest public companies inPoland, last year media and entertainment in-dustries paid the highest median yearly salariesto members of management boards (PLN 2.2million), followed by banking (PLN 1.6 million),telecoms (PLN 1.5 million) and fuels (PLN 1.3million). Companies included in the WarsawStock Exchange’s blue-chip WIG20 index paidPLN 1.4 million on average to their board mem-bers. The best-paying company was CinemaCity International, with an average of PLN 3.5million paid to each member of the manage-ment board.

SalansThe Warsaw office of Salans law firm has beenhonored in the Chambers Europe Awards forExcellence 2011 in the category Poland—Inter-national Law Firm of the Year. 2011 marks thethird time Salans has received the award. In2004 and 2009 it was recognized as the bestlaw firm in the CEE region. In the awards,Chambers, publishers of legal directories, iden-tifies the world’s leading lawyers and law firmsin various practice areas in different jurisdic-tions around the world.

Starwoods Hotels and Resorts

Members on the moveMembers on the move

PwCTomasz Bejm has become apartner at PwC, responsible forthe Technology Advisory Team.Bejm specializes in banking,insurance, telecoms, energyand fuel, and the public sector.He is a Certified InformationSystems Auditor and a Certi-fied Information Systems Se-curity Professional.

Marcin Chomiuk is a newPwC partner and will co-leadthe Indirect Tax Team.Chomiuk has published nu-merous articles concerningVAT.

Paweł Dżurak has beennamed a partner in PwC’s Ad-visory Department, where hewill lead the Operational Excel-lence Team. He specializes inM&A, corporate structural re-alignment, and building busi-ness value in managementsystems. Dżurak holds a PhDfrom the Warsaw School ofEconomics.

Andrzej Jacek Jarosz hasbecome a partner at PwC,where he heads the Tax andLegal Department in Poznańand Gdańsk and will continuehis management role in stateaid and private company serv-ices. He has over 15 years ofprofessional experience in taxreviews and tax advisory serv-ices for individual clients and capital groups.

Piotr Romanowski has be-come a partner in PwC’s Advi-sory Department. Romanowskihas 10 years of experience inmanagement consulting, cor-porate banking and the energysector. Romanowski’s compe-tencies include Poland as wellas Russia and other CEE coun-tries.

Mariusz Śpiewak has beennamed a partner in PwC’s Ad-visory Department. Śpiewakwill continue to lead the Finan-cial and Risk ManagementGroup in Poland and CEE. Hehas extensive experience inconsulting for financial institu-tions.

Piotr Urban has been namedmanaging partner of the PwCaudit systems, internal controland internal audit team inPoland and the Baltic States.Urban has 13 years of experi-ence at PwC in audit and advi-sory services for clients fromsectors such as energy, gas,manufacturing, mining, telecom-munications, and services. Urban will lead a team lo-cated in four PwC offices in Warsaw and Kraków.

The Sheraton Warsaw celebrated the 15th an-niversary of Starwood in Poland with a CrystalGala for friends, customers and business part-ners. One of the stars of the event was Sheratonchef Artur Grajber (pictured in previous col-umn), who prepared a special tasting menu forguests and a crystal anniversary cake. In its 15years on the Warsaw market, the Sheraton hashosted 1,500,000 guests.

Starwood Hotels and Resorts has launched anew customer loyalty program for event organiz-ers, Starwood Preferred Planner. Members mayexchange the points they earn from Starwood forhotel stays or airline tickets. For instance, 20,000points in the program can earn a two-day stay inthe Canary Islands, or 75,000 points a week atthe Westin Cape Town.

Catering to conference customers, Sheratonhotels have launched a new coffee break menu,developed in cooperation with Core Perform-ance, a specialist in healthy nutrition andlifestyles.

Vinoteque, a new food outlet, has opened atthe Sheraton Sopot, offering over 250 wines, raremeats and mineral waters. Vinoteque uses anEnomatic wine serving device, which allows therestaurant to offer many wines by the glass whilemaintaining the pristine quality of the wine left inthe bottle. Food sampling and takeaway areavailable, and Vinoteque also features a cigarlounge.

StafferStaffer Hospitality has launched the first cloud-based online staffing and scheduling tool forhourly workers in Poland. The tool should com-pletely automate the way hourly workforces arestaffed and scheduled. It allows workers to signinto their own accounts and sign up for availableshifts, and monitor pay and hours worked. Hoteldepartment managers have 24/7 access to theshift scheduling tool, where they can set up andcost contingent labor and view the database ofworkers. They can monitor and provide feed-back to all scheduled workers. Hundreds of hos-pitality service workers throughout Warsaw al-ready rely on the online platform, at such leadinghotels as the Hilton, the Marriott, the Hyatt andthe Sobieski.

Over the next 6 months Staffer Poland plansto deliver the tool and support services to theconstruction and healthcare industries.

Trusiewicz & SiwkoThe law firm of Trusiewicz & Siwko advised Pol-ish State Railways as it entered into a partner-ship with construction company HP Reavis tobuild a new railway station to replace the currentWarsaw West station. The project, estimated atEUR 110 million including office and retail sec-tions, is scheduled for delivery by the end of2014.

American InvestorThe ultimate connection to AmCham PolandCall to find out about advertising opportunities +48-22-520-5993


AgendaIntelligence from AmCham and its committees

Small & Medium-Sized Enterprises Committee

Bootstrap economy

Commercial banks have a tough jobconvincing small and medium-sizedenterprises in Poland to use external

financing, according to a recent report pre-pared by Bank Pekao SA in cooperationwith polling company PBS DGA. Only 22%of SMEs use bank financing, the reportfound. Tomasz Kierzkowski, head of the EUFunds and Public Programs Office in theSME Department of Bank Pekao, presentedthe main findings from the study at the SMEBusiness Forum, the fourth so far in a seriesorganized by the AmCham SME Committee.

Kierzkowski explained that becausePekao had no up-to-date data availableabout SMEs, in the autumn of 2010 thebank decided to ask the owners of smallbusinesses for their assessment of the pre-vious 12 months and the upcoming 12months in the economy at large, employ-ment trends at their own companies, busi-ness prospects, the availability of external fi-nancing, capital investment plans, exportsand innovation. Based on 7,000 interviews,the bank was able to draw a picture ofwhere SMEs stand in the economy acrossfour sectors: construction, production, serv-ices, and trade.

One of the questions was whether SMEsfinance business investments from their ownsources or resort to external sources. Fully78% of the sample looked only to them-selves for financing. Kierzkowski said, “Only22% said they use self-financing coupledwith external financing.”

Why do small companies prefer to boot-strap their financing rather than take outloans from commercial banks? As many as58% of the respondents who said they didnot use external financing explained thatthey were afraid of taking on the burden ofdebt. For 17%, self-financing was viewed ascheaper than borrowing money from com-mercial banks, while 15% said they did notneed external financing because their rev-enue streams are big enough to cover theircurrent financial needs. However, 11% saidthey did not apply for loans because theyfigured they did not qualify, while 8% gaveother reasons for not resorting to external fi-nancing.

“This is an important message to thebanking sector in Poland,” Kierzkowski said.“Some 78% of small and medium-sizedcompanies have yet to be persuaded to usecommercial banking to help their businessgrow.”

Other key findings of the report included

an overview of SMEs’ capital investments in2010 and their plans for 2011. Last year42% of SMEs were involved in some capitalinvestment projects and 58% were not.When it came to 2011 projections, 58% saidthey did not plan any investments this year,while 35% said they did have plans and 7%were not sure.

The good message for commercial bankswas that the value of investments declaredby SMEs for 2011 was much higher than for2010. Companies who said they were look-ing at additional financing also pointed toleasing, commercial loans and EU financingas their preferred forms of external financ-ing.

Kierzkowski stressed that companies inthe construction sector appeared to be themost willing to turn to external financing.“This may signal a boost in investment inthis sector in 2011,” he said.

Outsourcing was also on the agenda. Inthe Pekao survey, 33% of the sample saidthey outsource services regularly and 19%

from time to time, but 48% said they supportall business functions in-house. Of thosewho said they do outsource business func-tions, 71% said they outsource accountingand tax services. Marketing and advertisingservices were outsourced by 21% and IT by17%.

On more general questions about thebusiness environment in Poland,Kierzkowski said that SMEs ranked local ad-ministration highly as a partner for theirbusiness. They also ranked highly the qual-ity of credit advisory services provided byprivate banks.

The survey also revealed that SMEs arenot joiners, with only 8% of the sample be-longing to one or more business organiza-tions.

The first edition of the report was pub-lished in December 2010. The English ver-sion is available for download athttp://www.pekao.com.pl/mis. Another edi-tion will be published in December 2011.

A report from Bank Pekao attempts to diagnose the financingneeds of small businesses in Poland and their attitude toward the economy around them

Political Discussion Forum

People and profit

Poland should better utilize new technol-ogy and innovations in the economy inorder to continue its economic growth

and maintain competitive advantages for in-vestors in the years to come, according toGrzegorz Napieralski, leader of the post-communist party Democratic Left Alliance(SLD), who spoke at a meeting of the Am-Cham Political Discussion Forum in July.

Napieralski, who heads the ParliamentCommittee for Innovation and New Technol-ogy, said that developed countries have spe-cial policies aimed at helping promote inno-vation. It is high time Poland had its own pol-icy, Napieralski said, or the country will be aloser in the global economic game.

Napieralski noted that promoting innova-tion in the economy is not only about invest-ing in innovative technology. It requires achange in the education system as well as inthe overall economic philosophy of politicalleaders and other stakeholders. But such achange requires strong political leadership.SLD has analyzed how political leadership isput into practice in many different countries,including Israel, Germany and the UnitedStates, and it opts for establishing a newministry to oversee the development of newtechnology and innovation in Poland. In ad-dition to those areas the ministry would alsooversee academic and scientific research, aswell as patent law, so that all the elementswould move in harmony toward develop-ment of the innovative economy in Poland.

Napieralski said that the current Ministry ofRegional Development is the best candidatefor reform and could serve as thebasis for such a new ministry. Thisis because the ministry has beenhandling EU funds for regional de-velopment.

Better innovation and R&D inPoland will require better use ofEU funds for the growth of hightech and IT. Poland so far has uti-lized only a tiny portion of what itcould have spent, which is a prob-lem that needs to be addressedby the next government.

Establishing a new ministry isone of the preconditions for SLDto enter into a governing coalitionwith parties that will have enoughrepresentatives in the new Parlia-ment—presumably Civic Platform(PO) and the Polish People’s Party(PSL), which now form the govern-ing coalition.

As a potential coalition memberafter the parliamentary electionsthis fall, SLD would be interestedin heading a number of ministries,

including education, defense, and possiblyforeign affairs.

Apart from winning a healthy representa-tion in the Parliament this fall, SLD needs toreach a consensus within its own leadershipon whether or not the party is ready to takeresponsibility for governing in Poland.

In a crossfire of questions from the co-chairs of the AmCham Political DiscussionForum, Marek Matraszek and Robert Koński,Napieralski admitted that the younger gener-ation of SLD’s regional and local leaders,who are more or less Napieralski’s age (hewas born in 1974), say the party should stayaway from any government coalition talksafter the elections, because any governmentthat takes over after the incumbent PO-PSLcoalition is bound to lose popular support intime as it deals with many negative conse-quences of the PO/PSL era.

Although he did not exclude entering intocoalition talks after the elections, Napieralskidid say that there is one party that SLDwould not approach under any condition:Law & Justice (PiS), currently the largestparty in the opposition. “We believe that thePiS electorate might eventually forgive themfor entering into a governing coalition withus,” Napieralski quipped, “but we feel ourelectorate would never forgive us for makinga coalition with them.”

Napieralski said that although SLD is aleft-wing party, it is determined to supportthe development of the private sector, be-cause private business generates money forthe state budget. He said that SLD would opt

to eliminate administrative barriers that ham-per the development of business in Poland,especially in such areas as concessions andadministrative permits which businesseshave to obtain in order to grow. According toNapieralski, there is also too much fiscaloversight of the private sector in Poland.There are too many institutions that are au-thorized to conduct fiscal audits, and theiractions are not coordinated. That calls forimprovement, he said.

While Napieralski claimed that SLD wantsto balance economic freedom with protec-tion of working people, he pointed out thatthe law requires employers to look after thewell-being of their workers too. One tool fordoing this more effectively, in his view, is theLabor Code, which he argued has been lib-eralized too much by the current govern-ment.

Napieralski said that when it comes to for-eign policy, the European Union is Poland’smost important partner, followed by theUnited States. “The US is Poland’s most im-portant partner outside of the EU,” Napieral-ski said. He added that SLD would work to-wards deepening cooperation between thetwo countries, especially on such platformsas academic cooperation, including studentexchange programs. He said that the UShelped Poland a lot with the educational pro-grams it offered in the 1990s. “Those pro-grams focused mainly on democracy-build-ing,” he said. “Now it is time to change thefocus to free-economy-building.”

The SLD leader said that he is a strongproponent of closereconomic and politicalcooperation betweenthe US and the EU, andsaid Poland could serveas an important cata-lyst.

When asked aboutthe energy sector,Napieralski said he wasnot a proponent ofPoland’s nuclear pro-gram. Instead of build-ing a nuclear powerplant, which is costly,he said that Polandshould modernize itselectric grid and powerstations. A more en-ergy-efficient grid andmore efficient powerplants would add some30% more energy to thesystem without theneed to build any nu-clear plants.

Grzegorz Napieralski, leader of the main left-wing oppositionparty, shared his thoughts with AmCham on how to help busi-nesses grow while continuing to protect the social welfare ofemployees

Forum co-chair Robert Koński with SLD leader Grzegorz Napieralski

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Downtown livingWhile the residential market in Warsaw has seen a slump inmedium-range property prices and transactions, upscale loca-tions are still successful

Real Estate Committee

And the cloud rolls onOutsourcing IT functions to web-basedproviders helps companies keep costsdown to earth

Outsourcing/High Tech Committee


The Polish housing market seems to begetting worse as time passes, accordingto Paweł Sztejter, a partner at real estate

consulting firm REAS who spoke at a meetingof the AmCham Real Estate Committee inMay.

Sztejter said that most specifically Warsaw,which remains the primary market for residen-tial real estate, saw a dramatic drop in transac-tion volumes in 2010–2011. For instance, byMay 2011, there were a total of 4,500 newapartments completed in Warsaw that had notbeen sold. Of this figure, 1,500 units are in the

Businesses cannot exist without the latesttechnology, because their customersuse it and produce data that companies

need to integrate in order to spot markettrends and make proper market decisions, ac-cording to Piotr Pietrzak, chief technologist forthe CEE SEI Cloud Team at IBM Poland, whospoke at a meeting with the AmCham Out-sourcing/High Tech Committee in May. Thismeans, however, that the IT costs that busi-nesses incur are on the rise as they upgradetheir IT infrastructure to embrace more andmore data.

The cost structure for IT is complex andever-changing, and thus chief information offi-cers often do not know the price tag attachedto specific systems. “When you ask a CIOhow much it costs to operate a particular ITsystem within the company, such as ERP,CRM, or even e-mail, more than 50% of CIOswill not know the answer,” Pietrzak said, citing

Wilanów district, and about 80% are apart-ments of over 90 sq m in the mid-range pricesegment.

Other major residential markets—Kraków,Łódź, Poznań, Wrocław, and the Tricity(Gdańsk, Gdynia and Sopot)—have not faredmuch better in recent months. Of the six majormarkets, Wrocław is the one that has sufferedthe most from the crisis in residential propertysales. A year ago there were 763 unsold apart-ments in completed projects in Wrocław. Thisyear, the number rose to over 900.

When it comes to prices, the markets out-

side Warsaw saw a rather steep decline, tonominal levels from the first quarter of 2007,which represents an even steeper decline inreal terms because of inflation.

The price drop in Warsaw has not been sodramatic, however, due to its resilience as thecapital. In fact, Warsaw is faring quite wellwhen it comes to up-market residential. Thedistrict of Mokotów is still popular with buyers,while other districts are witnessing a revival.The most outstanding example is PragaSouth, thanks to the development of the newnational sports arena there, involving a large-

scale urban renewal project which will changethe image of the area upon completion nextyear. Part of the Praga South revival has alsocome about thanks to rapid growth of theGocław neighborhood.

But nationwide, developers have problemsselling their new projects. This situation hasobviously affected the number of new residen-tial projects started this year. Before 2010there were an average of 12,000 apartmentsstarted each year, but in 2010 only 10,000were delivered to the market. The drop in newprojects is supposed to stabilize the market.

But the demand for new apartments is ex-pected to remain limited. According to a studyby REAS, only 3% of all 900,000 householdsin Warsaw are potential buyers of new apart-ments, which translates into only 12% of allyearly transactions in residential property inthe city. Sztejter said this is the real reason de-velopers find it difficult to sell new residentialproperty.

Sztejter said that the outlook for 2011 is notencouraging. Developers in such markets asŁódź, Poznań and the Tricity are especiallyunder stress. “There were more project can-cellations than new transactions in thoseplaces,” Sztejter said.

According to Sztejter, one idea to boostsales of new apartments would be to deliverthem in turnkey condition rather than coldshell, which is the rule now. “This is because

in the past only a tiny fraction of homebuyerswere interested in turnkey apartments,”Sztejter said. “This has changed recently,however, with as many as 60% of potentialhomebuyers having a strong preference forturnkey apartments, according to a study byGFK Polonia.”

Sztejter explained that buyers prefer to han-dle the interior fittings and decoration on theirown instead of outsourcing the work and cov-ering the cost. But if developers introduced aturnkey standard as a value-added servicewithout actually charging for it, Sztejter thinksthis would boost sales of new apartments.

Despite the crisis in residential propertythere are outstanding success stories as well.One of them was showcased by anotherspeaker at the Real Estate Committee meet-ing, John Geoghegan, country director atMennolly Poland, the developer of the upscaleresidential complex Nowe Powiśle in the Pow-iśle neighborhood of Warsaw. The project,completed between October 2007 and De-cember 2010, delivered 296 apartments to themarket, along with six retail units and severaloffices. By May the developer had sold 75% ofall apartments, at an average of PLN 14,600per sq m. “At the moment we make a saleevery week, averaging about 80 sales a yearor PLN 12 million a month in transactions,”said Geoghegan. “This is not normal in thePolish market.”

Geoghegan underlined that the seed of theproject’s success was the developer’s focuson quality. First off, Mennolly invested in asuper location, a block between the recentlyopened Copernicus Science Center and theWarsaw University Library. Then the developerinvested in quality design, hiring one of themost renowned Polish architects, Prof. StefanKuryłowicz. (Kuryłowicz since died in a planecrash in Spain in June.) It is thanks toKuryłowicz that the Nowe Powiśle complex isviewed as one of the best residential com-pounds in Warsaw today, Geoghegan said.

Mennolly is now reaping the fruits of its boldinvestment. Potential buyers represent allwalks of Warsaw life. The developer recog-nizes each buyer’s uniqueness, letting themhave their say in the interior design of theapartments they plan to buy.

While sales of the Nowe Powiśle residentialdevelopment are thriving, the retail section ofthe complex has had remarkable success aswell. The British luxury car brand Bentley hastaken space there for its first dealership inPoland.

Mennolly concluded by saying that there isgood money in Poland for good product. “Butit has to be a good product,” he warned. “Youwon’t get away with plaster finishes and cheapwindows.”

Cloud computing became reality as broadband sped up

an IBM survey. “This is because there are a lotof hidden costs involved in IT. It is not easy tocalculate the real cost because of the need toconstantly grow it.”

This is one of the reasons cloud computingis becoming so popular with businesses.“With cloud computing, companies deal withmore flexible and transparent IT costs,”Pietrzak said. “Cloud computing providershave to know how much they need to put intotheir budget to maintain their operations.”

Pietrzak said that almost all of companies’IT needs can be supported by cloud comput-ing. The problem is that companies do notknow it. “The technology is available, but theproblem is that it is not known widely enoughyet,” Pietrzak said. “We can produce fasterprocessors and larger and faster discs. Com-panies do not absorb the new technologyquickly enough to support their daily businessand operations.”

Cloud computing providers are confident,but cloud computing, as an idea, is nothingnew. “Cloud computing is a term that covers awide variety of technologies, including hard-ware offered as a service and also software of-fered as a service,” Pietrzak explained. “Theseare service delivery models that have beenaround in the market for years. The cloudcomputing hype began when providersstarted to offer competitive pricing and moreflexible service. It was possible when technol-ogy advanced to the point of offering broad-band connectivity. It changed the way compa-nies could leverage the existing technology.”

What is different now from 10 years ago isthat companies now have to reconsider theirbusiness models in order to see how they canapply cloud computing to get a competitiveadvantage out of it.

Pietrzak observed that IT people employedby companies are often afraid of cloud com-puting, because they think that if the companythey work for outsources IT to the clouds, theirjobs will be in jeopardy. This is the wrong ap-proach, Pietrzak said: “IT professionals incompanies will not disappear because ofcloud computing. They will be needed to rein-vent business processes and build entirelynew markets.”

Pietrzak said that with cloud computing, ITissues are not going to be easier for compa-nies. “They are going to be much more com-plicated. Offering the simplicity of a process tothe end user often means that internalprocesses at the provider’s end are muchmore complex. So with cloud computing—which is focused on providing simple solu-tions to multiple clients—it means that IT peo-ple in companies will actually have more workto make the process smooth and simple.”

Pietrzak admitted that there are limits tocloud computing: “Because of data protectionregulations, which prohibit certain data frombeing processed outside the country for in-stance, some cloud computing providers can-not offer e-mail services or other services thatrequire transferring sensitive data outside ofthe company to another country where thecloud computing providers have theirservers.”

“This is something many politicians andbusiness leaders seem not to notice,” hesaid.

Piechociński said that part of the prob-lem is that the public does not understandthe importance of transport infrastructurefor the development of the national econ-omy. “Good infrastructure will not emergeon its own,” Piechociński said. “However, apopular view on how to build new infra-structure is to have a private investor workwith the public sector, through the public-private partnership scheme, regardless ofwhether the private company is going tomake a profit on its involvement in the proj-ect or not. Even educated people think thisis the way to go.”

Another problem is that Polish politicianshave failed so far to draw up clear rules ofengagement for the private sector so it canget involved in the development of infra-structure projects—not only in transporta-tion, but also in energy and other sectors.“Poland needs a clear policy toward privateinvestors,” Piechociński said. “Politiciansso far have failed to set clear goals for theprivate sector. What they have done—amending the Public-Private PartnershipAct—is not enough because the act is adead letter anyway. So the problem is notonly a bad atmosphere in the public admin-istration for contacts with the private sec-tor.”

Speaking more broadly, Piechocińskinoted that Poland’s political position withinthe EU is on the rise, which will allow thecountry to have its say in shaping the poli-cies of the EU in the years to come.“Poland has finished its entry into the EU, aprocess which is ended symbolically by thecountry’s Presidency of the Council of theEuropean Union,” Piechociński said.“Being a newcomer to the EU meant forPoland that the country had to either ac-cept or reject several pan-European plans,schemes, and projects drawn up by othercountries before Poland became an EUmember. But the time when Poland wasonly a consumer of EU solutions is about toend. A new phase is starting in whichPoland will be a co-author of economic andpolitical plans and schemes that will affectthe entire European Union.”

Piechociński added that this new situa-tion will have an impact on business organ-izations in Poland, which will have to refo-cus their attention from domestic legislationto rules coming out of Brussels. Some ofthe issues regard the quality of regulationsgoverning business. “Other issues may re-gard the national bias of some EU regula-tions,” he said, “as member countries try toprotect their interests in many differentways on different legislative platforms.”

According to Piechociński, the big ques-tion for Poland will be the state of its econ-omy after 2020, when Poland is no longerabsorbing huge EU financial aid. “We canmake the same mistakes that Ireland andSpain made,” Piechociński said. “Thosecountries, for years, were presented asleaders in utilization of EU aid. But after aperiod of very dynamic growth, they haveexperienced a dramatic economic slow-down.” The trick for Poland will be to avoidmaking the same mistakes.

Noah’s HighwayPoland’s efforts to upgrade its road systemare stymied by the requirement to protectnatural habitats

Infrastructure Committee

Subsidizing farmingThe EU system of direct subsidies to farmerswill probably become even more complex

Agri & Food Committee

Know the ropesProducers must learn theins and outs of the PolishTrade Inspection

Consumer Products Committee

EU money is not enough

Four corridors of the strategic Trans-Eu-ropean Transport Network cuttingacross Poland, linking Eastern and

Western Europe and connecting SouthernEurope with the Baltic harbors, will be signifi-cantly modernized through the 2011–2015National Road Development Program coordi-nated by Poland’s General Directorate forNational Roads and Motorways (GDDKiA).According to Katarzyna Maranda, deputy di-rector of the Environment Department atGDDKiA, who met with the AmCham Infra-structure Committee in May, the program issimple from the engineering point of view. Itis more difficult from the point of view of envi-ronmental protection, however, because thepath for the network collides with several na-tional parks, nature reserves and landscapeparks in Poland that are under the protectionof the European Union’s Natura 2000 pro-gram. “They are really impossible to bypass,”Maranda said.

When a road cuts across a nature reserve,it poses a set of environmental issues. For in-stance, if the area is the natural habitat of ani-

There is a question mark hanging over thefuture of road infrastructure developmentin Poland, because the country does not

have enough money in its budget to provide itsown portion of financing for all constructionprojects that may qualify for co-funding fromthe European Union, according to JanuszPiechociński, a member of the Polish Parlia-ment from the Polish People’s Party (PSL) andvice chair of the Parliament Infrastructure Com-mittee, who spoke at a meeting with the Am-Cham Infrastructure Committee in June.

The system of direct subsidies to farmers,which is one of the flagship mechanismsof the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy

(popularly known as “CAP”), will be continuedin the next EU financial perspective, whichstarts in 2014, according to Waldemar Guba,deputy director of strategy at the Departmentof the European Union and International Coop-eration at the Polish Ministry of Agriculture andRural Development, who spoke at a meeting ofthe AmCham Agri & Food Committee in June.Guba noted that despite the criticism of directsubsidies to farmers, even in the following fi-nancial perspective, the system will be contin-ued due to the growing prices of energy andnatural resources.

The system may be modified, however.“There is a trend within the European Commis-sion to treat subsidies to farmers as a form ofpublic aid focused on the maintenance of nat-ural resources, instead of help to boost prof-itability,” Guba explained. “This may be exe-cuted through a new aid program.”

Guba noted, however, that restrictive regula-tions governing environmental protection infarming may have a negative impact on theagricultural market in Poland, because it is rel-atively underdeveloped and is striving to im-plement modern mass-market productionmethods. “More restrictive regulations govern-ing farming may negatively affect the competi-tive edge of Polish farmers against their com-petitors in the European Union as well as out-side of the union,” Guba said.

Meanwhile, farmers are already under pres-sure from the restrictive CAP policy. Farmerswho receive CAP subsidies are routinely in-

Dariusz Łomowski, deputy director of theDepartment of Trade Inspection at theOffice of Competition and Consumer

Protection (UOKiK), met with the AmChamConsumer Products Committee in July topresent the legal framework that governs theTrade Inspection in Poland, the goals of the in-stitution, the system it has in place to combatviolations, and the rights and duties of busi-nesses in the marketplace.

The Trade Inspection is a governmentagency that monitors the legality of businessactivities in selected spheres of commerce. Al-though the list of commercial activities that theTrade Inspection does not cover is long (suchas agricultural products, banking, finance, in-surance, IT and R&D), the agency has a fingerin many pies. It has a say on nearly all issuesinvolving trade in consumer goods and com-panies that bring them to the marketplace.

mals, the new road has to include over-passes and underpasses that will allow theanimals in the area to move freely from oneside of their habitat to the other. The designof the passages has to take into account thetype of animals—frogs, for example, requirewater bridges, and deer require landbridges—as well as the population size.

But passages to protect animals are notenough. The highway itself has to be pro-tected against animals, which could causecollisions if they intrude into the motorway. Tothis end, different types of protective fenceshave to be erected for small and large ani-mals. “There are regulations governing thetype of fence to use, even in the constructionphase,” Maranda said.

But while certain aspects of protecting theenvironment during road construction anduse are clear and simple to follow, there aremore complex legal issues with planning newroads, especially when they cross areas thatare on the Natura 2000 list. The list is stillopen, and new sites are being added. AsMaranda explained, “Sometimes those newly

added sites come as big surprises for GDD-KiA.”

As of May, the Natura 2000 list included364 protected sites in Poland, considered tobe natural habitats, covering 8.1% ofPoland’s landmass. Meanwhile, the Polishgovernment has submitted an additional 469sites to the European Commission for inclu-sion in the Natura 2000 list. “We anticipatethat all the proposed sites will be acceptedby the commission,” Maranda said, “whichwill boost the number of protected sites inPoland to 833.”

She added that the European Commissionthinks that along with the sites already identi-fied by the government, Poland should cre-ate 34 more sites for the protection of rarespecies and their natural habitats. If their sta-tus becomes “strict protection,” they will be-come huge obstacles for GDDKiA’s develop-ment of road infrastructure.

Maranda said that while GDDKiA is moni-toring the development of the Natura 2000list, the directorate, which is the largest in-vestor in road construction in the country,has no other choice but to draw up new roadplans to bypass the protected regions. How-ever, there are instances where constructionhas already begun when suddenly a pro-tected area is established along the route.For GDDKiA, it is usually impossible to aban-don what has already been built, and thenthe agency has to recultivate, one-for-one,the land covered by construction work (witheach hectare claimed for construction beingoffset by a hectare of newly recultivatedarea). This slows down completion of theagency’s construction projects.

When the agency is forced to reroute aroad project it also loses time, because thewhole investment process—including feasi-bility studies and the like—has to be startedagain from scratch.

Maranda described Natura 2000 as one ofthe main impediments to smooth develop-ment of roads in Poland. “We have to be incompliance with the EU legislation on protec-tion of nature,” she explained. “So we do thebest we can. But Natura 2000 was introducedin other countries in the EU when they hadalready built their road networks, so it is acompletely different problem in Poland thanin the West.”

Poland’s budget for road construction is shrink-ing, with no coherent financial policy in sight

Infrastructure Committee


12 AMERICAN INVESTOR SEPTEMBER 2011 SEPTEMBER 2011 AMERICAN INVESTOR 13

Piechociński stressed that while Poland mayspend up to PLN 34 billion on road construc-tion this year, it will be able to come up withonly PLN 26 billion next year and PLN 8 billionin 2013.

According to Piechociński, whose party is amember of the current governing coalition,thanks to cohesion funds from the EU the cur-rent government will go down in history as theone that started the largest number of roadconstruction projects ever in Poland. “Polandgot a significant boost in financing infrastruc-

ture development following the country’s entryinto the European Union in 2004,” he said.“However, when the global economic crisis hitin 2008, some investment processes werestalled.”

Piechociński said that in 2009 the govern-ment decided to take PLN 10 billion off of theroad infrastructure development budget. Thereality was that the money from the EU was toomuch, compared to Poland’s ability to co-fi-nance projects, and therefore Poland could notutilize it. In order to keep at least some invest-ment projects going, in 2009 the governmenthad to cut road maintenance expenditures,passing some of them on to local govern-ments.

According to Piechociński, EU funding aloneis not enough for Poland to implement a ra-tional policy for development of its transporta-tion infrastructure, especially given the manyyears of neglect in infrastructure investments.

Road construction is subject to strict environmental rules

spected for their compliance with CAP regu-lations. “Farmers are entitled to 100% subsi-dies only when they comply with the CAPregulations 100%,” Guba said. “If farmers arefound to be willfully breaching the regula-tions, they may be deprived of even 100% ofthe subsidies.”

Another problem, according to Guba, ishow to define agricultural innovation at a timewhen some CAP subsidies are expected tobe rechanneled to support the developmentof innovation in farming. But there is a rub.“Usually it is big companies that make gooduse of innovations,” said Guba. “Meanwhilethe farming market in Poland is dominated bysmall and medium-sized farms. This is thespecific nature of Polish agriculture. So if wesupport innovation in farming, we have tomake sure we support mechanisms that ben-efit not only big companies, but also smalland medium-sized farmers.”

Guba noted that the definition of farming isalso evolving within the EU and may soonembrace other areas than just food produc-tion. Renewable energy is one of them. “TheMinistry of Agriculture is a strong proponentof renewable energy within the EU,” Gubasaid. “At present the discussion about renew-able energy, such as biomass, is very techni-cal. It focuses on whether bio-energy may re-ally contribute to the reduction of green-house gas emissions. We are looking atwhether large-scale production of biomasswill have a negative effect on maintaining thequality of soil, for instance. So the discussionis really technical.”

The goal of the Trade Inspection is tomake sure that companies adhere to the reg-ulations governing the products and servicesthey offer. The Economic Freedom Act, whichis the bill of rights for businesses in Poland,authorizes the Trade Inspection to audit legalcompliance by businesses.

The agency is generally required to notifybusinesses in advance when it intends toconduct an inspection, but inspectors maysometimes show up unannounced, particu-larly when they are investigating a consumercomplaint, a safety issue or an alleged seri-ous breach of law. Agency inspectors arealso authorized to conduct controlled pur-chases of suspicious goods, in order togather evidence for further proceedings.

At the meeting, Łomowski walked the par-ticipants through each step of the inspectionprocedure, explaining the applicable regula-tions. He highlighted along the way the rightsthat businesses have and the typical prob-lems that may surface during and after an in-spection. He also explained some of the limi-tations of the system that may affect the ac-tions taken by inspectors.


Accounting forhuman assetsThe numbers show that employee engagement creates shareholder value

Corporate Social Responsibility Committee


Companies that are seen by their work-force as good employers have a highershare value than companies that are

not good employers, according to Paul Her-man, a promoter of the concept of investingfor positive impact on human and social is-sues as well as natural resources, who metwith the AmCham CSR Committee in May.

Perhaps this is because happy employeesare more inclined to commit their skills to theirprofessional work. Herman cited a Gallup sur-vey of employee engagement, which coveredsome 3 million workers in the US. Only 18%of the respondents said they used their bestskills at work every day, and 80% said theydid not. Herman said that if the 80% only hada work environment that engaged their poten-tial, the companies they work for would bene-fit from their innovative skills, which couldtranslate into new products and great cus-tomer service.

Herman is the founder and CEO of invest-ment firm HIP Investor (HIP stands for“Human Impact and Profit”). He told the Am-Cham committee that the rating by Forbesmagazine called “The Best Companies toWork For” is the best indicator of how happyemployees increase their company value. TheForbes rating is based on a survey of the peo-ple who work for companies that are rated asthe best—both publicly traded and closelyheld. The survey asks about their employeesatisfaction, how engaged they are with thecompany, and what their salaries are. The rat-ing first appeared in 2007, and a new editioncomes out every spring. Herman said thatpublic companies that were top-rated as em-ployers offered above-market returns on theirstock over the period of 2007–2010.

One of the best examples to support thistheory is Google, which for years has beenone of the most profitable companies forshareholders and which notably engages itsemployees, for example by giving them the

freedom to work on a project of their ownchoosing one day a week.

Employee engagement boosts companies’value in Poland too, Herman claimed. Publiccompanies in Poland are rated under severalperformance indicators, one of them beingthe Respect Index, which seeks to identifycompanies managed in a responsible andsustainable manner. It also puts strong em-phasis on the investment attractiveness ofcompanies, as characterized by such aspectsas reporting quality, the quality of investor re-lations, and information governance. Fromyear to year, this index includes some 15 to20 companies listed on the Warsaw Stock Ex-change. Herman said that during the first yearof the index’s existence, the value of the com-panies in the index grew by about 30%, whilethe market average was about 15%. “Oneyear does not make a big difference,” he ad-mitted, “but it is something to look at andconsider. That could be a topic to discuss inPoland.”

Herman pointed out that there are datashowing that happy employees translate intoa company’s better future results. However,investors do not necessarily appreciate thiscorrelation.

This is because of modern accountingstandards. “You must have heard that peopleare companies’ most valuable asset,” Her-man explained, “but in general people arenot included in financial statements as anasset. They are a cost on the income state-ment and a liability on the balance sheet.Sometimes if you do an acquisition of an-other company and you pay your price, peo-ple might be an asset on the balance sheetas good will.”

In the US, companies that report their prof-its to Wall Street are under pressure from thestock market to show more profit, Hermanexplained. “Companies want to reduce costs,and it means that they reduce people—in-

stead of taking this asset, which hopefully isan appreciated asset, and reinvesting in peo-ple to create productive capacity in intellec-tual property, products and services.”

Where do people come in? “A higher andhigher portion of total stock price is comingfrom intangible assets,” Herman said, refer-ring to the US experience. “Desks, comput-ers and chairs are real assets. Unfortunately,to the accounting world, people are intangi-ble assets. But I think I’m pretty tangible, cre-ative and productive.”

Herman said that his company, HIP Invest-ment, analyzes annual reports from compa-nies around the world. “The only examplethat we have found so far of a possibility ofputting people on the balance sheet is fromInfoSys, a global technology company head-quartered in India,” he said. “Their 2008–2009 report has a human resource evalua-tion. They took the number of software pro-fessionals and the support staff who servethe customers, and put a value on human re-sources in Indian rupees. They talked aboutthe producing capacity of people. That calcu-lation ends up leading to something calledreturn on human resources value or return onassets.”

When people are booked as an asset,however, the results can be puzzling. “Whatyou usually find on return on assets in a hightech business, such as computers, is from20% to 40%, which is a very attractive return.But according to InfoSys, the return onhuman assets is 5–6%. So you might say it isa threat. We actually don’t know whether it isgood or bad, because nobody else is doing itin this way. What they showed us for 2008and 2009 was under 5% and 6% respectively,so it was a positive trend on return on assets.But we don’t know whether they were betterthan Tata or IBM. This is something that candevelop.”

Herman said that given the current stan-dards of international accounting, people willcontinue to be a cost on the balance sheet.“This is something we need to invest in tohelp them appreciate it, in order to createnew products and services to keep cus-tomers coming back.”

Herman also commented on the UNHuman Development Index, a scorecard forthree categories (economic, social and envi-ronmental) used to grade countries and re-gions. “The top-rated are typically Scandina-vian and English-speaking countries,” Her-man said. “Bottom-rated are countries inAfrica.” Interestingly, while there is a humandevelopment index for countries, there hasbeen no such index for companies. Now HIPInvestment has prepared one. “It is a humandevelopment index that is linked to profitabil-ity,” Herman explained. “The business casefor doing it is that customers want to do goodwith what they buy and how they invest.”

Although they may be difficult to obtain,Herman thinks that the numbers depictingthe correlation between human developmentand profitability should be available. “Thereal problem,” he explained, “is a human bar-rier, not a technical barrier to taking us intothe 21st century and tapping into all of thatinformation, which is available from a numberof government, non-government and aca-demic institutions.”

On the books employees are only a cost

Engage, engage and sellExamining how brands can make an impactthrough social media

AmCham Media Patronage

Social media are a two-way conversationthat takes place between customers,but marketers are part of the dialogue,

according to Jake Fisher, cofounder of theNew York-based social media marketing firmAttention, who spoke at a conference in War-saw in July announcing a partnership inPoland between Attention and Valkea Media, aniche magazine publisher whose portfolio in-cludes the English-language weekly WarsawBusiness Journal and an array of custom-made magazines for companies in various in-dustries.

Although technologically social media in-clude blogs, discussion forums, social net-working, micro-blogging platforms with mediasharing, and other forms, social media aremore about interaction than technology. “It isabout how content connects with people,” asFisher put it.

This would explain why companies withouttraditional media and publishing expertise arenot the best providers of content for onlinemarketing. Without the knowledge of the im-pact their content may have on social mediausers, their marketing efforts may easily goastray and do more harm than good to thebrands and their reputation. Fisher mentionedthe example of a global marketer that failed todevote proper attention to the posts it gener-ated on its Facebook profile, resulting inthreats of legal action from users. Anotherglobal brand misjudged its Facebook strategyto the point that it had to close the profile,which again generated legal claims fromFacebook users who had contributed to theprofile.

While ending up in court is an extreme ex-ample, companies who do not have contentthat is crafted for specific use on social net-works are at best wasting their money. Tospend wisely, marketers need to consider anumber of factors.

One is that, contrary to popular belief, socialmedia cannot be equated with Facebook.

“Facebook is a website that we use when wewant to get a certain behavior out of our cus-tomers,” Fisher said. “Facebook is a tactic,and it can be a really powerful tactic, but it isnot the center of our social media strategy.”

Fisher illustrated his analysis with refer-ences to Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and so-cial blogs. He said that each of the platformsrequires a different marketing strategy, just asold-time media require different marketingstrategies too. “Facebook is incredible at en-gaging with your customers, making a dia-logue with them,” Fisher said. “It is very muchabout customer relationships.” YouTube, inturn, is the right platform for driving aware-ness: “You can generate hundreds of thou-sands of views—lots of people that are ex-posed to your message on video.” But, Fishersaid, YouTube is terrible for driving traffic tomarketers’ websites. “Less than one-tenth ofone percent of people who watch a video onYouTube actually click a link instead of watch-ing that video.” But the blogosphere, he said,“is amazing for driving demand. It is about thataffinity. If I’m following a football club, I’m click-ing every single blog and can’t get enough ofit.” What about Twitter? “It can be really power-ful in influencing because it helps us reach theright group of people.”

Those different strategies can be properlyexecuted only when “informative decisions”are made with the support of data that depictthe behavior of individuals who become in-volved in the interaction. “Every action onlinecreates data, and data can be mined to get in-sights into the actions of our clients,” Fishersaid. “It show how they engage with ourbrands and with each other. Social media ispretty measurable. There are different metricsto get to know different things, such as point-of-sale sales, loyalty, engagement, peer mar-keting, and other parameters. Metrics canhelp marketers make business decisions re-garding brands. Such data is not cheap to get,but as with any media planning for any kind of

advertising campaign, data is an essential partof making knowledgeable decisions.”

But those metrics need proper understand-ing. “A proper Facebook strategy is not aboutthe number of friends you have,” Fisher said.“The number of friends on Facebook is proba-bly the worst metric. I can buy half a millionfans of my Facebook page, and it takes notime. The important thing after that is what youare going to do with those 500,000 fans—howyou are going to sustain engagement.”

According to Fisher, a successful marketingstrategy on Facebook is not measured by thenumber of fans or friends that a marketer’sprofile has, but the number of “likes” it gener-ates over time and how many times the con-tent is viewed and commented on, includingtext comments as well as comments consist-ing of photos and other media.

While marketers on social media must beengaged in the conversation between theircustomers, they also need to be looking atuser-generated content. Some content, suchas critical comments about products or serv-ices, may not be what marketers hope to see.Again, Fisher said, there are ways of measur-ing user-generated content for whether or notit is driving marketers’ business objectives.

One example of how complex marketing onsocial media may be involved getting usersengaged with a beer brand. Following an un-satisfactory marketing effort, Fisher’s com-pany discovered that 7 pm on Sunday is thebest time to push beer on social media. “If weposted at that time we got five times as manyengagements as we did posting at any othertime,” Fisher said.

While all the metrics and strategies for so-cial media marketing are essential, marketerswill not succeed without original content that isunique, trustworthy and engaging. This is whyAttention partnered with Valkea Media tomerge the knowledge of interactive media withold-school knowledge of how to create con-tent that suits different targets.

Consumers come face-to-face with online content


COVER STORY: Outsourcing

No matter how we perceive the ef-fects of the recession—as fuelingthe growth of the outsourcing sec-

tor because firms seek more cost-effectivebusiness solutions, or as hampering it be-cause more investors would have set upoutsourcing operations had it not been forthe unfavorable economy—the numbersdepicting the growth of the outsourcingsector in Poland are impressive.

According to the report entitled “Busi-ness Services Sector in Poland” from theAssociation of Business Service Leaders,as of December 2010 Poland had 282 out-sourcing centers owned by 220 foreigncompanies. Together they supported nearly70,000 jobs. Of this number, 205 werebusiness process outsourcing centers(hired to provide selected non-operationalbusiness processes, including IT) andshared services centers (hired to handlebusiness processes for clients or affiliates).There were 77 outsourcing centers spe-cializing in research and developmentcommissioned by other companies.

In the geographical spread, Warsaw isthe hot spot for outsourcing, home to 54centers, followed by Kraków (43), Wrocław(38) and Łódź (31). Over half of all out-sourcing centers are located in these fourcities, but other budding hubs include theTricity (Gdańsk, Gdynia and Sopot) andPoznań.

Perhaps more impressive than the sheernumber of jobs that foreign outsourcingcompanies have created in Poland is thespeed at which they have done so. Whenthe global economic crisis hit in 2008, theyemployed 46,500 people. Two years later, atthe end of 2010, the number had gone to69,000—nearly 50% growth. The trend isstill upwards. ABSL estimates that thenumber hit 75,000 by mid-2011.

The five largest outsourcing employersin Poland include four companies withAmerican capital. Capgemini employs over3,000 people in Kraków, Katowice andWrocław. General Electric supports over3,000 jobs in Gdańsk and Warsaw. IBMemploys a similar number at centers in

Kraków, Wrocław, Gdańsk and Warsaw.France Telecom’s outsourcing operationsin Poland maintain nearly 2,500 jobs, asdoes the Hewlett-Packard center inWrocław.

Last year was a good year for outsourc-ing. The main market developments in-cluded the expansion of Infosys BPOPoland for its parent company InfosysTechnologies Ltd to provide service to SAPclients. ACP Pharma opened a financialservices center in Rzeszów, and Amwayopened a business services center in Za-bierzów (counted as part of Kraków).Wrocław saw new centers opened by IBM(shared services) and McKinsey (R&D). InPoznań, IKEA and Kennametal openedshared services centers, and Sony PicturesEntertainment opened a center for finan-cial and accounting services in the Tricity.Citibank opened a new R&D center inŁódź.

Investors remained busy in the first halfof 2011. Ernst & Young opened a sharedservices center in Wrocław, BSH a center

in Łódź, and McKinsey a support servicescenter in Poznań. New centers from vari-ous investors were in the pipeline in Łódźand Białystok.

competency pyramidOutsourcing is sometimes perceived as asweatshop industry, where young peopleare hired to perform simple, nearly auto-matic tasks. While this is true to some ex-tent in manufacturing and call centers, it isfar from reality when it comes to BPO.

Consider Lionbridge, a NASDAQ listedUS company which provides content local-ization services (it works for global mar-keters, software developers and computergame developers, among others, to adaptall types of content of their products to thelanguage and cultural specifics of the tar-get group).

Lionbridge has four global delivery cen-ters, in China and India, and a joint opera-tion in Warsaw and Žilina, Slovakia. It isthanks to the development of employeecompetencies that the Warsaw/Žilina deliv-

ery center managed to boost the numberof jobs it supports from 150 and 35 respec-tively five years ago to over 400 and 80 byJuly this year.

“In the beginning we were undertakingrelatively simple, clearly defined tasks,”said Jacek Stryczyński, general manager ofLionbridge Poland and Slovakia. “We deliv-ered a piece of an entire project that wasmanaged someplace else, in the US, West-ern Europe or Japan. Gradually, however,we began to handle more and more com-plex elements of the projects, and eventu-ally got to manage entire processes forclients.”

Now Lionbridge engineers work directlywith their clients. “We handle client rela-tions so we are at the top of the valuechain, which is one of the prerequisites fora stable business in the future,” saidStryczyński. “But we continue to developour value chain further.” He added that be-cause of the success of this developmentstrategy, nearly 100 Lionbridge staff areproject managers, including many whohave been certified by the Project Manage-ment Institute.

IBM has a similar story of competencebuilding. IBM’s first outsourcing venturewas a financial and accounting center,opened in 2005, which supported 89 jobs.Today there are three centers maintainingan estimated number of 3,000 jobs (thecompany does not reveal its local figures).IBM outsourcing centers provide servicesnot only to IBM’s internal network, but toexternal clients as well—a significantprogress in competencies. According toJolanta Jaworska, government relations di-rector at IBM and vice president of ABSL,“It is a much more demanding job thanservicing your company internally. Whenyou service your own company, you aredealing with the same internal processes.When you are servicing external clients,you have to adjust to their processes insuch areas as IT, human relations, pro-curement, and financial procedures. Polishworkers can successfully adjust to such re-quirements. This is what gets noticed inthe West and what attracts investors toPoland. They perceive the country as aproven ground for outsourcing.”

the human factorThe ability of Poles to embrace outsourc-ing jobs with skill has become a character-istic feature of the market. Unlike workersin China or India, Poles share cultural val-ues with other Western countries, such asthe US, and can effectively interface withclients from those countries. “Poles arewell-educated, creative, willing to work,

Is this a sustainable business?

To maintain itsglobal edge,

outsourcing inPoland must

become morecompetence-

intensive

acknowledged that the outsourcing sectorwould get a significant boost if the govern-ment itself resorted to outsourcing in moresectors than just IT. As Stryczyński said, “Ifthe public administration could knowledge-ably outsource some of its processes itwould be a real boost for the sector. TheUK and the US have appropriate lawswhich allow government institutions to dolong-term deals with the private sector. Weneed that too.”

To some extent, such long-term deals arealready a reality in Poland, according toBaker & McKenzie’s Rosiński. “Some gov-ernment institutions in Poland outsourcetheir IT to the private sector.” Rosińskisaid that the law that regulates such out-sourcing is a good basis for extending thispractice into more areas, beyond IT.

“The problem is more political thanlegal. There are many examples of strate-gic, long-term outsourcing deals signed bygovernment authorities, which show that itis possible in the public sector” saidRosiński. “Every country needs moderntechnologies and the support of IT compa-

nies to implement and maintain them. TheSchengen Information System, the IT sys-tem of the police headquarters or the EUsubsidy system for farmers are all examplesof outsourcing transactions in the publicsector. Nobody would challenge the neces-sity to implement modern technologies, asnobody would challenge the necessity tobuild new roads. The issue becomes moretricky when it comes to outsourcing ofhuman-supported processes. This will in-evitably trigger difficult discussions aboutmeasuring performance and improving ef-ficiency and therefore will involve politicalrisks.”

Again, for Rosiński, we have a strategicchoice to make, which will define the out-sourcing industry in the long run: to focuson low-competence outsourcing based oncost reduction and lay offs or the sophisti-cated high-end services which are the basisof an innovative, modern economy. AsRosiński put it choosing the latter is in thebest interest of Poland and we should buildsupport around this. “We need a long-termstrategy for the development of a moderncompetence-based outsourcing industry.”

them to cheap labor countries. In otherwords, the outsourcing industry createssustainable jobs—a win-win situation forthe private sector and the nation’s economy.

As IBM’s Jaworska put it: “It is mucheasier to relocate a manufacturing unit to acheap labor country than a service center.You can hardly relocate a company whosebusiness is supported by hundreds ofhighly qualified personnel who have mas-tered the skill of working as a team withinthe company and with clients outside of thecompany. Think of the cost and length ofthe recruitment process such a move wouldrequire. Think of the training programsand the costs involved.”

For Stryczyński, keeping outsourcingcompanies in Poland is one of the strategicissues that will have a critical impact onshaping Poland’s economic future. “This isabout building Poland’s competitive edge,”he said. “If for some reason the cost oflabor in Poland grows, investors will seewhat options they have. On one hand,salaries in Poland will have to grow. On theother hand, however, the financial efficiency

of service centers in Poland should not bedecreased.” Pointing to the labor-relatedcosts that employers must bear, he said,“That is the challenge for lawmakers.”

Stryczyński perceives a shifting equilib-rium. “The way I look at it is from the per-spective of maintaining the competitiveedge of the Warsaw operations vis-à-vis ourdelivery centers in other countries,” he ex-plained. “Many factors come into play here.For instance, when the złoty got strongeragainst the dollar, we in Warsaw becameless competitive compared to our opera-tions in the US. There is high unemploy-ment in the US, and it is also a factor.There was a time in 2008 that the dollarwas so weak against the złoty that it paid offto create new jobs in the US more than inPoland. Those are the dilemmas investorsare facing every day.”

What can government do?Industry insiders voice many different ideasfor government to help the outsourcing in-dustry reach new heights and ensure a sus-tainable business for years to come. Apartfrom such issues as whether Polish laborlaw is liberal enough for the private sectoror whether taxes and labor-related costscould be lower, it seems to be universally

tunities for students to interface with busi-ness practitioners.”

According to Marek Rosiński, a principalat Baker & McKenzie, “The education sys-tem aims at theoretical knowledge.”Rosiński heads the law firm’s Technologyand Outsourcing practice and is also amanagement board member of the Out-sourcing Institute, an industry’s think tank.“University graduates do not have basicpractical knowledge required in the mod-ern professional environment. For instance,they may not know how to make a Power-Point presentation,” he said. “But there hasbeen some progress made recently, as vari-ous business organizations have taken theissue to universities. This is an area whichhas room for improvement, and the processhas already started.”

Skiba-Walczak added that the universitieshave noticed the problem too, and in facthave created a new educational niche. “Theproblem is being addressed by universitieswho are joining hands with many privatecompanies to offer postgraduate coursesthat focus on the practical side of businessmanagement,” she said. “Universities havenoticed a market niche, and are more andmore willing to cooperate with the privatesector in this area.”

Part of the problem is also that while thetalent pool is huge in Poland, outsourcingcompanies are already looking furtherahead to the time when it may be more dif-ficult to recruit the right people. They usetheir cooperation with universities for em-ployer branding, to get noticed by futureuniversity graduates and attract them totheir companies.

The competition is keen in Kraków,where 43 service centers employ 15,600people, the highest number for an individ-ual city in Poland. According to Skiba-Wal-czak, “There is work in outsourcing cen-ters in Kraków. People who have a knowl-edge of European languages other thanEnglish know they will get a job with an-other company, so they do not cling to theircurrent job and are willing to change jobseven for just slightly higher pay. In this re-spect they are similar to their colleagues inWestern Europe.”

lack of outlookWhile outsourcing companies clearly havean eye on the future development of thesector, the same cannot be said of lawmak-ers and political elites in Poland. Many out-sourcing industry insiders say that Polanddoes not have a strategy for stimulating thedevelopment of competence-intensive out-sourcing.

There are many reasons Poland shouldhave such a strategy. Along with those fac-tors already mentioned—a good educa-tional base, cultural synergies with majormarkets, and the depth of the talent pool—service centers are competence-intensiveenterprises. This means that once they areestablished, it is not feasible to relocate

self, it requires the skill of combiningprocesses with a flexible and creative ap-proach to meeting the goal of finishingprojects within a given time frame andbudget,” he said. “We work under the pres-sure of time, because the market launch ofthe products we work on is already defined.It is we who oftentimes serve as a bumper,able to make up for delays that occurredsomeplace else. But we can handle thatsurprisingly well because project manage-ment is one of our core competences.”

room for improvementInvestors in outsourcing centers cannotcomplain about the lack of skilled univer-sity graduates. Stryczyński noted that thereare many graduates with basic managementknowledge, because business studies arepopular. Where he sees a problem, however,is that their knowledge is theoretical andlacks all the practical aspects that are amust in today’s workplace. To leverage that,Lionbridge has a special implementation

program for its new blood. “The people werecruit, by default, are first project assis-tants who support managers and learn theropes in the meantime,” Stryczyński said.“The recruits know they have to learn, be-cause there is no university program thatwould prepare professionals to work insuch a specific sector.”

Stryczyński understands that the univer-sities cannot be expected to teach the exactskills his company needs. But they canteach certain intellectual attitudes. “Weneed people who are open-minded,” hesaid, “and open to other people. We needpeople who are willing to upgrade theirskills and update their information, whoembrace change with open minds. This iswhat universities should teach, becausethose are the aspects that will be critical forthe economic development of Poland in thefuture.”

Stryczyński is not alone in his complaint.Many outsourcing insiders underline thatthe potential of the people working in theoutsourcing sector would be higher if theyhad received more practical training at theuniversity level. According to Skiba-Walczakfrom Kelly, “Our universities offer rathertheoretical knowledge and give little oppor-

know foreign languages, and still availableat a competitive cost than their counter-parts in the West,” Jaworska said.

According to Alicja Skiba-Walczak, selec-tion branch manager at Kelly Services, ahuman resource company, the success ofoutsourcing in Poland has to do with demo-graphics. “Generation Y has had a signifi-cant impact on service centers,” she said.“They are very conscious about their pro-fessional career planning and perceive serv-ice centers as a good starting point. Theyappreciate the international character ofthe business, that they interface not onlywith their immediate managers but alsowith client representatives, and that the jobgives them an opportunity to learn theropes of working in big international corpo-rations.”

What is really an outstanding quality ofPoles working in outsourcing is their cre-ativity and flexibility, according to Lion-bridge’s Stryczyński. “When it comes toproject management, which is an art in it-


Tomasz Ćwiok

More resources

One of the best forums in Poland

for discussing outsourcing is-

sues is AmCham’s own Out-

sourcing/High Tech Committee

(www.amcham.pl/outsourcing), available

exclusively to AmCham members.

The Association of Business Service

Leaders in Poland (www.absl.pl) suc-

cessfully lobbies for government support

for the outsourcing industry. Thanks to

lobbying efforts by ABSL, the Polish gov-

ernment has allowed public aid to be

granted to companies who invest in big

cities. Previously the government had

planned to allow certain incentives to be

available only to investors in the least

economically developed regions of east-

ern Poland.

ABSL also focuses on establishing di-

rect contacts with municipal authorities

to share with them their experience and

needs. In its first two years of existence,

ABSL has held roundtable meetings with

officials from municipal government and

public agencies critical to the BPO busi-

ness in Łódź, Gdańsk, Poznań,

Szczecin, Kraków and Katowice.

ABSL also liaises with the Ministry of

Foreign Affairs and the Polish Informa-

tion and Foreign Investment Agency on

a promotional campaign for Poland

abroad.

The Outsourcing Institute (www.in-

stytut-outsourcingu.pl) is a think tank

which works to identify obstacles to the

development of the outsourcing sector in

Poland and propose solutions. The tools

are conferences, publications about out-

sourcing, meetings with the media, edu-

cational outreach, and providing a hub

for the industry to exchange ideas and

best practices.

Currently the institute is preparing a

white paper to serve as a basis for a dis-

cussion among top government officials

about what vision for the economic de-

velopment of Poland should gain gov-

ernment support. It will address the

issue of outsourcing from the public sec-

tor and how it may give a boost to the

development of the outsourcing sector in

Poland.

Outsourcing in Polandin a nutshell

Service centers with foreign capitalbegan business in Poland as earlyas the 1990s, but it was in 2005–

2006 that most of the existing centerswere founded. This came as a result of aboom in global offshoring, coupled withPoland’s entry into the European Union,which helped build a positive image ofthe country in terms of its compliancewith EU regulations and its political stabil-ity.

The largest single-year increase in thenumber of outsourcing centers in Polandwas in 2006, when 45 new ones ap-peared. The growth of investment in theoutsourcing sector continued in 2007–2008, followed by a decline in 2009 whichresulted from the global economic crisis.In 2009–2010, 20 new centers wereadded in Poland.

“Foreign investors perceive Poland as a provenground for outsourcing.”

Jolanta JaworskaIBM

“If the public administration could knowledgeablyoutsource some of its processes it would be a realboost for the sector. ”

Jacek StryczyńskiLionbridge

“There is an issue of the strategic vision for the de-velopment of the outsourcing industry.”

Marek RosińskiBaker & McKenzie

“Generation Y has had a significant impact onservice centers.”

Alicja Skiba-WalczakKelly Services

COVER STORY: Outsourcing


The Monthly Meeting in June was anopportunity for the American busi-ness community to bid farewell to Jim

Wilson (pictured left),Commercial Counselor atthe US Embassy. Wilsonhas returned to Washing-ton to take on new re-sponsibilities at the USState Department as thechief officer promotingtrade in Africa. Accordingto US Ambassador LeeFeinstein, Wilson had puteconomic and trade issues at the center ofPolish-American relations.

“Over the course of our couple of yearsworking together, we have seen not just themagnitude of Polish-American economic tiesgrow, but also the quality and the scope,” Feinstein said. “Many times some of the

biggest firms and some of the most prosper-ous hedge funds will circumvent embassiesbecause they have lots of their own resources.

But not since Jim hasbeen here. All of thesepeople make a point ofmaking a stop at Jim’sbecause they know thatJim is a very strong ad-vocate for Americanbusiness and veryknowledgeable aboutthe business commu-nity.”

AmCham Chairman Joseph Wancer (pic-tured right) added that Wilson has been a verystrong and reliable link between the US ad-ministration and the American business com-munity in Poland. He said that Wilson’s cooloutlook oftentimes helped achieve a more re-alistic view of business issues.

in ensuring Poland’s membership in NATOand the EU. “Poland has every right to beproud of its growing influence in both organi-zations,” he said. “There are a lot of prob-lems in the world and a lot of economic chal-lenges in the world, and the best way to ad-dress them is to work together. So thestronger Poland is in the EU, the better welike it. The stronger the EU is, the better welike it too.”

Ambassador Feinstein also said that duringa meeting with President Obama, Prime Min-ister Tusk spoke very personally about howmuch the US and Poland have in common ona number of the issues that will come to lightduring Poland’s EU Presidency. They includethe common security and defense policy, en-ergy policy, climate change issues and intel-lectual property, to name a few. This is why, asAmbassador Feinstein stressed, the strongerand more influential role that Poland can playin the EU, the better it is for the US.

a new chapterSpeaking more broadly, Ambassador Fein-stein noted that in an interview for PolishTelevision a day after President Obama’svisit, Polish President Bronisław Komorowskisaid that the visit opened a new chapter inPolish-American relations. “We really think itdoes,” Feinstein said.

Addressing specifically the AmCham com-munity, he said the new shift in Polish-Amer-ican relations has been possible “thanks tothe hard work of people like you who havebeen working on Polish-American relationsfor a long time.”

MONTHLY MEETING: US Ambassador briefing

AmCham’s Monthly Meeting with theUS Ambassador, an annual event thattakes place in June, had an extra inter-

esting twist this year, as it was conducted onlya few days after US President Barack Obamaheld his first visit to Poland—a visit thatmarked a new phase in Polish/US relations.

US Ambassador Lee Feinstein thanked theAmerican business community for helping puttrade and economics at the center of the rela-tionship between Poland and the UnitedStates, on par with other areas of Polish-American relations such as security and thepromotion of democracy.

“The American business community inPoland played a major role in making the visitthe success that it was,” Ambassador Fein-stein said. “For the last couple of years wewere trying not only to demonstrate the con-tinued closeness of Poland and the UnitedStates, but also to show that the relationshipwe have is not only about our history but alsoabout our present and our future. In doing sowe wanted to show that our relations are notonly about common security—of course secu-rity is fundamental—but are also about theimportance of economic ties between the twocountries.”

Feinstein said that the leadership of the twocountries agreed to convene a Poland-USbusiness summit in the fall of this year withcabinet ministers as well as senior business-people at the table: “This is something thatwas done in 2003 with great success, and I’mvery pleased we will be able to partner withAmCham as well as other business organiza-tions and private sector groups. It will be avery important meeting, and we believe therewill be a lot to talk about.”

energy sectorThe ambassador said that among the thingsthat are welcomed by American business isthe commitment of the Polish government tothe development of nuclear energy. Feinsteinobserved that during Obama’s stay in Poland,the President said—not for the first time—that nuclear energy “is not an option that wecan take off the table.” He added that whilePoland is seeking the best offer for develop-ment of its nuclear program, it is good newsfor American firms. Used to competition, theyare confident they can make the best offer toPoland.

Ambassador Feinstein said that when itcomes to the energy sector, Polish-US cooper-ation has been very good for at least a year.Just weeks before Obama’s arrival in Poland, aconference on shale gas was held in Warsaw. Itwas the second such conference co-sponsoredby the US Embassy in Poland and the PolishMinistry of Foreign Affairs, following a confer-ence organized in the spring of last year. Am-bassador Feinstein said that the May 2011event generated a lot of media attention not

only in Poland but internationally as well. “Wewanted to focus not exclusively on Poland thisyear, or on Polish-American cooperation, buton shale gas in the region, and we got a fairamount of international attention.”

According to the ambassador, while explo-ration for shale gas is underway in Poland, allsides concerned should be cautious about theprospects of the shale gas industry here. Buthe pointed out that it is equally important tomake sure that there are no artificial barriersto shale gas development. “This was a veryclear message that came from the shale gasconference,” Feinstein said. “It was reinforcedon the highest levels of both our governmentsat a meeting between President Obama andPrime Minister Donald Tusk.”

Beyond tradeThe ambassador said that President Obamawelcomed a proposition from the Polish gov-ernment to set up a sort of “innovation fund”under whose auspices Polish firms would ob-tain access to the newest technologies devel-oped in the US, to help develop them further.This is a very important initiative, Ambassa-dor Feinstein said, as it means that Polandwill need to harmonize policies in regulatoryareas with the US before new technologiesare introduced onto the market in Poland.“This is something that is going to be ex-tremely important to us,” he said.

GeopoliticsAnswering questions from AmCham mem-bers, Ambassador Feinstein talked about theperception of Polish/US relations in terms ofPoland’s growing role in international politics.He said that the US played a supporting role

Meet the speaker

LEE A. FEINSTEIN was nominated byPresident Barack Obama to be the nextUS Ambassador to the Republic ofPoland on July 20, 2009, unanimouslyconfirmed by the US Senate on Septem-ber 22, and sworn in on September28. On October 20, 2009, AmbassadorFeinstein presented his credentials to Pol-ish President Lech Kaczyński. Feinstein isthe 25th US Ambassador to Poland.

Ambassador Feinstein has worked inseveral senior capacities in the US De-fense Department and State Department,including as Principal Deputy Director ofPolicy Planning, where he advised onstrategic goals and objectives in politicalmilitary affairs.

Feinstein was National Security Direc-tor to Hillary Rodham Clinton during herpresidential campaign and an outside for-eign policy adviser to President Obamaduring the general election. He served onthe Presidential Transition Team after theelection and then as Senior Advisor to theOffice of the Secretary of State.

As a Visiting Fellow in Foreign PolicyStudies at the Brookings Institution andDeputy Director of Studies and SeniorFellow at the Council on Foreign Rela-tions (CFR), Ambassador Feinstein wrotewidely on US national security, foreignpolicy, and international institutions. Headvised Newt Gingrich and GeorgeMitchell, who chaired a congressionallymandated Task Force on the United Na-tions, and co-directed the non-partisanCFR Task Force on Enhancing US Lead-ership at the United Nations.

Ambassador Feinstein served as senioradvisor to Human Rights First and is anauthority on the principle of the “respon-sibility to protect.” He is the author of Dar-fur and Beyond: What Is Needed to Pre-vent Mass Atrocities, which was featuredin CFR’s Emmy Award-winning multime-dia presentation Crisis Guide: Darfur. WithTod Lindberg, he is also author of Meansto an End: US Interest in the InternationalCriminal Court, published by the Brook-ings Institution Press.

An international lawyer, AmbassadorFeinstein holds a JD from GeorgetownUniversity, an MA in political science fromthe City University of New York, and anAB from Vassar College. He is married toElaine Margaret Monaghan, a native ofScotland and a foreign correspondentwho has covered the Kosovo conflict, theNorthern Ireland peace talks, and devel-opments in the former Soviet bloc. Theyhave two children.

Photos from the Monthly Meeting on page 38

Polish-Ameri-can relationshave entered

new areas beyond

energy and defense—

with a hugecontribution

from theAmericanbusiness

community in Poland

Openinga new

chapter

Farewell to Commercial Counselor Jim Wilson

Tomasz Ćwiok


Business as unusualfirst high-density satellite television networkin Europe, utilizing the mpg4 media file for-mat. He said that applying innovative think-ing and practice in business is a tough call,especially in such industries as telecoms, fi-nancial services, insurance and banking,which operate on saturated markets where itis extremely hard to get new business andcustomers, and thus to utilize innovation.“Somehow you have to work out how to getthe best ideas,” he explained, “because youremployees cannot see or feel what customersdemand and anticipate.”

Kułakowski said that businesses tend tohire new people who have had experience inthe same or related industries, but that is amistake. By not looking to people with expe-rience in a business other than the one thecompany is in, the company significantlylimits the innovation potential of its ownstaff.

On the other hand, business leaders oftenhave to handle an overdose of creative ideasand select what they think will best suit theirbusiness. “Here you have to make sure thatit is not just machinery that selects an idea,but some clever thinking behind it,”Kułakowski said.

Grygier pointed out that one way to solvethat is to allow customers to comment ondifferent ideas submitted for their consider-ation and evaluation.

risk/rewardAnother problem with pro-innovative think-ing in business, according to Kułakowski, isthe apparent lack of trust between innovatorsand business angels. “The conditions underwhich business angels are willing to invest inan innovative business are unacceptable tothe innovators,” he said.

Grygier noted that one of the inhibitors ofinnovation and creativity is the low level ofrisk tolerance in business—a characteristicfeature of business strategies in Poland. “Ifyou want to encourage innovation and cre-ativity,” she said, “you have to recognize thatyou are not going to be able to get it all ab-solutely right. There are going to be someideas that can be great ideas but are just notgoing to work. If you have a culture thattends to focus on punishing mistakes ratherthan rewarding good ideas, then that poten-tial for creativity is going to be lost.”

Grygier observed that this attitude in cor-porations in Poland is one reason that a lot oftalented people go to Western Europe or theUS: “They do brilliantly there because theythrive in an environment which rewardstheir outstanding creative personalities.”

interactionTrue to the spirit of the AmCham CEOForum, which encourages extensive audi-ence participation, several important points

The role of CEOs in encouraging in-novation across the corporation wason the agenda at the AmCham CEO

Forum in June. Facilitated by renowned jour-nalist Michał Kobosko, the discussion wasled by Olga Grygier, managing partner ofPwC Poland, and Bogusław Kułakowski,business development director and manag-ing director of Qualcomm Poland.

mind-readingThe first part of the forum belonged to Gry-gier, who presented the main conclusions ofthe Global PwC CEO Survey, an annual pollof the attitudes of 1,200 CEOs concerningthe economy.

Grygier said that the key theme of the2011 survey was innovation, as more andmore CEOs broadened their attention to in-novation as a tool for their companies tokeep pace with the market. “From about2007 up to 2010, the CEOs were very muchfocused on protecting their market share onthe existing markets,” Grygier said. “Itmeant that all companies were very focusedon their customers, on protecting and gain-ing additional market share. There was a lotof price competition as well as a focus on ef-ficiencies and cost reduction.”

This year, however, the importance of in-novation came to the fore. “CEOs are sayingthat all of that is still important, but we needto grow out of this because we are not goingto grow by doing things the same way,” Gry-gier said. “The markets are changing, ourconsumers are changing, and a lot of ourconsumers are now in emerging markets.And they think differently. We need to repo-sition to that, and we need to be workingwith our customers a lot more to helpchange our products and services to whatthey actually need and expect from us.”

Grygier noted that not only do consumersexpect “more for less,” but they want to seewhether products are manufactured andsupplied in a responsible manner and alsowant to have their say in how new productsare developed.

Here technology and innovative thinkingplay a huge part. “Consumers feel that theaccess to social networks and mobile devicesgives them direct access to business andmanufacturers,” Grygier said, “so that theycan actually influence the way companies de-velop their products and services.”

CEO Forum: Innovation and leadership

Building from the ground upThe PwC survey revealed that CEOs are be-ginning to think about innovation in a muchbroader way. “They want innovations andgreat things to change the world, but there isa great focus on incremental innovation,”Grygier said. This involves a focus on ideasthat can improve business model efficiencyand turn out products that are more suitablefor their customers.

With such an attitude, CEOs are nowmuch more focused on encouraging theiremployees to be innovative. This attitude hastaken innovative thinking to the ground floor.As Grygier put it, “No longer are we think-ing about innovators as men and women inwhite coats locked away in a lab.”

She noted that while innovation may startwith a focus on environment-friendly prod-ucts and services, it may easily embrace anyarea of business. “Business leaders aremuch more open these days to partnershipsand collaboration,” Grygier said. “Giveneverything that is happening in the worldand how quickly that is changing, and alsogiven the recent economic crisis, no com-pany, no matter how big, may think that theycan do everything by themselves.”

As a practical result of this process, com-panies are much more inclined to enter intoalliances and partnerships with suppliers,customers, research institutes and govern-ments. They are also much keener to involveemployees in the process of innovating.

potential—then what?Along with the CEOs’ shifting focus on in-novation, the PwC survey revealed the grow-ing importance that CEOs attach to emerg-ing markets in their policies for battling theeconomic crisis. Grygier explained that inprevious recessions it was clear that it wasthe developed economies that were going topull the economy out of trouble. Not thistime. “We are seeing a real divergence of theglobal economy,” she explained. “Eventhough the predictions for global growth arearound 4%, half of the developed world isexpected to grow at half that rate, while theother half is expected to grow even faster.”

In this picture, Poland is viewed as one ofthe fast-developing spots.

Indeed, when it comes to innovationPoland has great potential. To make herpoint, Grygier cited the 2010 edition of the

Innovation Scoreboard, a study of how inno-vative the economies of EU member statesare, which compares a number of dimen-sions that are used to grade innovation. “Onhuman resources we are doing really well. Asa nation, we are seeing well-educated peopleand good access to people with skills that areneeded. We have done very well in the last 20years, which brought fantastic businessmodels and some great ideas into the mar-ket, resulting in a number of local successfulbrands and businesses.”

Grygier noted, however, that when youlook at all the eight indicators that reflectlevels of innovativeness, Poland has hugeroom for improvement. It is ranked as a“moderate innovator”—a nice way of sayingthat Poland is mediocre at innovation com-pared to the EU as a whole. There are threeareas that dragged Poland down: “Linkagesand Entrepreneurship,” a category that in-cludes the level of collaboration and the po-tential to enter into partnerships, “Innova-tors,” which is the number of commercialventures that bring their innovations to themarket, and “Economic Effects of Innova-tions,” or the ability to translate innovationinto new jobs, exports, and profits.

Grygier offered a hypothesis to explain, atleast partially, Poland’s poor performance inthe “Linkages and Entrepreneurship” cate-gory. “It may have something to do with thelow level of public trust in Poland,” she said.“We have the lowest level of trust in Europe,while the countries that are known for beinginnovative tend to be at the higher end of thespectrum. There seems to be some correla-tion between being an open environmentthat nourishes ideas and creativity or aclosed society that does not trust anybody.With a changing economic perspective it isclear that cost-competitiveness is not a sus-tainable advantage for Poland over WesternEuropean countries. This means that Polandhas some major challenges ahead on its wayto becoming one of the most competitiveeconomies in Europe.”

Grygier said that the traditional way ofdoing business in Poland is always to play itsafe. “Until now it has worked well for theeconomy. Poland has had a good, large mar-ket. The country could compete with well-tested ideas from other markets and makethem work in our market. But is this goingto be a valid strategy in terms of growthgoing forward? I think that knowing some ofthe issues—the trust issue and the lack ofcollaboration and cooperation—businessleaders will need to have their own strategiesfor overcoming those issues.”

opening upThe other speaker, Bogusław Kułakowski, iswell-known for building from scratch the

Innovation is the key to getting ahead and staying aheadwhen times are tough

were voiced from the floor. AmCham BoardMember Richard Lada, who blazed the high-tech trail in Poland in the early 1990s, ob-served that the Polish university systemgrooms graduates who are discouraged fromthinking outside the box and sharing theirideas with their peers. Lada said that one ofthe characteristic features of life at his almamater, Stanford, was the open environmentfor exchanging ideas: “Everybody was talk-ing about innovation, and teachers workedon the hotbed for new ideas.” In Lada’s view,change is needed for the university system inPoland to break away from the old-styleschool, which promoted political and othertypes of conformism among university grad-uates. “With the existing university system,you will not have CEOs who are willing totake risk,” he said. “You have to reform theeducation system in order to develop thecore of CEOs who are going to be able to un-dertake innovation.”

Paula Wąsowska from Cisco, who alsoteaches at the Harvard Business School In-novation Academy, echoed Lada’s observa-tion, saying that when she teaches executivesabout the model of open innovation, they donot accept the idea of disclosing their com-pany’s business plans. “This has to do withtheir level of trust,” Wąsowska said. “I thinkit is because of history, not because ofhuman nature.”

cultureRyszard Żabiński, president of Focus Re-search, a marketing research company withregional branches in 20 European markets,said that creativeness is not determined onlyby universities or general cultural issues.The importance of markets in inciting inno-vation should not be overlooked. “As much as70% of all innovation at Focus Researchcomes from Poland,” Żabiński said. “Thebulk of those innovations come from ourcustomers and employees. This is becausePoland is a very competitive market, with allmajor brands already present here.”

Another speaker from the floor was DavidStokes, general manager of IBM Central &Eastern Europe. IBM has several centers inPoland, and Stokes said it is pleased with thetalent available here. However, he stronglyadvocated the power of business culture tocreate an innovative environment. “Businesscan create a culture of innovation,” Stokessaid. “We have learned that you have to builda business culture for innovation, and thisculture can be built independent of thecountry you are in. We are in 170 countriesin the world. Each has a different environ-ment when it comes to supporting innova-tion. Our experience is that company cultureis not just one thing triggering innovation. Itis THE thing.”

olga Grygier, who was born inPoland, lived in the United Kingdomfor 24 years. She has been with PwCsince 1991, becoming a partner inthe Corporate Finance Energy Teamin London. Grygier has extensive ex-perience in advising governmentsand leading international corporatesfrom the energy and infrastructuresectors on privatization, M&A activityand restructuring. She also has con-siderable experience in advising onPPP projects in Great Britain andCentral Europe. She is a fellow of theInstitute of Chartered Accountantsin England and Wales.

Bogułsaw kułakowski is countrymanager responsible for businessdevelopment at Qualcomm. He joned Qualcomm from LinxTelecom, a privately held telecom,where he was a member of the su-pervisory board. In 2007-2008 he waspresident and CEO of mPay Interna-tional. His most acclaimed businessrole was that of CTO and a boardmember of the privately-held mediacompany ITI Group, for which helaunched the first mpg4-based televi-sion in Europe. In 1996-2005Kułakowski was chairman and CEOof PTC, one of the leading mobilephone operators in Poland.

Meet the speakers

Tomasz Ćwiok

terms of “lobbying for my sector,” 20% said“very valuable” and 38% said “valuable,”but 43% said “not valuable.” Inasmuch asmost sectors have their own dedicated lob-bying organizations, this may nonethelessbe regarded as an acceptable response.When asked if AmCham is valuable in termsof “general policy work,” 9% said “very valu-able,” 59% said “valuable,” and 33% said“not valuable.” While it is appropriate thatwe rate higher on general policy work thanon sector-specific issues, a one-third dissat-isfaction level gives cause for concern.

Couple this with the response to thequestion of the “usefulness of committeemeetings,” where 38% of respondents were“very satisfied,” 55% “satisfied” and 7%“not satisfied.” In itself, this is not a bad re-sult, but categories that rated better includeCEO Forums, balls, Business Mixers,Monthly Meetings and our annual picnic.The AmCham committee structure is one ofthe most valuable features of our operationsin that it identifies specific areas of atten-tion, specific speakers and decision-makersto meet with, is a place for companies to en-gage in real work and exchange information,and generates research and papers we pro-duce. As such, we would like satisfactionwith the committees to be higher. Conse-

lobbying and committee work. Two otherareas that raised questions include the valueof our magazine for advertisers and theplace for AmCham’s involvement with otherbusiness organizations. These areas ofweakness and questions are where theBoard of Directors has focused its effortsand where changes are being implemented.

media presenceFor years, AmCham has made a deliberateeffort to be visible in the press, which is re-flected in over 100 media hits per year, withrecent increases in TV presence. Yet 61% ofrespondents say AmCham is not sufficientlyvisible in the media, if visible at all. Thesteps taken to improve our media presenceinclude creating a Marketing & Communi-cations Committee for AmCham members,which should also serve as an advisory bodyfor AmCham itself, and encouraging allBoard members to increase their own mediapresence to ensure a convergence of mes-sages.

When asked if AmCham is valuable in

In February 2011 AmCham conducted acomprehensive survey to check the tem-perature of the membership. The re-

sults offer a useful tool for the leadershipand the new chairman to reexamine thechamber’s activities and priorities and toidentify areas for improvement.

The overall results were encouraging. Outof the 85 responses received (out of 330members and a database of 800+ e-mails),satisfaction was rated above-average to highin most categories. Thirty-one percent ofrespondents are “very satisfied” with theirmembership, 60% “satisfied,” 5% “some-what satisfied,” and 4% “not satisfied.”

Most highly valued are the chamber’smajor events, including Monthly Meetings,Business Mixers, the 4th of July Picnic, andanniversary balls.

In our analysis of the results, however, wefocused on the areas that rated the lowest,even though the scores for those areas were,on balance, positive. The areas that showroom for improvement include our mediavisibility, which was deemed too low, and our


AmCham continues to improve its effortsto meet the needs of its members

Getting better all the time

Source: AmCham Membership Satisfaction Survey, 2011

Usefulness for the members’ businessHow AmCham members valued AmCham products and services for their business. The chart does not include “not applicable” responses.

4th of July Picnic

Very Satisfied Satisfied Not Satisfied

Monthly Breakfast Meetings

Business Mixers

American Investor

Anniversary Ball

Committee Meetings

CEO Forums

Special Reports

Kraków Branch

Policy Papers/Legislative Updates

Website

Charity Drive

Wrocław Branch

0% 25% 50% 75% 100%

quently, we have taken specific steps in thisarea, including a review of our committeeswith an aim at right-sizing them, and a re-view of our lobbying procedures and com-munication channels.

The question remains, given our re-sources in terms of finances, staff and com-pany mix, how influential and robust can weexpect to be? Regardless, it is clear that themembers (71%) believe that AmCham mustfocus on policy work.

comparison with other chambersWhen comparing AmCham to other busi-ness organizations, it must be taken into ac-

count that AmCham has 8 staff members,while some other organizations have 30 to60 staff to support their work.

Generally, the Board of Directors seesAmCham’s role as being rather specific inpromoting American business in Poland andgeneral good business practices in Poland,without trying to take the place of strongPolish business organizations. Given thisniche, we do well.

American Investor

The chamber’s magazine, American In-vestor, gets high marks as a source of mar-ket information (37% “very satisfied,” 59%

“satisfied,” and 4% “not satisfied”), but72% said that the advertising is not valuableto them. This makes it clear that sustaininga monthly magazine with fewer and feweradvertisers is not feasible. Therefore, we arelooking to move to a quarterly magazinewith electronic newsletters in between and awebsite that supports better communicationoverall. Most other AmChams in Europehave already moved in this direction.

cooperation with othersAnother issue requiring further thought isour level of cooperation with other businessorganizations. While 35% of respondentssaid this is very important, 48% said it isneutral and 17% said it is of low impor-tance. The Board is in the process of re-viewing our level of cooperation with otherbusiness organizations and the reasoningbehind it, as well as establishing our strate-gic position and how best to communicateour strategy and achievements in this regardto the general membership.

This analysis was supported by several in-terviews with members to better interpretwhat the responses mean. AmCham wouldlike to thank all members who took the timeto respond, and Roman Gurbiel for his im-mense support in carrying out this project.

Source: CN Richard Ellis, European Investor Survey, February 2011

Most valuable products and servicesBusiness networking and the chance to interface with VIP speakers and guests were seen as the most valuable AmCham services.

Valuable business networking

VIP speakers and guests

Fun events for meeting people

Prestige of belonging

Lobbying for my sector

Resource when I have a need

American Investor as a source of market news

US visa assistance

General policy work

Photos in American Investor

Advertising in American Investor

Meetings where I can learn about mysector

Very valuable Valuable Not so valuable

0% 25% 50% 75% 100%

Satisfaction guaranteed?As many as 92% of the sample said they

were “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with Am-

Cham services and products

Satisfied61%

Very satisfied31%

Not satisfied 4% Somewhat satisfied5%

Policy watchOver 70% of the sample support AmCham’s

significant focus and commitment on policy

and position papers

Source: AmCham Membership Satisfaction Survey, 2011

Yes71%

No 29%

FOCUS: Membership Satisfaction Survey

Dorota Dabrowski


A new chef in town information and look to execute a plan,”Baxter says.

Baxter has already placed his footprinton the new Lobby Bar. He has brokendown the bar’s performance to identifywhich areas work well and found new andinteresting alternatives. Sunday brunchhas been of great interest for Baxter. “Iturned it around and changed it,” Baxtersays. “We have a great ChopstiX bar serv-ing Asian favorites, but sushi was pre-pared by other people in the kitchen andthey were not executing it as well as thecooks in the ChopstiX kitchen could do it.I decided to take one of them and do livesushi preparation in front of the guests,which is actually a form of entertainment.Sushi is popular, so people really want tosee it, know it is prepared fresh, and feelthe experience.”

Another of his projects was changingthe menu at ChopstiX—a kind of constantchange. “There is a new menu comingout in the next two weeks,” Baxter says.This alone is a game-changer for thecooking crew. To prepare a new menufrom start to finish takes over a month.“We cook everything,” Baxter says. “Wephotograph it, break everything down,every ingredient, and set up displays forcooks inside. To have that ready takesfrom a month to six weeks.”

Working with peopleThe position of executive chef is as muchabout cooking as about managing staff.When Baxter came to the Marriott he did alittle bit of cooking himself, late at nightsometimes, and did a lot of presentations.His staff learned early on that Baxter is achef who enjoys cooking.

Another point was his openness. First,he let his staff know what his expectationswere. He tried to make his staff feel he isopen to questions and will always givethem a straight and honest answer. As Bax-ter says, “I think I’m hard but I’m fair, andI’d like to think that I’m reasonably well-respected.”

Honesty for Baxter is the key point thathe is looking for in people he works with.But equally important is people’s passionabout what they do. This is because Bax-ter’s expectations of his staff are high. “Iwant to be sure that the guests who arecoming here are pleased,” Baxter says.

Having spent 11 years at sea as achef on private yachts and largeluxury cruise lines, Gavin Baxter,

from Australia, who earlier this year wasappointed executive chef at the MarriottWarsaw, has developed a sense of lookingat his diners’ expectations first and fore-most. He was fortunate to start early onin the cruise business, when people camethere for food rather than the views.“They wanted to have a great dining ex-perience above all,” Baxter says. “Theyreally wanted to feel that their expecta-tions have been fulfilled and exceeded.”

This is why on a ship the menu has tochange every day, which makes every daydifferent and, needless to say, a very chal-lenging one for the chef. “I would changeit 26 times on a 26-day cruise,” Baxtersays. “Every lunch menu would be differ-ent. Then probably after a month or soyou might see some similarities comingback through on a rotational basis.”

With main deliveries every two weekson a ship, and perhaps little top-upsalong the way, Baxter learned to mergecreativity with a super-solid approach toprovisions and economy. “When we weregoing to different regions and areas, Iwould go ashore and buy what I thoughtwould make a great impact on the guestsand I’d bring that onboard. I would exe-cute that with local dishes from the re-gion on the menus for that particularday.” The production process was facili-tated by a computer system, which helpedBaxter control the use of products andplan menus for the coming days. The sys-tem had to make up for the lack of anyopportunity to place an extra order. Intime Baxter perfected the business to thepoint of running his own operations onthe ship. “I organized all my own menusand was personally responsible for theoverall experience.”

changing marriott outletsAs a chef, Baxter can exercise his influ-ence over the Marriott outlets he is incharge of. They include restaurantsParmizzano’s, Lilla Weneda and ChopstiX,the Lobby Bar, the Panorama Bar &Lounge, Champions Sports Bar, ViennaCafé and La Patisserie—a total of 650seats with 90 staff working in the kitchenand in the wait area. “At the Marriott wework on a ‘cook smart’ philosophy, whichis delivery of simple, fresh chef-craftedfood,” Baxter says.

Compared with his work on ships, at theMarriott there is more focus on simplicityand sharp-quality presentations that arewell-executed. Baxter is confident he hasthe flexibility to do that. He has alreadyimproved the salad and cold food presen-tations and introduced curries with condi-ments. He worked to create different ef-fects of height and color, and with differ-ent cups and glasses, to create presenta-tions that have eye-catching contrasts. Healso focused on improving the kitchenwork so it embraces a variety of vegetablesas well as different cooking techniques.“The comments that are coming back arereally good,” Baxter says. “Our regularguests have had sensational comments. Itwas a quick fix.”

One example of how Baxter improvesthe overall performance is to work on tast-ing menus before the events and adjust tothe needs of the customers. “We work tosee which areas we think it will work well,and look to execute menus through thoseparticular areas,” Baxter says. But it alsomeans that he has to watch closely theperformance of the outlets he is in chargeof. This includes monitoring the perform-ance of the dishes—their financial per-formance, but also guest comments. “Wedo try to get as much feedback from thedifferent guests to be able to digest all that

In a world where the restaurant business is driven bytaste and economy, Gavin Baxter has the right bal-ance of experience to embrace the two domains withquality and confidence

FOCUS: Executive chef

“It’s up to my associates to make sure thatwhat they do is to the best of their ability. Ifthey need to be shown or advised, they justneed to ask me. The key point here is al-ways good communication.”

But working with people in the restau-rant business in Europe is somewhat dif-ferent from working on cruise ships orwith Americans. Baxter, who has beenworking with Americans for many years,says that they are always very well-orga-nized and motivated to focus on customerservice. “They want to make sure that youget what you want,” he says. “They havegreat work ethics. That’s why they havegreat restaurants in the US too.”

Working in five-star hotels in Europe,Baxter has noticed that everybody heretalks about stress. He remembers thisfrom the early days when he arrived in Eu-rope—something that he found different.“In this industry in Australia everybodyworks very hard and solid, but nobody talksabout stress. We aren’t talking about it.You’re busy, you work hard. You have justhad a very hard day.”

learning new productsThe opening of the kosher kitchen at theMarriott Warsaw in March was an intenseperiod. The project was accomplishedunder the supervision of Chief Rabbi ofPoland Michael Schudrich. “The kosherkitchen has many rules and regulations,”Baxter says. “You need to pay attention todetails. But that is normal in the restaurantbusiness.”

One of the challenges with the kosherkitchen project was finding some of the re-quired products in Poland. “With meats,there are only specific culls at certaintimes,” Baxter says. “If you look at coun-tries like France or the Netherlands, theyhave a greater varied product. You walkinto something like a supermarket and canpick things off the shelf. This is not so inPoland at the moment. You need to orderand source them.”

meatsKosher aside, it is because of meat thatBaxter finds Poland an exciting new marketfor the restaurant business. “One thing

that really stands out for me is what theydo with pork products here,” Baxter says.“I really enjoy getting products from smallsmokehouses, where they’ve got greathams, a nice smoked pork neck, and all dif-ferent cuts of pork. The way they preparehams and sausages is certainly first-class.”

Baxter is also appreciative of such prod-ucts as cabbage and the way it is used inbigos (stewed with different cuts of meat),and kaszanka (a traditional sausage of pigparts—blood, liver, lungs, skin and fat—and buckwheat).

But there is room for improvement inthe diversity of the products available onthe marketplace and pricing. He findsmeat products a little too expensive, partic-ularly beef and lamb. Time will bring newsolutions, he believes. “I’m sure they areworking on it in Poland,” Baxter says.“They are sure to develop their beef indus-try and their meat industry in general, andfine-tune their breeding programs forpoultry, which comes down to the pointthat Poland is in transition to developingmore skills and techniques.”

the changing marketIt is about time. Baxter is fascinated bywhat he has seen in Poland in terms of newrestaurant concepts as well as product andservice quality. Despite his relatively shortstay in Poland, Baxter has already visited anumber of places (including the Marriott’sown Parmizzano’s—“great to dine in yourown restaurant with friends and introducenew concepts and food”). The AmberRoom leaves a big impression (“great qual-ity cuisine, with an abundance of details—light, modern, sharp presentations, andalso innovative”), and Papaya, in Warsaw,“is very interesting, with fusion cookinggoing on in there,” Baxter says. “It’s greatflavors with nice food presentations.”

Other favorite places in Warsaw includeSense (“it’s great-looking, well-located,with a well-varied menu”) and CudaWianki, which has just recently opened(“ideal for regional cooking and dining onweekdays—escargot from Mazury done ingarlic butter—it was good”). While inGdańsk, Baxter spotted the restaurantFellini. The chef, Greg, who is very pas-

sionate and hands-on, according to Baxter,prepared for him one of his signaturedishes—foie gras with a chocolate truffleparfait. “It was great,” Baxter says. “Thething I liked very much was daily fresh pro-duce used on the day, and an extensivespecials board.”

the bookBaxter is not only a chief cook and a man-ager, but also has a passion for educatingthe public about good cooking. Becausetraveling is a big aspect of Baxter’s career,he decided to write a book focusing on 20countries, most of which he explored forculinary purposes, with highlights of acouple of characteristic dishes. His experi-ence in Poland will contribute to a chapter.“The book aims at bringing readers closerto markets,” Baxter says. “It is to attractpeople to actually cooking, give them a lit-tle bit of the flavors from different coun-tries around the world, and if they’re goingto do a little bit of traveling, informationfrom some markets within those coun-tries.”

immediate impactWhile the impact of his book remains to beseen, Baxter hopes to have a more immedi-ate impact on the restaurant-going publicin Warsaw, the country’s most competitiverestaurant market, through his work at theMarriott. First and foremost he wants din-ers to see that the Marriott outlets are de-veloping their food products and focusingon quality, consistency, and great execu-tion.

He hopes that in time diners will feelconfident about coming back in differentways to the Marriott outlets. “I’d like to seethem come back to Parmizzano’s, take adrink and something to eat at thePanorama, try some sushi in ChopstiX, orenjoy a Sunday brunch at Lilla Weneda,”says Baxter. “The new Lobby Bar is com-ing, and it is going to be an enhancementto the product. I hope I can deliver betterfood and bring people here. I want peopleto come to the Marriott to eat in 2011 andbeyond.”

“They are sure to develop their beef industry and their meat industry in general, and fine-tune their breeding programs for poultry, which comes down to the point that Poland is in tran-sition to developing more skills and techniques.”

1. Teamwork: Baxter helps fix a problem. 2. A dish being sent out to a diner. 3. Baxter gives directions to one of his assistants

1 2 3

Executive chef Gavin Baxter in the kitchen of the Marriott Warsaw

Tomasz Ćwiok

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Exploring for business

What are chevron’s aims and aspira-tions in poland and how are you goingto develop this business opportunity? Chevron has acquired four five-year conces-sions in the Lublin Basin: Zwierzyniec,Frampol, Krasnik and Grabowiec. It is ouraim to build a successful shale gas businessin Poland and to ensure that our contribu-tion to Poland is a positive one and that ourreputation will be as a good neighbor, agood partner and a good steward of the en-vironment.

Our immediate plans are focused on ful-filling our license obligations. We are nowcarrying out a seismic acquisition programin our concession areas and are scheduledto drill our first well in the fall. We are at theearliest stages of evaluation, and it is far toosoon to have any indications on how, or in-deed if, the opportunity will mature. We be-lieve that our concession areas hold goodpotential, but this will need to be confirmedover time by an extensive period of explo-ration and evaluation, through which we willbuild an understanding of the reservoir andhow to reduce economic risk.

Our activities in Poland are subject toChevron’s Environmental, Social andHealth Impact Assessment process, whichis applied to all major capital projects andwill be applied to this shale gas opportunity.ESHIA is a rigorous global process whichidentifies potential impacts and the meansof avoiding, minimizing or mitigating these.This process ensures that we are goodstewards of the environment in all our oper-ations worldwide. Engaging with local au-thorities and communities is a key require-ment within ESHIA and exemplifies how wedo business, so we are talking to a lot ofpeople to get an understanding of concernson the ground and to establish a way for-ward to address these.

What are chevron’s corporate values?Chevron holds the protection of people andthe environment as a core value. Our com-mitment is a matter of deeply held beliefswithin our organization in the responsibilitywe share to ensure that we carry out ourbusiness safely, with integrity, and withoutenvironmental harm.

Our top priority is safety. We do not putcost ahead of protecting people and the en-vironment, and this commitment is funda-mental to the way we conduct business. Wehave stringent processes and procedures in

place that are subject to regular audit to en-sure we meet our own high standards.

Partnership is also a core value. We be-lieve in being a good partner and buildingpositive and beneficial relationships withgovernments, communities and industrywherever we do business, and we aim to bea welcome presence in the communitieswhere we work.

Our first focus is always on prevention.We believe that our operations are safe andthat we can drill shale gas wells in Polandsafely and without environmental harm.

What can you say about the company’sfuture growth prospects in poland?We are obviously hopeful that in the eventthat productive shale is found, an economicdevelopment case will follow. However,shale gas is high-cost by comparison to con-ventional gas developments. We are at theearliest stages of evaluation, but we do rec-ognize that if initial drilling results are posi-tive, our operations will require scaling up,which will actively progress in line withgrowth requirements.

American Investor’s Tomasz Ćwiok talks with JohnP. Claussen, Country Manager for Poland at ChevronUpstream Europe, about Chevron Polska Energy Re-sources Sp. z o.o., an energy company which recentlyjoined AmCham, and its prospects in Poland

FOCUS: New member companyFOCUS: Management education

Mastering a degree inbusiness administrationInsiders explain the options for earning an MBA inPoland and offer tips on how to manage the deci-sion-making process

This year marks the 20th anniversary ofthe first program in Poland offeringan Executive MBA degree in conjunc-

tion with a US partner: the Warsaw-IllinoisExecutive MBA, run jointly by the Universityof Warsaw and the University of Illinois at Ur-bana-Champaign. Indeed, modern manage-ment education in Poland, based on a marketeconomy, was recognized only a short whilebefore the program was established.

In theory, “management” was taught atuniversities during the communist era, butthe approach was theoretical rather thanpractical. As a result, companies that em-ployed graduates of this theoretical manage-ment could attain an advantage in the marketonly because of superior access to raw materi-als and equipment, not as a result of overallsuperior management practice.

The change in the economic environmentthat resulted from the opening up of Polandand all of Eastern Europe to world marketsled to a surge in the demand for well-trained,forward-thinking managers able to developand operate market-driven endeavors.

Perceiving a need for management educa-tion in Poland in line with international stan-dards, the Ford and Mellon foundations putseed money into joint sponsorship of pro-grams by US and Polish universities. The ef-

fort was later supplemented by the USAgency for International Development. Thissupport led to establishment of several jointprograms. Two of the more prominent pro-grams granting MBA degrees from the USpartner are the Warsaw-Illinois ExecutiveMBA program and the Warsaw ExecutiveMBA program, established in 1995 by theWarsaw School of Economics and the Univer-sity of Minnesota. The programs offer US de-grees with quality instruction by American,Polish and international instructors with yearsof teaching and management experience. Theprograms are recognized by US and Europeanaccreditation agencies.

a degree of confusionAs absurd as it may seem, legally speaking, aPolish university cannot confer a Master ofBusiness Administration degree. No such de-gree exists under the law that defines aca-demic degrees in Poland. This is why thejoint programs do not offer an MBA degreefrom the Polish institution, but instead it isissued by the US or other international part-ner.

Another twist is that US universities re-quire at least a bachelor’s degree (the basicundergraduate degree in the US) to be admit-ted to an MBA program. However, bachelor’s

degrees were not recognized in Poland, wherethe basic degree is an MA. This meant thatstudents were required to have a Polish mas-ter’s degree in order to be admitted to anMBA program. For this reason, the MBA wasinitially perceived on the Polish market asequivalent to a postgraduate degree, ratherthan as a graduate degree. This created con-siderable confusion.

Finally, as with any new product, there areproblems with establishing quality standardsfor the product in an environment wherethere is a limited understanding of quality ineducation. As a result, the market today is indesperate need of an independent assessmentsystem for Polish MBAs, based on alumniperformance in the professional world.

due diligenceAnyone interested in enrolling in an MBAprogram in Poland should take time to con-sider a few issues before signing up. First andprobably most important is whether the USpartner of the MBA program in Poland is anestablished institution. This means that theUS university should be a top-rank institutionwhose business school is at least accreditedby the Association to Advance CollegiateSchools of Business. When dealing with busi-ness schools outside of the US, potential stu-dents should look to whether they are accred-ited by the Association of MBAs or the Euro-pean Foundation for Management Develop-ment.

Another issue to consider is whether theprogram offered in Poland is an importantpart of the portfolio of the partner institution.There are a variety of reasons why a US uni-versity might enter the Polish market, some ofwhich are better than others from the stu-dent’s perspective. The institution must becommitted to offering the same quality of in-struction as in its US degree programs, andnot just view the Polish program as a way tomake money. Clearly, the US institutionneeds to cover the costs of the program withits tuition, but the primary objective shouldbe to provide a top-quality management edu-cation to the Polish participants.

With this come more in-depth issues. Isthe curriculum equivalent to that of the part-ner’s US-based MBA program? A rule ofthumb is that there should be about 600hours of in-class instruction—face time withfaculty in the classroom. Obviously, you willbe spending more time than that in total, butlook carefully at how much time is devoted toactual instruction.

More fact-checking should be applied tothe curriculum. Is it generalist or specialized?This is obviously a personal choice, but youneed to be aware of what you are getting.Many programs are focused on a particulardiscipline, such as finance, or a particularmarket, such as high tech.

By Susan Cohen, PhD, University of Illi-nois at Urbana-Champaign, and TomaszLudwicki, PhD, University of Warsaw.

The authors are the directors of the War-saw-Illinois Executive MBA program.

MBA degrees from US universities have been available in Poland for 20 years

One should also be aware that most high-ranking US business schools will not allowtheir degree to be offered away from the maincampus unless at least 50% of faculty contacttime is with faculty from the US institution.

Finally, an important issue is the quality ofthe contacts and networking that the programprovides. You will work closely with your fel-low students and make friends for a lifetime.You will have the opportunity to interact withhigh-level managers from various operationalareas, different industries and different coun-tries. Whether you plan to do business inPoland, across Central Europe, the EU, theUS or Asia, you will make valuable contacts. Itwill be of great benefit if the program pro-vides an alumni network that includes bothPolish and US members.

pricingAccording to a portal devoted to managementeducation in Poland, mbaportal.pl, there arecurrently over 50 MBA programs on the mar-ket. The tuition ranges from PLN 4,000 toover PLN 100,000 per program, with an aver-age of about PLN 30,000. Price is not the onlydifference between programs, of course.

All programs in Poland are priced favorablycompared to their US counterparts, and inthis sense they can offer great value formoney as well as a great education. Tuitionfor the Warsaw-Illinois EMBA program, forexample, is EUR 18,200, versus USD 94,000for the University of Illinois EMBA programin Chicago. The University of Minnesota pro-gram run jointly with the Warsaw School ofEconomics costs about USD 29,400. By com-parison, in Prague the University of Pitts-burgh Executive MBA costs USD 48,500. Inshort, programs are attractively priced for thePolish market.

a business decisionThe final point is that before you enroll, youmust collect information about the programsyou are interested in. Visit their websites, at-tend information sessions or lectures forprospective students, and, most importantly,talk to alumni. If you are lucky, you can findgraduates of the programs at work or amongyour friends and family. Their first-hand ex-periences and opinions are important, and in-deed are among your most valuable guideswhen choosing where to get your MBA.

The process may look daunting at first, butif you gather the right information you will beable to make the best decision for you, yourfamily and your career.

Growth on the radar

it seems that last year and the first halfof 2011 have been good for the com-pany. What were the main driving fac-tors for your business?Jim Hemmer: The main driver behind ourrecent business success has been the con-tinued growth of mobile as a channel toengage both consumers and employees. Asmobile becomes more and more strategicto businesses, enterprises are realizingthat they need a comprehensive solutionthat addresses the needs of all users. Asmobile becomes more and more strategicto businesses, enterprises are realizingthat they need a comprehensive solutionthat addresses the needs of all users. An-tenna delivers the whole spectrum of mo-bile experiences, a wide variety of mobileapps and mobile optimized websites thatempower employees to be more effectiveand make it easier for consumers to dobusiness with their favorite brands. An-tenna also made two successful acquisi-tions during this period—Volantis Systemsin January 2011 and Vaultus in March2010—which have enabled the company toexpand into new segments, geographiesand markets.

After buying Volantis Systems in Janu-ary, Antenna is expanding the Kraków-based operations so it becomes one of thecompany’s key technology centers, alongwith centers in Jersey City, Boston,Toronto and Bangalore.

What are the driving factors for devel-opment of the kraków operations?Mark Watson: The main factor behind theexpansion of our technical center inKraków has been our significant globalbusiness growth. The center providesproduct development and customer servicefor customers across the Americas, Europeand Asia-Pacific. The teams will continueto provide engineering support for the An-tenna Mobility Platform—AMP. They willbe focusing mainly on AMP mobile webproducts, and customer support for mobileapps, both native and hybrid architecturalstyles.

Why kraków and not the antenna op-erations in the uk, for instance?Mark Watson: We have had an engineeringcenter in Kraków since 2005. Kraków waschosen because of its proximity to highlyqualified IT and engineering staff and itsflight connections with the rest of Europe.Our Kraków engineering teams are all em-ployees of Antenna.

We were also helped significantly by theKraków branch of the American Chamberof Commerce in 2005, at a time when wewere investigating whether to locate ourengineering center in Poland.

how important is the polish market forantenna?Jim Hemmer: Poland is an important Euro-

American Investor’s Tomasz Ćwiok spoke with two managers of Antenna Software—JamesHemmer, President & CEO, and Mark Watson, EVP and General Manager—shortly after An-tenna announced the creation of a technology center in Kraków

FOCUS: Member company

Mark Watson and Jim Hemmer

pean market for us. Antenna is particularlyinterested in developing business withinthe manufacturing, financial services andtelecommunications sectors.

how important is poland as a source ofmanpower? Mark Watson: Poland is very important tous a source of highly qualified IT and soft-ware engineering staff.

What is the corporate culture at an-tenna like?Jim Hemmer: As a global organization, weare very multicultural and we pride our-selves on promoting a set of core valuesthat hold us true to our vision and that aresupported across the organization. Aboveall, Antenna is committed to fostering a vi-brant, rich and productive community ofemployees, customers and partners.

What are the plans for further develop-ment of the kraków center?Mark Watson: As our business grows therewill be a requirement to increase employeenumbers across the business. We have thecapacity to support just over 150 employeesat our new center in Kraków. We plan to ex-pand our engineering capabilities inKraków to ensure that we keep on the cut-ting edge of innovative and quality prod-ucts, and to provide proactive customeroutreach in terms of customer support.


The European Courtof Justice issued ajudgment on May12, 2011, of greatsignificance for theentire airline indus-try in the EuropeanUnion, concerningthe liability of aircarriers for the con-sequences of un-foreseeable eventsresulting in flightcancellations

EXPERT: Airlines and consumers

The problem of grounded flights

By Piotr Majer

legal adviser

Łaszczuk & Partners

fact that despite the best inten-tions on the airline’s part andallowing additional time, it maystill be impossible to carry outthe flight because the schedulefor departures and arrivals atthe airport may make it difficultto adjust the flight schedule. Atbusy airports, minor delay of adeparture may mean that theaircraft loses its slot, and even ifit is fully prepared for takeoff itmust often wait an hour for an-other slot.

There is no way to define pre-cisely the additional time thatmust be allowed in order toavoid such situations. If airlinesattempt to apply the ruling rig-orously, they should set asideadditional time even though it isuncertain whether the cushionwill in reality be sufficient tocarry out the flight if emergencycircumstances arise. This ap-proach would definitely gener-ate significant additional costsfor airlines. Small airlines oper-ating only a handful of planeswould be most seriously af-fected. In order for such airlinesto remain profitable, they mustoperate their aircraft with mini-mum downtime—not standingon the runway waiting for what-ever emergency circumstancesmight arise. It is unclearwhether these factors weretaken into consideration by thecourt when it issued the rulingin the Air Baltic case.

more to comeThis is not the only recent casethat has significantly limited theairlines’ ability to invoke the ex-traordinary circumstancesclause in order to refuse pay-ment of flat compensation. In ajudgment dated December 22,2008 (Friederike Wallentin-Hermann v. Alitalia, Case C-549/07), the ECJ rejected re-liance on the extraordinary cir-cumstances clause for technicalproblems, even if the aircraftwas serviced regularly and prop-erly.

Despite the ambiguity inher-ent in these rulings by the Eu-ropean Court of Justice, theymay be relied on by passengersseeking compensation for flightdelays and cancellations, andthe industry must be preparedto face increased operatingcosts.

cause no one doubted that clos-ing the airspace over the Malmöregion was an instance of forcemajeure. No one could havepredicted that this specific dif-ficulty would occur or how itmight affect the ability to carryout the flight. The court appar-ently had no doubt about thiseither, but it nonetheless foundthat airlines should not fill theirflight schedules up to the brim,but should always allow a littleextra time. Thus, even if AirBaltic could not have predicteda power outage in Sweden, itshould have assumed that someexternal difficulties might delaythe flight, and provided a crewthat was not overworked.

Unfortunately, the ECJ didnot provide any guidelines forhow airlines should set aside aminimum reserve time. It indi-cated only that the same criteriawould not be appropriate for allsituations. It also found thatArt. 6(1) of Regulation261/2004, which requires aircarriers to provide passengerswith care after a delay of at leasttwo, three or four hours (de-pending on the length of theflight), should not be used as aguideline. This was what thepassengers sought. That wouldmean that in the case of anyflight exceeding 1,500 km, theair carrier would have to reserveat least 2 hours to counteractthe effects of extraordinary cir-cumstances—or 4 hours forflights of over 3,500 km. Fortu-nately, the court rejected thatinterpretation.

As consolation to the airlines,the court held that “the assess-ment of the ability of the aircarrier to operate the pro-grammed flight in its entirety inthe new conditions must not re-sult in the air carrier being ledto make intolerable sacrifices inthe light of the capacities of itsundertaking at the relevanttime.”

Beware of time slotsNotwithstanding this reserva-tion, the ruling by the ECJ isunfavorable to European air-lines, primarily because of theunclear criteria under which anairline should establish theminimum cushion in its flightschedule in order to be able tocarry out flights even whenemergency circumstances arise.The ruling does not reflect the

depending on the length of theflight. This was the compensationsought by the passengers in therecent ECJ case.

The key issue, however, waswhether cancellation of the flightto Riga resulted from extraordi-nary circumstances which couldnot have been avoided even if allreasonable measures had beentaken. If the carrier can demon-strate extraordinary circum-stances, the passengers are notentitled to flat compensationunder Regulation 261/2004. Thepurpose of this rule is to releasethe carrier from liability for in-stances that are beyond its con-trol, such as force majeure.

consult the crystal ballThe European Court of Justiceheld in this case that because theair carrier is “obliged to imple-ment all reasonable measures toavoid extraordinary circum-stances, it must reasonably, at thestage of organising the flight, takeaccount of the risk of delay con-nected to the possible occurrenceof such circumstances. It must,consequently, provide for a certainreserve time to allow it, if possi-ble, to operate the flight in its en-tirety once the extraordinary cir-cumstances have come to an end.”

This means that when airlinesplan their flight schedules, theymust factor in the risk of unfore-seen circumstances and scheduleflights and departures with sometime cushion.

The holding is surprising, be-

In Andrejs Eglītis & EdvardsRatnieks v. Latvijas Repub-likas Ekonomikas ministrija

(Case C-294/10), passengers onan Air Baltic flight from Copen-hagen to Riga sought compensa-tion from the airline for cancel-lation of the flight. The flightwas scheduled for departure at8:35 pm, but at 8:30 the airspacearound Malmö was closed be-cause of a power outage affect-ing radar and navigation sys-tems. Passengers waited on-board the aircraft until 10:45pm, when they were told thatthe flight was cancelled. Itturned out that the reason forthe cancellation was that duringthe wait for takeoff, the flightcrew had exceeded their per-missible working time.

legal groundsThe basis for the passengers’claims was the EU’s Denied-Boarding Compensation Regu-lation (261/2004). The regula-tion imposes various obligationson airlines toward passengers ininstances of denial of board-ing—typically as a result of over-booking, delay or cancellation ofthe flight. Depending on the sit-uation, airlines may be requiredto provide passengers appropri-ate care, lodging, reimburse-ment of the cost of the ticket, orother benefits.

One right that is popular withpassengers is flat compensationfor denial of boarding or flightcancellation, of EUR 250 to 600


Product placementhas finally becomelegal in Poland, con-ditions notwith-standing

EXPERT: Product placement

Catching up with reality

By Małgorzata Darowska

Attorney-at-law

Head of Intellectual Property, Tech-

nology & Communications Practice

Group, Salans

and Karol Laskowski

Associate, Salans

from it—including Hollywoodand other foreign productions.This will make compliance anightmare, because the broad-caster will have to determinewhether a program includestheme placement or directlyencourages the purchase of cer-tain products. If it does includeproduct placement, the audi-ence will have to be informedseveral times over. Thus, theproduct placement regulationswill indirectly affect the entireaudiovisual market, since mostmovies are eventually shown ontelevision, and broadcasters willhave to organize their program-ming schedule to comply withthe law.

Good try, but …Let’s look at the positives: thelegalization of product place-ment is a good initiative insofaras it creates a legal frameworkfor a type of commercial com-munication that is already com-monly used in the media.Under current regulations, wewill not have to watch actorspontificating on the benefits ofcertain products. The disclo-sure requirement is generallyneeded as well, but it mayswiftly become excruciating tobear if a high percentage ofprograms contain productplacement messages. If theproduct placement is for, say, achocolate bar sold almost ex-clusively in North America, is aduty to disclose the placementrelevant or appropriate whenthe broadcaster has no influ-ence over the placement andmakes no profit from it?

Of course it may be arguedthat the viewer has a right toknow about any type of hiddenadvertising, but there again theBroadcasting Act does not applyto movies on general release inmovie theaters, DVDs, com-puter games or music, whereproduct placement is a commonpractice.

of any placed products and di-rect encouragement to pur-chase them are also prohibited.The Broadcasting Act providesa general requirement that theuse of the product placementshould not affect the editorialindependence and autonomy ofthe broadcaster. If any programincludes product placement,the broadcaster has to informthe audience accordingly.

The Polish Parliament optedfor an unconditional ban ontheme placement, i.e. wherereference to a product, serviceor trademark is made in theprogram’s script or dialogue.So it seems you can look at aproduct, service or trademarkbut not talk about it.

The restrictions on productplacement and duties of broad-casters are quite wide-ranging,but the new regulations applyonly to programs producedafter the amendment came intoforce. However, care should beused to ensure compliance, be-cause violation of the rules onproduct placement can attractlarge fines—up to 10% of thebroadcaster’s revenues for theprevious year or up to 50% of

the fee for the broadcasting fre-quencies.

hollywood productions Bizarrely, even though the EU’sAudiovisual Media Services Di-rective offers member statesthe option to derogate fromrules on commercial communi-cation with respect to externalprograms (e.g. Hollywood pro-ductions), Poland’s legislaturedecided to make broadcasterscomply with regulations onproduct placement in relationto all programs, regardless ofwhether the broadcaster hasany influence over the productplacement or gains any profit

placement differs from sponsor-ship mainly in that the sponsor-ship need not be featured in theprogram itself. That said, productplacement has been used beforein programs on the basis of spon-sorship agreements, where prod-ucts were lent to producers freeof charge and appeared in theprogram. Under the new regula-tions, it may prove difficult to dif-ferentiate between these twoforms of commercial communica-tion.

the rulesThe amended Broadcasting Actsets out a general rule that prod-uct placement is prohibited andthen provides rules under whichit may be conditionally allowed.

Product placement is generallyadmissible in cinematographicworks, movies and series madefor audiovisual media services,sports programs and light enter-tainment shows. In other types ofprograms, especially those aimedat children, product placement isnot allowed. Singled out for blan-ket bans are tobacco products, al-coholic beverages, medical serv-ices, and gambling.

In addition, excessive exposure

Legislation legalizingproduct placement tookeffect on May 23, 2011,

in the form of an amendment tothe 1992 Broadcasting Act.Product placement has sufferedin the past from bad PR, oftenbeing regarded as a sneaky formof advertising, and has beenprohibited by Polish and EUregulations. Nevertheless, de-spite the legal uncertainties, ithas featured in a number ofmovies and TV shows, includingsome Polish productions.Viewed from that angle, the newlegislation is merely playingcatch-up, providing a legalframework for what is alreadyout there on the visual mediamarketplace. However, broad-casters and producers will nowbe able to use the new regula-tions, conditions permitting, toraise financing for productions.

legal definitionsThe new regulations define“product placement” as inclu-sion of or reference to a prod-uct, a service or a trademark sothat it is featured within a pro-gram, in return for payment orother consideration, as well asinclusion of products in a pro-gram or providing services tothe program free of charge(known as “prop placement”).

Product placement is differ-ent from traditional advertisingprimarily because it is includedin the program itself, not in aseparate advertising slot. Prod-uct placement is closer to theconcept of sponsorship, whichinvolves promoting a specificbrand, product or service in re-turn for financing the produc-tion or media service. Product

The legalization of prod-uct placement creates alegal framework for a typeof commercial communi-cation that is already com-monly used in the media.


Innovation in business is understood inmany different ways, but there are somesolid indicators to stick to

EXPERT: Innovation

Follow the path of world leaders

By Michał Turczyk

Senior Manager, R&D and

Government Incentives Team

Tax Department, Deloitte

innovation and achieve the es-tablished aims, it would be nec-essary to introduce other in-struments to encourage allbusinesses to invest in R&D.

European funds are a goodexample of such an incentive inPoland. In previous years, busi-nesses could obtain non-re-fundable grants for the develop-ment of innovation and R&D.They could obtain support evenfor outside research, whichhelped to expand cooperationwith research institutions andstimulated the growth of thissector. However, grants fromthe EU are already running outand will not be available at leastuntil further competitions arelaunched in the 2014–2020 pro-gram period. In this situation, itwould be good to introduce ap-propriate solutions in the fiscalpolicy of the state, in the formof tax breaks for enterprises in-vesting in innovation. Thismechanism is already function-ing in Poland (with tax deduc-tions for expenses incurred toacquire the results of R&D), butit is not very popular (only 431out of over 1.8 million regis-tered enterprises have made useof it). Moreover, it focuses onthe purchase of innovative solu-tions from external sources anddoes not support R&D carriedout by companies in Poland.

accelerating innovationThe EU’s ambitious plan forthe year 2020 is achievable, butrequires more resolute and dy-namic action on the part of themember states. Poland shouldfollow the path of world leaders,who set a good example.

Apart from increasing budg-etary expenditures, it is neces-sary to take care of enterprisesby offering them new, morefunctional instruments, such astax exemptions effectively re-ducing the cost of hiring engi-neers in Poland. This wouldmake Poland more attractiveand competitive on the interna-tional arena when seeking FDI,and also provide an incentive forcreation of R&D centers andclusters employing teams ofhighly specialized engineers.

but the countries try to com-pete on the international arenato attract foreign direct invest-ment. The advantage of lowlabor costs in production isceasing to be the primary dis-tinguishing feature of CEEcountries. The factor that is be-coming increasingly more deci-sive for the location of FDI byinternational corporations is thepotential for development oftechnology centers in a givencountry. Costs for hiring engi-neers and technicians are stillvery attractive compared toWestern Europe and NorthAmerica, but mechanisms ofcooperation with the R&D sec-tor and tax and grant systems towhich companies are accus-tomed are poorly developed inmost countries of Central &Eastern Europe.

solutions for polandIn response to the challengesposed by the EU’s Europe 2020strategy, Poland adopted an ac-tion plan aimed at increasinginnovation, including R&D ex-penditures as a share of GDP.The plan was set forth in theNational Research Program, aninstrument which is supposedto facilitate implementation ofthe state’s research policy,bringing Poland into line withEuropean and world standards.The program calls for an in-crease in innovation throughconcentration of the scientificcommunity and state budgetoutlays on specific priority areas(e.g. power engineering, medi-cine, pharmaceuticals, IT,telecommunications andmechatronics).

The National Research Pro-gram takes a highly formal ap-proach to the issue, focusing ontechnical areas that will be pro-moted and supported from thecentral budget in Poland. It maybe expected that this solutionwill achieve only partial results,because, as mentioned above,private enterprise influencesthe share of R&D expendituresin the country. Even though theprogram will probably con-tribute to an increase in expen-ditures by enterprises in thespecified priority areas, it willnot serve as an incentive for anincrease in innovation for com-panies operating in other areas.Therefore, in order to increase

proven strategiesEncouraging companies to assignlarger parts of their budgets toimplementation of R&D in thegiven country or region is a strat-egy adopted by many developedcountries attempting to buildadded value for their economies.Creation of a favorable climate forR&D investments is one of theirmain priorities. Good examplesinclude Canada and the UnitedStates, particularly specific re-gions like Quebec (the most at-tractive tax incentives for R&D ac-tivity in Canada) and Massachu-setts (the biggest share of R&Dexpenditures in relation to GDPamong enterprises in any USstate). The priorities for eco-nomic development in these re-gions include tax incentives, R&Dgrants, and support for coopera-tion between research entities andbusinesses by financing the devel-opment of clusters and creation ofresearch infrastructure. This typeof strategy produces results. Thenumber of companies transferringtheir R&D activity to such regionsis growing every year. Often, man-ufacturing capacities for the mostadvanced products are relocatedthere as well, building the re-gional and national economy evenfurther.

Actions and initiatives support-ing the development of R&D inthe US and Japan have proved tobe effective, with R&D expendi-tures there representing a highershare of GDP than the average for27 EU countries.

The example of countries thatuse economy-building strategiesbased on stimulation of invest-ment in R&D should be followedas soon as possible by Poland andother CEE countries, where theshare of R&D expenses is small

Innovation is usually associ-ated with the implementa-tion of new products or serv-

ices based on proprietary solu-tions of the innovator. This un-derstanding of innovation isshared by most countries in theworld that encourage businessesto invest in R&D in their coun-tries.

The indicators that countunder this approach to innova-tion are R&D expenditures as apercentage of the country’sGDP, the number of patentsregistered, the method that gen-erated the innovation (e.g. li-cense or research), cooperationbetween the innovator and busi-ness, and the quality of R&D in-frastructure available in thecountry.

The importance of the firstindicator is clear. The most in-novative economies, such asSweden, Finland and Japan,spend from 3.2% to 3.7% oftheir GDP on research and de-velopment. Less innovativecountries, such as Poland andmost other countries in Central& Eastern Europe, spend lessthan 1% of GDP on R&D—wellbelow the 3% recommended bythe EU in the Lisbon Strategydeveloped in 2000.

One element that may be de-cisive for attaining the goals ofthe Lisbon Strategy may be in-tensification of activities en-couraging the enterprise sectorto increase R&D expenditures.The enterprise sector is respon-sible for over 50% of R&D ex-penditures in any given country.It would be necessary to under-take very resolute actions on theEU and national level in order toencourage businesses to investmore in R&D.



Golfing to help children in needSharing diverse approaches to CSR

Science and money meet in Wrocław

EVENT: CharityEVENT: AmCham Wrocław

The an-nualMc-

Masters charitygolf competitiontook place in Mayat Lisia PolanaGolf Club. Theevent was organ-ized by theRonald McDon-ald Foundationand AmCham,and sponsors in-cluded Golf &Life magazineand the photo-graphic agencyAKPA. The eventwas a fundraiserfor the childhoodcancer preven-tion programsupported by theRonald McDon-ald Foundation.

Experiencedgolfers competedin team and indi-vidual matches.The individualtournament waswon by WojciechSzpila, followedby Con Murphyand AmChamBoard MemberRoman Rewald.

Meanwhile,new players tooklessons with theexperienced in-structors fromthe Lisia PolanaGolf Academy.

After the com-petition, every-one took part in acharity auction.The funds weredonated to theRonald McDon-ald Foundation.

Over 50 guests, includingDeputy Governor ofLower Silesia Ilona An-

toniszyn-Klik, Anna Panasiukfrom the Ministry of Labor andSocial Policy, and representa-tives of Polish and interna-tional companies, learnedabout different approaches toCSR policy in local and multi-national enterprises operatingin Poland at a workshop organ-

ized by AmCham Wrocław, incooperation with the Polish-German Chamber of Industryand Commerce, the BritishPolish Chamber of Commerceand the Scandinavian-PolishChamber of Commerce. Themain business partner of theevent was IBM, which hostedthe event at its Wrocław deliv-ery center.

Prof. Jerzy Langer, Foreign Secretary of Academia Europaea and former DeputyMinister of Science and Higher Education, and a science and innovation advi-sor to the Mayor of Wrocław, spoke about financing large-scale R&D initiatives

using EU funds. He also discussed the concept of the Wrocław Research CentreEIT+, the institute’s activities and its future development plans, at a breakfastmeeting hosted by AmCham Wrocław in June.

1. Marzena Drela, AmCham Deputy Director; Prof.Adam Jelonek, Chairman, Ronald McDonald Founda-tion; Katarzyna Nowakowska, Managing Director,Ronald McDonald Foundation. 2. Golf Academy in ac-tion. 3. Golf lessons for children. 4. The trophies.5. Foreground: Paweł Kastory, Corporate Profiles;Piotr Jucha, AmCham Board Member. 6. KrzysztofKłapa; Con Murphy, PM Group. 7. Guests at thefundraiser.

1. Karolina Lisowska, UPS Polska; Joanna Emilianowicz, Kraft Foods; Iwona Makowiecka, Polish-German Chamber of Industryand Commerce. 2. The workshop in full swing. 3. Joanna Matryba, Kraft Foods, presenting the company’s internal CSR policy.

1. Wojciech Wasik, HS Wrocław; Prof.Jerzy Langer; Piotr Freyberg, 3M. 2. Wo-jciech Wasik; Joanna Bensz, AmChamWrocław Director. 3. Piotr Freyberg;Jerzy Langer. 4. Paweł Tenerowicz,Miller Canfield; Bill Hall, PittsburghGlass Works; Piotr Freyberg; JerzyLanger. 6. Bill Hall; Paweł Panczyj, Ernst& Young. 8. Joanna Bensz; Bill Hall.

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Reinforcing business ties in Katowice

EVENT: AmCham Kraków

In May, the AmChamCouncil, repre-sented by AmCham

Board Member PaulFogo and AmCham Ex-ecutive Director DorotaDabrowski, accompa-nied by US ConsulGeneral in KrakówAllen Greenberg, met inKatowice with MayorPiotr Uszok and repre-sentatives of the busi-ness community inUpper Silesia, includingAmCham membercompanies and selectednon-member firms.The venue for themeeting and the busi-ness mixer that fol-lowed was the Gold-stein Palace in the cen-ter of Katowice. Theevent was organized byAmCham’s Krakówbranch.

1. The official part begins. 2. Piotr Uszok, Mayor of Katowice; Dorota Dabrowski, AmCham Executive Director. 3. Andrzej Kor-pak, General Motors Manufacturing Poland; Allen Greenberg, US Consul General in Kraków; Dorota Dabrowski; Paul Fogo,AmCham Board Member. 4. Monika Pilarska, AmCham Kraków Director; Paweł Tynel, Ernst & Young. 5. Andrzej Korpak. 6. EwaMartuszewska, Dave Gibson, Fluor. 7. Marek Suczyk, Kroll Ontrack; Marcin Nowak, Capgemini; Paul Fogo. 8. Marcin Nowak;Łukasz Kwieciński, Skanska.

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Business Mixer out of town

EVENT: AmCham Kraków

TheKrakówBranch of

AmCham hostedthe SummerBusiness Mixerin June at VillaRotunda in thebeautiful suburbof Przegorzały.The event wasgenerously spon-sored by BP,CH2M Hill,Cooper Stan-dard, Interna-tional Paper, RRDonnelley andSkalski SA.

1. Monika Pilarska, AmCham Kraków Director, starts the official part of the mixer. 2. Yossi Wircer, Holiday Inn Kraków City CenterHotel; Stijn Oyen, Sheraton Kraków; Małgorzata Jamrozik, CH2M Hill; Aleksandra Filutowski; Małgorzata Lewicka. 3. Krzysztof Put,Coca-Cola; Grażyna Nowak, FEC&C. 4. Stijn Oyen; Małgorzata Lewicka; Yossi Wircer. 5. Jerzy Fedorowicz, MP; Sylwia Salwińska,Art; Piotr Skalski, Skalski SA. 6. Jerzy Fedorowicz; Anna Wieraszko, Amway. 7. Mieczysław Pasowicz, John Paul II Hospital; Prof.Krzysztof Zieliński, Cracow University of Technology; Sławomir Kopeć, Kraków Technology Park. 8. Dariusz Kiełtyka, Irena Biela,Fluor; Małgorzata Jamrozik. 9. Leszek Rożdżeński, Web Inn. 10. Andrzej Pawłowski, Halina Ząbczyńska, Jagiellonian University.11. Grzegorz Smołka, GM; Monika Pilarska; Małgorzata Podrecka, Can-Pack; Anna Wieraszko. 12. Monika Pilarska; JakubNowakowski, Galicia Jewish Museum; Allen Greenberg, US Consul General in Kraków; Natalia Oleksy, Galicia Jewish Museum.13. Marek Rajca, Silgan White Cap. 14. Marcin Nowak, Capgemini; Alex Fiszer, Marchołt Club. 15. Jerzy Fedorowicz; Piotr Skalski.16. Marcin Nowak; Tomasz Berbeka, International Paper. 17. Monika Pilarska; Marek Swach, Bank Pekao SA.

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Once a year at the Ambassador’s place

EVENT: Monthly Meeting

It has become a tradi-tion for AmCham to as-semble at the US Am-bassador’s residence

once a year to learn whereUS-Polish commercial rela-tions are heading and howAmCham can help. Withhost Lee Feinstein, Am-Cham also took the oppor-tunity to bid farewell to JimWilson, head of the USCommercial Service inPoland, who heads back toWashington.

1. US Ambassador Lee Feinstein. 2. Jim Wilson, US Commercial Service; Joseph Wancer, AmCham Chairman; DorotaDabrowski, AmCham Executive Director; Marzena Drela, AmCham Deputy Director. 3. Lee Feinstein; Joseph Wancer. 4. JimWilson; Dorota Dabrowski; Lee Feinstein. 5. Monika Pilarska, AmCham Kraków Director; Piotr Jucha, AmCham Board Member;John Lynch, AmCham Board Member. 6. Maciej Łaszczuk, Łaszczuk & Partners; Mirosław Dackiewicz, Agri Plus; Justyna Sz-para, Łaszczuk & Partners; Andrzej Pawelczak, Animex. 7. The chef at the US Ambassador’s residence is well-known for hisculinary arts. 8. John Lynch; Jim Wilson; Tony Housh, AmCham Board Member. 9. Dorota Dabrowski; Paul Woodward, Coca-Cola Poland Services. 10. Tony Housh; Xavier Douellou, 3M Poland.

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Innovation at the top

EVENT: CEO Forum

CEOs’ experience and perspectiveon encouraging innovation in thecorporations they lead were onthe agenda at the AmCham CEO

Forum in June. The panelists were Bo-gusław Kułakowski from Qualcomm andOlga Grygier from PwC. The moderatorwas journalist Michał Kobosko. Thevenue was Mamaison Hotel Le ReginaWarsaw.

1. Bogusław Kułakowski, Qualcomm; Olga Grygier,PwC; Michał Kobosko, Point Group Business Unit.2. Joseph Wancer, AmCham Chairman. 3. JosephWancer; Paula Wąsowska, Cisco. 4. BogusławKułakowski; Olga Grygier; Richard Kałużyński,Kałużyński & Madeja; Marek Suczyk, Kroll Ontrack.5. Alain Bobet; Michał Szwarc, TechSoup Foundation.6. Paul Fogo, AmCham Board Member; Adam deSola Pool. 7. Dorota Gutkowska, Levi Strauss;Richard Żabiński, Focus Research; Joseph Wancer.8. Olga Grygier; Sylwester Klarowicz. 9. DorotaWalkowska, Agnieszka Naumiuk, Mamaison Hotel LeRegina. 10. Judith Gliniecki, AmCham Vice Chair;Agata Dulnik, Right Management; Dorota Gutkowska;Dorota Hansberry; Dorota Dabrowski.

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1. Magdalena Środa; Henryka Bochniarz. 2. Paula Rewald; Thomas Schoen, Sheraton Warsaw Hotel. 3. Jacek Siwicki, En-terprise Investors; Magda Maruszczak, KPMG. 4. Dorota Dabrowski; Christopher Smith. 5. Ron Nawrocki; Joseph Wancer;Wojciech Warski, Softex Data. 6. Dariusz Dziekanowski with daughter. 7. Matt Lynch with a partner. 8. The Jucha familywith Marzena Drela; Dorota Dabrowski. 9. Marta Pawlak, AmCham; Paula Wąsowska, Cisco; Dorota Dabrowski; SławekŚlązak. 10. Cezary Krasodomski, Cisco, with family. 11. Beata Bednarska-Gostomska, FedEx; Michał Szwarc, TechSoupFoundation; Richard Kałżyński. 12. Ambassador Feinstein with family. 13. Jacek Siwicki; Richard Lada, AmCham ViceChairman; Marzena Drela; Jerzy Kleniewski, MEP; Roman Rewald; Marta Pawlak, Anita Kowalska, AmCham.

Photos by AGENCJA REPORTER

Celebrating America’s independence

Silver sponsorsGold sponsors

The official partof the picnic wascommenced withthe Presentationof the Colors bythe US MarineCorp, and chil-dren singing theAmerican and Pol-ish national an-thems.

Despite therainy weather theguests had asplendid timeunder a big tent ofover 1,300 sq m.The Platinumsponsor of theevent, McDon-ald’s, served Mc-Nuggets andshrimp along withsalads and icecream. The Sher-aton Warsaw alsoserved deliciousdishes, while theSofitel WarsawVictoria Hotel pro-vided desserts.The InterConti-nental Hotel of-fered ice cream tosuit any palate.Drinks wereserved by BrownForman, distribu-tor of JackDaniel’s whiskeyand FinlandiaVodka, andCEDEC, distribu-tor of Żubrówkavodka and CarloRossi wine. Beerwas sponsored byZamkowe andPerła brands, andsoft drinks byCoca-Cola andPepsi. Specialthanks go toLevi’s, whichdressed the Am-Cham staff for theevent.

While adult par-ticipants engagedin socializing,children played atthe Kids Cornersponsored by Uni-versal Express andExpress Reloca-tions and partici-pated in activitiesorganized by theUnited Way Foun-dation. Older chil-dren tested theirpilot skills onflight simulatorsprovided by

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1. US Marines bring in the American flag. 2. US Ambassador toPoland Lee Feinstein; AmCham Chairman Joseph Wancer; Am-Cham Executive Director Dorota Dabrowski; AmCham ViceChair Judith Y. Gliniecki; AmCham Board Members Roman Re-wald and Peter Kay, with children who sang the Polish andAmerican national anthems. 3. Joseph Wancer and theMarines. 4. Peter Kay; Judith Gliniecki; Lee Feinstein; RomanRewald. 5. Henryka Bochniarz, Boeing; Roman Rewald; Lee Fe-instein. 6. Robert Korzeniowski; Piotr Jucha, AmCham BoardMember. 7. Judith Gliniecki; Dorota Dabrowski; Marek Sowa;Patrycja Gołos, UPC. 8. Joseph Wancer; Marzena Drela, Am-Cham Deputy Director; Piotr Chmielecki, Jack Daniels. 9. AlainBobet; Roman Rewald; Lee Feinstein. 10. Krystyna Wancer;Joseph Wancer. 11. Linda Caruso, US Embassy; Judith Glin-iecki; Dorota Dabrowski. 12. Aneta Montano, FCm Travel Ex-press, with family. 13. Richard Kałżyński, Kałżyński & Madeja,with friends.


As many as600 Am-Cham

members andfriends with theirfamilies, includ-ing 150 children,joined US Am-bassador Lee Fe-instein, AmChamChairman JosephWancer and theAmCham Boardof Directors tocelebrate Ameri-can Independenceat the 4th of JulyPicnic at the Kró-likarnia Palace inWarsaw. Notableguests includedHenrykaBochniarz, presi-dent of the PolishConfederation ofPrivate EmployersLewiatan,Olympic goldmedalist RobertKorzeniowski,philosopher andwomen’s rightsactivist Mag-dalena Środa, andformer nationalsoccer teamplayer DariuszDziekanowski.

In a shortspeech, Ambassa-dor Feinsteinthanked theAmerican busi-ness communityfor their inspiringcooperation,which has helpedput business be-fore politics inPolish-Americanrelations underthe Obama ad-ministration.“This is the way itshould be,” Fein-stein said to greatapplause from thecrowd.

Platinum sponsorEVENT: Fourth of July Picnic

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Grand Prize sponsors

1. Picnic participants having a good time. 2. A lucky winner of one ofthe grand prizes; Marzena Drela; Robert Korzeniowski. 3. Winners ofthe LOT Polish Airlines ticket to any destination in Europe. 4. ChillMistentertained the party. 5. Giant soap bubbles were one of the attrac-tions for children. 6. The raffle was popular as ever. 7. Over a hundredprizes were awarded to raffle players. 8. The AmCham team. 9. V.O.A.rocked the night. 10. Brian Bode supervised the AmCham lottery draw-ing. 11. United Way activities for children. 12. Little picnickers. 13. IzaRzeszowska, an actress from the Jewish Theater in Warsaw, performslive. 14. Members of American football team the Warsaw Werewolveswith Marzena Drela and Katarzyna Duba, Avon Cosmetics Polska.15. Picnic sponsors had an excellent opportunity to showcase theirproducts to over 600 participants. 16. Fireworks culminated the event.


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FedEx.The UEFA Cor-

porate HospitalityClub Prestigestand was mannedby Robert Ko-rzeniowski.

One of the mostexciting momentsof the evening wasthe announcementof the raffle win-ners. With over 150prizes, the raffleattracted a recordnumber of players.The grand prizewas provided byLOT Polish Air-lines: a round-tripticket to any Euro-pean destination.FCm Travel Ex-press and Aerosvitsponsored tworound-trip ticketsto any Ukrainiandestination. Alucky winner tookhome an HP note-book, while two bi-cycles in the rafflewere sponsored byAvis and McDon-ald’s.

In-kind sponsorsof the event in-cluded Animex,with Krakus andMorliny meatproducts, Frito-Lay, Oreo andHeinz foods, Lynkaand Russell Europewith t-shirts,Medicover withmedical assistance,and Walt Disneyand WoltersKluwer with toys.

The artistic partof the evening wasdivided into threeperformances: amix of pop and fu-sion by MistChill,and rock and rollby V.O.A. and divaIzabella Rzes-zowska.

Bronze sponsors

1. Andrew Hope, Fanton Hill Capital, with Marzena Hope and daughter. 2. The Kids Corner was sponsoredby Universal Express and Express Relocations. 3. The United Way stand. 4. The InterContinental War-saw provided ice cream. 5. Deep-fried shrimp from McDonalds were sought out by many participants.6. Desserts were sponsored by the Sofitel Victoria. 7. Coca-Cola provided soft drinks. 8. A flight simulatorfrom FedEx. 9. Children and their parents have fun. 10. Michael Moritz, Radio PiN; Marzena Drela. 11. TheSheraton Warsaw provided catering. 12. Jack Daniel’s was one of the drink sponsors... 13. ...andŻubrówka another. 14. Robert Korzeniowski. 15. Participants gather for the official part of the evening.16. Ronald McDonald entertains children and some of their parents. 17. Dafne Dabrowski, age 1, was oneof the youngest guests at the picnic.

Photos by AGENCJA REPORTER except No 17 by Anita Kowalska

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AmCham Guide to Committees

Agri & Food www.amcham.pl/agri_food

Mission: To provide aplatform for discussingand solving issues andidentifying opportuni-ties in the agriculturaland food sector by cre-

ating a base for dialogue and expertise. Co-Chairs: Andrzej Pawelczak, Animex; MaciejŁubieński, Universal Leaf Tobacco Poland.

Healthwww.amcham.pl/health

Mission: To provide aunited forum for UScompanies to sharetheir expertise on thehealthcare system and

exchange knowledge and experience with na-tional counterparts, and promote the US expe-rience and capital while establishing the bestconditions and opportunities for investments.Co-Chairs: Elisabeth Asirifi, IBM Polska;Jolanta Chlebicka-Dominiak, Johnson &Johnson.Infrastructurewww.amcham.pl/infrastructure

Mission: To discussissues of the devel-opment of infrastruc-ture; to promote in-frastructure solutions

for cooperation between private and publicpartners. Co-Chairs: Krzysztof Wierzbowski,Wierzbowski Eversheds; Andrew C. Ka-pusto, Raytheon Homeland Security.

Tax & Financial Serviceswww.amcham.pl/tax

Mission: To provide aplatform for identifyingtax and financial issuesand create an educa-tional forum to keep A Cham members in-

formed on current and upcoming legislation.Co-Chairs: Piotr Bartuzi, Bank BPH; AndrewHope.

Political Discussion Forumwww.amcham.pl/pdf

Mission: To build rela-tionships with key play-ers in Polish politics, re-gardless of whetherwithin the government ornot, in small groups and

in private settings, to serve as a vehicle into theworld of Polish politics behind official curtains.Co-Chairs: Robert Koński, Kulczyk Holding;Marek Matraszek, CEC Government Rela-tions.

Corporate Social Responsibilitywww.amcham.pl/csr

Mission: To encourageand facilitate responsi-ble business practicesamong AmCham mem-bers to support them toimprove the quality and

effectiveness of their CSR programs. Co-Chairs: Wojciech Arszewski, UPS Polska;Anna Jawor, IBM Polska. Small & Medium-Sized Enterprises

www.amcham.pl/sme Mission: To provide aforum for exchange ofideas/best practices toimprove the perform-ance of SMEs; to iden-

tify and promote solutions to facilitate and sup-port the managerial and operational efforts ofSMEs through educational, networking or lob-bying efforts that leverage the resources andknowledge of AmCham and its membership.Co-Chairs: Alain Bobet; Cezary Krasodomski,Cisco Systems.

Employee & Labor Relations www.amcham.pl/labor

Mission: To create aninformation exchangeforum of HR profession-als to share, discussand learn about the lat-

est trends in HR management and influencelocal policy and decision-makers. Co-Chairs:Jolanta Jaworska, IBM Poland; Peter Strupp,United Business Development.

Consumer Productswww.amcham.pl/consumer

Mission: To provide aforum to share knowl-edge and exchangeexperience in allareas common andrelevant to manufac-

turers and distributors of goods. Co-Chairs:Małgorzata Surdek, CMS CameronMcKenna; Agnieszka Dzięgielewska-Jończyk, HP Polska.

Real Estatewww.amcham.pl/real_estate

Mission: To discuss is-sues regarding thecomplexities of the realestate market in Poland,and exchange informa-tion. To be an educa-

tional and networking forum for members andto lobby and influence legislative departmentsof the Polish government. Co-Chairs: HalinaWięckowska, K & L Gates; John Bańka, Col-liers International.

Pharmaceuticalwww.amcham.pl/pharmaceutical

Mission: To discuss andidentify common interestsand exchange informa-tion regarding Poland’spharmaceutical market;

to act as a representative body and collectivevoice of pharmaceutical companies beforegovernmental institutions. Co-Chairs:Jarosław Oleszczuk, Abbott Laboratories;Roberto Servi, Eli Lilly Polska.

Outsourcing/High Techwww.amcham.pl/outsourcing

Mission: To provide aplatform for discussing,identifying and address-ing common SSC/BPOissues related to high-

tech operations; to maintain contact with localauthorities, educational and governmental in-stitutions to present a unified business per-spective and to suggest ways of possible co-operation. Co-Chairs: Marek Suczyk, KrollOntrack; Jacek Stryczyński, Lionbridge.

Intellectual Property Rights www.amcham.pl/ipr

Mission: To advocatefor IPR protection andprovide leadership thatwill bring together inter-ested partners; to

share information with decision-makers andlaw enforcement. The police, judiciary, pros-ecutors, customs officials, legislators andjournalists are among the target groups,while the curriculum of law schools shouldhave more emphasis on IPR. Co-Chairs: Ag-nieszka Wyszyńska-Szulc, Philip Morris; AnnaLasocka, Łaszczuk & Partners.

Marketing & Communicationswww.amcham.pl/marketing

Mission: To provide a forum formember firms to share knowledgeand exchange experiences in mar-keting, communications and PR;provide educational and network-

ing opportunities for member firms inter-ested in these areas; and serve as an advi-sory body for AmCham. Co-Chairs: AnyaOgorkiewicz.

Defense & Security www.amcham.pl/defense

Mission: To serve as aplatform for defense in-dustry issues and ex-change relevant infor-mation. The committee

creates a networking forum and fosters a pos-itive working relationship with the governmentand people of Poland. Co-Chairs: Paul Za-lucky; Stan Prusiński, Sikorsky Europe.

Energy & Environmentwww.amcham.pl/environmental

Mission: To help mem-bers develop their en-ergy and environmentalbusiness in Poland. Byhelping members work

collectively to overcome any systemic difficultiesencountered in their business the committeeaims to increase the level and quality of invest-ment and activity in these sectors. Co-Chairs:Adam de Sola Pool; Jerzy Chlebowski, Mitsubishi.

For the most recentinformation about the

work of AmCham Committees, and upcoming events:

www.amcham.plEuropean Union Affairs www.amcham.pl/eu

Mission: To providemembers with relevantinformation on EU-re-lated issues, includingEU funds, and to rep-resent American in-

vestors before the Commission and the Polishgovernment. Co-Chairs: Magdalena BurnatMikosz, Deloitte; Jerzy Thieme.

W tym numerze:

COVER STORY

Pomimo globalnegokryzysu ekonom-icznego sektor out-sorcingu w Polsceprzeżywa wzrost. Czyten stan będzietrwać? str. 16

MONTHLY MEETINGnowy rozdział Relacje polsko-amerykańskiewkraczają w nowy etap oparty o relacje biznesowe, str. 20

CEO FORUMBiznes jak zwykle Innowacyjność to sposób nauzyskanie przewagi konkurencyjnej w czasach gospo-darczego spowolnienia, str. 22

FOCUSlepsza oferta AmCham kontynuuje starania dos-tosowania swojej oferty do potrzeb i wymagań członków,str. 24

nowy szef kuchni Gavin Baxter z warszawskiegohotelu Marriott, str. 26

dyplom Bma Jak zdobyć dyplom MBA w Polsce, str.28

poszukiwanie biznesu Tomasz Ćwiok z “AmericanInvestor” rozmawia z John P. Claussen, dyrektorem naPolskę w firmie Chevron Upstream Europe, str. 29

rozwój na celowniku Tomasz Ćwiok z “AmericanInvestor” rozmawia z James Hemmer i Mark Watson,manadżerami z firmy Antenna Software, str. 30

© American Chamber of Commerce in Poland 2011. All rights reserved.

American Investor to oficjalny magazyn Amerykańskiej Izby Handlowej w Polsce. Magazyn reprezentuje głos środowisk międzynarodowego biznesu w Polsce. Celem magazynu jestdostarczanie członkom Izby i innym czytelnikom aktualnych informacji na temat działalności Izby a także trendów biznesowych i polityce społecznej firm.

listy do rekacji prosimy wysyłać na adres poczty elektronicznej: [email protected]

EKSPERCIproblem odwołanych lotów Odpowiedzialność przewoźnikówpowietrznych za nieprzewidziane wydarzenia skutkująceodwołaniem lotów, str. 31

podążając za liderami Choć innowacyjność w biznesie jestróżnie określana warto trzymać się wypróbowanych definicji , str. 32

RELACJE ZDJĘCIOWESpotkanie na temat CSR we Wrocławiu, str. 34

Spotkanie na temat finansowania nauki, we Wrocławiu, str. 34

Charytatywne spotkania graczy w golfa, str. 35

Spotkamie zarządu AmCham z władzami Katowic, str. 36

Biznesowy mikser w podkrakowskich Przegorzałach, str. 37

Spotkanie z Ambasadorem Stanów Zjednoczonych, str. 38

CEO Forum na temat innowacyjności w biznesie, str. 39

Piknik z okazji Dnia Niepodległości Stanów Zjednoczonych, str. 40

DZIAŁY STAŁEInformacje o Firmach Członkowskich Izby, str. 2

Informacje o działalności Komitetów Izby, str. 8

Przewodnik po Komitetach Izby, str. 45

SUMMARIES: in Polish


american investor september 2011

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