On December 18th, took place the national awareness-raising workshop organised online by Next Step, the Hungarian partners of the NT4EU project. The event was a great success and was attended by more than 40 people!
James Peter, president of Next Step Hungary Association, opened the event with some words of welcome and introducing the agenda. The workshop was then composed of four main parts:
– Working in Hungary, legally: presentation of Dr. Valéria Eszter Horváth, attorney-in-law.
The first presentation by Dr. Valéria Eszter Horváth covered these main topics:
• Seeking legal employment in accordance with legal status/work permit: Dr. Eszter Horváth did a review of a wide range of legal status and their relationship with the right to work;
• Rights and duties of an employee: Dr. Eszter Horváth explained the terms of an employment contract (duration of the contract, work programme, working hours, workplace, wages, paid leave, obligations of the employer and employee, liability for damages, discrimination, termination of the employment relationship, etc.);
• Being self-employed: Dr. Eszter Horváth presented the option of both individual entrepreneurship and setting up a company with others, as a way of self-employment in Hungary.
After this presentation, third-country national guests raised several questions of legal nature, with respect to their situation.
– Affordable learning opportunities to foster the labour market integration of third-country nationals in Hungary. Activities, results, and lessons learned from the NT4EU project: presentation of Lilla Prontvai (Next Step Association), project manager of the NT4EU project.
This part presented by Lilla Prontvai focused on the NT4EU project and covered the following main points:
• Introducing Next Step Hungary Association and its activities: programmes of employment-oriented hard skills development, soft skills trainings, workshops of empowerment and awareness-raising, community-building events, responding to arising financial needs with charity solutions;
• The NewTalents4EU project: Lilla presented the IT and foreign language trainings and the Kids Coding Trainers’ Hub. Lilla shared with the audience also the results as well as the impact of COVID-19 on the project implementation, such as the challenges of remote digital learning. This part finished on the lessons learned by the implementation of the project;
• Lilla presented the activities of other Hungarian NGOs for the skill development of third-county nationals.
– Testimony of Maytham AlNeama, student of the NewTalents4EU project
In his testimony, Maytham referred to his personal experience and journey of reaching a certain level of integration in Hungary despite hardships of employment due to his legal status. He gave practical information on the keys to finding a job in Hungary, such as IT and Hungarian language skills development, having a properly composed CV and cover letter, being open to communicating with people and being aware of legal rights and obligations. Though he has a PhD degree in mechanical engineering, Maytham has never had the opportunity to work in his field in Hungary.
After Maymath presentation followed another short Q&A session. The questions were in connection with Next Step’s education programmes and Maytham’s practical advice on how to find online jobs and jobs not requiring strong Hungarian language skills.
– Chances of small businesses among third-country nationals: report of Marcell Lőrincz, director of the Subjective Values Foundation.
Marcell talked about current and recent projects of Subjective Values Foundation focusing on the labour market integration of third-country nationals in Hungary (such as the Entrendeurs Project – Entrepreneurial Self-Knowledge Workshop, or the See Me In project). He put a significant emphasis on the difficulties of being an entrepreneur, the importance of the preparatory phase before opening a business, and the attitude of “expecting the best, but being prepared for the worst”.
