Network events

EU Business School Barcelona (EU) is the official educational partner for the Crucero Business Networking (CBN) project that offers executives and companies a new and innovative way of making connections on the high seas. Making its maiden voyage in April of 2014, CBN is a combination of education, entertainment and networking. The project not only opens people up to new connections, but also opens their minds to new possibilities.

After five or six years of attending Barcelona networking events and networking events in other parts of the country, co-creators José Manuel Núñez Núñez and Ana María Pachón Farias found that there was an empty niche in the networking world in Spain and, more expansively, Europe. They decided to start up a project that would offer a new way for companies and senior executives to network: a cruise wherein the participants could have fun, learn something valuable and make important business connections that would help them expend their professional contact base.

Crucero Business Networking’s project takes place, as the name suggests, aboard the MSC Splendida cruise ship. With promises of fun, learning and connecting, CBN participants will go on the most productive and lucrative vacation they’ve ever taken.

“Crucero Business Networking is an innovative idea that combines business, education and networking in a package which takes people out of their comfort zones and makes them all guests at the same level. Participants will be much more willing to share, exchange and be candid when their guards are down and they are all equal; I’m sure it will lead to in-depth communication and very strong and fruitful corporate business connections,” says Carl Craen, Managing Director of the European University Barcelona campus in a recent interview.

During their stay they will receive pragmatic a business training from European University professors Andrew Ward, Sergio M. Gil Puy, Pablo Gilardini Ricci and Albert H. Vahlhaus, who are designing a practical business program that meets the needs of participants who have been out of school for years and are already seasoned business veterans. The courses will refresh their knowledge and give them new and different perspectives on international business concepts.

“European University Business School has always been innovative and, though we are an international network, each campus has a reciprocal relationship with its individual city and country,” says Craen, “Our role in providing the educational aspect of this project and putting some of our best faculty members up to the task is our way of contributing to this revolutionary project.”

Following the practical education principle and exercising pragmatism by learning from active professionals, the cruise program also includes expert guest speakers who can offer participants insight into the current market. Speakers attending the kickoff event will include John Merolla, one of the leading experts in digital marketing and social media in Spain and author of six books on Enterprise Marketing 2.0.; Juanma Romero, who has been a TVE journalist for 30 years and is considered by Business Experts Top Ten as one of the top ten media professionals in Spain; and Albert Catalán, a stylist and entrepreneur who is the co-creator of TheQhair Hairdressers Guide; the Michelin stars of the hairdressing sector. These speakers will give a non-academic perspective of the business world and share their secrets to success with participants.

It is true that personal connections do make the difference in business. This is one of the things that makes the CBN so effective. After the cruise, you will have spent at least thirty minutes of your time with the people you have made connections with. In addition, you were both part of the same experience; this, as with alumni from the same university, brings individuals closer together. During the journey, participants will also be able will meet other entrepreneurs from the locations where the cruise ship stops: France, Italy and Tunisia. Companies or entrepreneurs that want to branch out into any of these countries or other parts of Europe will also find this beneficial.