Winner of the Third Coca-Cola HBC Management Challenge Announced

 Prague, 2 March 2021 – For the third time Czech and Slovak university students had the chance to take part in the nation-wide Coca‑Cola HBC Management Challenge, which takes place in cooperation with the non-profit company JA Alumni. The event represents a bridge between academia and the world of internationally successful business. Due to the uncertain situation this year, the whole challenge took place online for the first time. The twenty webinars organized in cooperation with partner universities in Czechia and Slovakia were attended by 1,800 students. 

 “Within the challenge, the student teams are asked to process an empirical case study. Those that succeed will have the opportunity to win one of many interesting prizes, such as a day with a Coca-Cola HBC manager, financial award, a WOW experience of their choice or drinks for a student event. This year members of the winning teams will newly also be competing for an internship in our company and will get the opportunity to learn from top managers,” said Kiriaki Kritidi, HR manager at Coca-Cola HBC Česko a Slovensko.

“We are excited to cooperate with Coca-Cola HBC for the third time in the Management Challenge. From the students’ perspective, this challenge represents a great aid in starting one’s career and improving managerial skills and abilities. It also gives us the opportunity to learn new things within our network and to always keep moving the project a step further. We believe that this year was very successful, despite the fact that everything had to take place online,” added Eliška Straková, national coordinator, and Tereza Hyšková, social network manager from JA Alumni, which brings together young and talented people.

From October 2020 until the end of January 2021 the students had time to put together teams, choose a case study and come up with a solution. The whole challenge is held in English. Thanks to webinars, whose topics were selected to fit the partner universities and their study plans, the students had the opportunity to not only learn about how business is conducted at Coca-Cola HBS but also grow personally and learn how to find success on social media. Marketing topics were the most popular among students. In their webinars, marketing manager Lukáš Rokošný and national marketing manager Pavel Beroušek explained how to properly plan a marketing campaign.  Financial director Ion-Alin Cojocaru and financial manager of commercial services Petra Lara then introduced the students to corporate numbers.

The winning teams this year were: 

1. Kapůča:  Nikola Lomenčíková (CEMS VŠE), Julie Janáková (VŠE), Martin Rampa (VŠE), Martina Kopová (Erasmus School of Economics), Berta Šimonová (CEMS VŠE)
2. Cherry Eco Coke: Christopher Svitok (Newton College, Brno), Pascal Masár (Newton College), Jana Hochel The University of Cambridge), Aleksandar Brdar (Masarykova univerzita,Brno).
3. Recycle The Feeling: Johana Karbanová (VŠE), Matěj Hronek (Univerzita Karlova), Martin Stanislav (Univerzita Karlova), Jaroslav Pryjmak (Technická univerzita v Liberci)

The absolute winner will receive a prize of 25 000 CZK/1 000 EUR and one day with the CEO. The second team can choose a WOW experience and the third one will get beverages from the company. This year we saw many high-quality and well-processed projects. 

More information is available here: https://cz.coca-colahellenic.com/cz/pracujte-s-nami/coca-cola-hbc-management-challenge and here: https://managementchallenge.net/.