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Language is made up of five basic components: morphology, phonology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics. Morphology in linguistics represents the study of the words, how they are formed and their relationship with other words in the same language; phonology involves the rules regarding the structure of the speech sounds and their sequence; syntax is the study of morphemes and how they form larger units; pragmatics involves the rules for appropriate and effective communication; semantics deals with vocabulary and the way concepts are expressed through words. Thus, vocabulary is one of the constituent elements of the language. Words carry meaning and have their own energy representing the building blocks of communication. According to the context they are used in, their meaning differs, therefore, vocabulary acquisition is crucial when talking about English for Specific Purposes, in our situation, Business English. But how is vocabulary acquisition in second language done? Vocabulary building often occurs through reading, however, it is unlikely for the students in foreign language to acquire the basic specific vocabulary through reading. The present paper deals with the strategies a Business English teacher approaches in order to assist students to learn vocabulary as well as to equip them with methods to turn perceptive vocabulary into context vocabulary. How can vocabulary be taught efficiently? How can teacher provide learners the needed input in order to shift vocabulary from input to output? How can teachers introduce vocabulary in order for optimal retention to be ensured? These are some the questions the present paper addresses.

More natural than analytical thinking, design thinking provides solutions to common dilemmas. Fundamentally, it is a human centered and collaborative approach. It all starts with empathy, through the help of a deep research. Furthermore, banking success resides from understanding customers, not exclusively from profits. It is necessary to figure out human thinking, the needs and desires of customers, in order to have a portfolio of appropriate products and services. This is where success comes from. Having this desideratum, the paper analyzes the characteristics of the design thinking method and the digital elements that appear in the banking sector. Certainly, the biggest challenges in the banking system are generated by the digital transformation, by emphasizing the relationship with customers and current social trends. Consequently, Bank of America is an example of a successful application of the design thinking method. Likewise, the beneficial impact that the design thinking method can have on the bank’s employees should not be ignored. Through this research paper, there was analyzed the environment of the banking system which is influenced by design thinking.

The aim of this article is to understand the theoretical framework of the social capital concept, based on different approaches identified in the literature and highlight the direct influence social capital has on the entrepreneurial personality characteristics of individuals and organizations. The objectives of the paper focus first on conceptualizing the notion of social capital, by acknowledging the social capital structure and components in the acceptation of the most popular scholars in the research field, the sources of social capital and its role in building social economy; further on, the article explores the influence of social capital in the creation of innovation and economic growth, its dimensions in the entrepreneurial process and the definition of the instruments of measurement, including indicators of trust-generalized and institutional, number of social networks, associational activities-passive and active membership and civic norms. The paper gathers some of the outcomes of different researches conducted in the literature with respect to the positive relationship between social capital dimensions and entrepreneurship, through attracting the right potential of human capital and the required level of financial capital, reducing the transaction costs, identifying new market opportunities and leveraging the social networks, transfer and knowledge overflow and information channels, enabling the launch and the survival of business venture and help gain competitive advantage that would ensure sustainability and success. The case studies referenced in this article use various approaches of highlighting the social capital as a key enabler and not necessarily a generator of entrepreneurial activity, by analyzing the likelihood to launch new ventures based on the interactions with key partners and exchange of information, the sustainability and success of a start up or push/pull factors that determine an entrepreneur to enter the new ventures environment. The article is concluded by a high level introspection on how social capital is created in large corporations, what are the dimensions and the structure of this new “must have” capital form.

In the 1990s, the rise of the Internet throughout the world helped significantly the job of the English language teachers, in ways of having access to vast information and access to new methods of teaching foreign languages. We think that, back then, nobody thought of what technology and access to Internet would mean to us one day. But since the beginning of 2020, the world has been going through an unprecedented crisis. The pandemic has changed everything: family behaviour, schools, businesses, environment, and so on and so forth. The world has been divided into two: the businesses and companies that have been stopped and the sector of the jobs that continued working. Since many countries have faced lockdowns, subsequently many schools have closed their doors. The teachers have faced the situation of delivering courses using virtual classrooms, not matter how tech-shy they have been. Of course, online teaching English has both advantages and disadvantages. The question is simple: do the perks outweigh the downsides of teaching English online? The answer is difficult. It depends on every teacher. The present paper is trying to throw some light on this question.

In the entrepreneurial environment of the 21st century, changes are taking place constantly. Business performance benchmarks are changing and competition is more pronounced. The current economic conditions and fierce competition that prevail today, are forcing companies to look for new ways to reduce costs and increase profitability. If a company expects to survive and grow, it needs constant creativity to differentiate, add value, and create a competitive edge. Therefore, to thrive and excel, business organizations need continuous innovation, rapid response, and creative human talent. This paper presents an essential aspect of entrepreneurship in the 21st century, the importance of innovation and creativity, and the role they play in the global entrepreneurial context. Introduces the entrepreneurial environment and discusses the evolution of entrepreneurship as a science from the earliest period until the present. Using a methodology based on a critical research method, the results briefly describes the importance of innovation and creativity in today's global entrepreneurship, the importance of knowing the difference between creativity and innovation, and the advantages it has over entrepreneurship all over the globe. The aim of the article is to emphasize the connection between creativity and innovation, as well as the strategy to encourage creativity and innovations among entrepreneurs in today's competitive business environment, as long as creativity generates new ideas and innovation materializes them. The globalization topic summarizes the evaluation of entrepreneurial opportunities and explains the objectives involved in global entrepreneurship.

Starting from the main challenges and growth opportunities of Romania, and also considering the actual context of the social and economic developments, the aim of the paper is to analyse in terms of the research opportunities, the core activities that can be applied in Romania, in order to increase and support sustainable and favourable social inclusion. The analysis will be based on the National plan and the National strategy of the research, development and innovation projects that will also include sets of objectives that have close links for forecasting the results -of the national RDI system. At the same time, this program is supported by the state, which emphasizes the importance of the correct organization of funds in order to create activities necessary for the wellbeing of the society. Therefore, this work will also analyze the strategic orientation of the European Structural and Investment Funds for the period 2014-2020, learning from the lessons of the programming period between 2007-2013, in order to find out the answer to the research question: What are the main sectors in Romania where research development, and innovation projects would be needed as a priority? Following the qualitative analysis carried out by observation and comparison methods, it has been found that there are thirteen main areas that require the priority attention of the research, development, innovation programs, which are divided into two categories: smart specialization and public relevance. First, the field of smart specialization includes: bio-economy; information and communication technology, space and security; energy, environment and climate change; eco-nano-technologies and advanced materials. Secondly, the category of public relevance includes: the field of health; heritage and cultural identity and new and emerging technologies. Consequently, all of the above mentioned aspects are not possible without the stimulation of research and technological innovation programmes. Also through the correct application of the involution processes, using creativity and development-based entrepreneurship, it will be possible to train the population to generate credible program models, eventually this process becoming a lifestyle that will encourage the culture of innovation. Therefore, the purpose of RDI programs is to provide members of the global scientific community with an attractive development environment, involving both young researchers and top researchers from around the world.

This paper seeks to relate the effects of human resource management on innovation, from the perspectives of both employees and managers in the hotel area. The first part of the article consists from a literature review for hotel innovation. Thus, the innovation processes could be very diverse due to the different approaches to new developed products or services from the tourism area. Within the hotel industry human resource has become one crucial element for innovation, mainly because of the increasing role of the customer-contact employee. Considering the specificity of the Romanian hotel industry we appreciate that emphasizing the human resource role could generate and sustain a competitive advantage in a more dynamic environment. Within human resource approach, we point out that training program for employees and managers’ expertise are important factors in sustaining innovation. Therefore, three hypotheses are stated. Two of them refer to the training programs while the last one to the managers’ expertise. All of them are confirmed by the study’s findings. The second part of the study consists of developing findings for the region of Braşov County based on the presented research methodology. We consider two dependent variables, innovation decision and innovation level, respectively. Our goal is to determine the correlations between those two and the explanatory variables referring to employees and managers- training, constant training, occasional training, manager’s experience and manager’s education. The results demonstrate the need for an articulated training process in the hotel industry with a stronger emphasis on managers from the view of making decision process. On the other side, the role of employees is obvious when these decisions should be implemented. Meanwhile, the interference between the two categories is more and more intense due to the increasing process of employee empowerment within the hotel industry area. Thus, innovation could become a more competitive weapon and a source of increasing efficiency, also.

Romania, as a country with a low R&D level, in order to converge to the living standards of western economies, is doomed to foster private investments in applied research and experimental development. Thus, it is critical to study what are the main objectives for innovation at organizational level. This paper investigates the most important objectives for innovation in Romania and in the European Union, aiming to find out what are the main challenges innovative enterprises have to face. The general approach is focused on the analysis of the frequency with which these objectives occur, both at general and structural levels. Therefore we have extracted the most important three highly important objectives for innovation, both in Romania and EU: improving the quality of goods or services, the need to increase the range of goods or services and the entering new markets or increase the market share. All these three are positively correlated with the size (number of employees) of the organization. One of our findings underlines that there are fewer objectives in EU then in Romania, both at general and structural levels. Such a situation suggesting that the differences derive from two main sources: Romania has more needs, thus the enterprises target more goals, and there is a lack of managerial know-how that leads to non-prioritized objectives for innovation. Also, we identified an asymmetry, consisting in the fact that in EU, medium sized enterprises are more likely to act as the small ones, as opposed to the Romanian context. R&D and innovation component should be in the center of the Romanian strategy for convergence and competitiveness strengthening, treating differently the SMEs in order to foster innovation in a sustainable manner, through the encouragement of private enterprises to engage in partnerships for R&D an innovation. Also there is a critical need for governmental intervention in building facilities for the modern business infrastructures (business incubators, industrial parks, clusters, and competitive poles), creating a viable VC market for innovative projects, stimulating the creation of new SMEs and fostering internationalization of the local enterprises.

Creative industries have recently gained attention from economists and policy makers as they are said to contribute in a significant way to the economic and technological development of knowledge societies. In Romania there has not been too much talk about the way in which these industries are inserted in the larger chain of industrial innovation, nor about the particularities of their innovation processes which could provide interesting insights for the more traditional industries that are in need of a creativity boost. This paper seeks to fill this gap by offering a process view of business innovation in an event management company, which we argue has many of the characteristics encountered in organizations belonging to creative industries. Through an in-depth case study based on diary entries and interviews we uncover the way in which innovation is understood in this service sector and how this understanding is translated into repeatable business processes. Based on the review of the literature concerned with innovativeness in creative industries we have decided upon four important research themes: people, products, places and policies. By people we refer, first of all, to the entrepreneur who was asked to reflexively answer questions related to passions/interests, formal and non-formal knowledge and social capital in order to assess the entrepreneurial capacity. Also included in this category are the clients of the company and the employees, which represent major players in the innovation process during different stages. Places are important because they are used in the definition of innovation: something new to someone somewhere, and also because they are regarded as a source of inspiration and a possible hindrance in the implementation of the desired event design. Products encompass the raw materials that are used in creating the flower arrangements and the general room décor as well as the technologies that stand behind them, while policies refer to national or local governmental mechanisms that seek to guide and fund innovation. These categories represent (f)actors that bring important contributions to the innovation process, while at the same time representing sources of major business risks for the event management company. The article follows the way in which these four items interact during the innovation process which was split into four stages: idea generation, negotiation of the idea, preparations for implementation and implementation of the idea. We conclude with the observation that innovation in event planning is human centered, the main referential system being based on the dyad company-client, a thing which has not been explicitly researched until now. Also we suggest that before trying to understand the way in which companies innovate, it is critical to undergo a thorough assessment of the entrepreneurs’ perception of business risks.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how business environment and performance can be improved in an organization that used and implement Lean Six Sigma methodology and who create an organizational framework auspicious for theirs employees. Lean Six Sigma can be a management approach of an organization focused on quality and continuous improvement, based on the participation of all its employees which aims to ensure long term success. Its very important for a organization to believe in the capacity of work and intellect of their employees, to invest in them, so in this way they will feel useful and will became more self confident and will help the company to move one step ahead in this very competitive market we are facing today.