ABSTRACT
Half a decade into the economic transition of Central and Eastern Europe, there appear to be some widespread misconceptions about how managerial and entrepreneurial skills develop. Many indigenous businesses remain hampered by lack of managerial talent–at least the kind necessary to advance into modern, competitive enterprises. At the microeconomic level, real reform of Central and Eastern Europe requires exposure to the operations of modern business enterprise. Through foreign direct investment (FDI), emerging private industry in Central and Eastern Europe has opened to the rigors of global capitalism for the first time in decades. There has been an explosion of entrepreneurial development in Poland since 1989. It has been estimated that two million entrepreneurs have started businesses since the fall of communism. According to recent estimates, small business is growing at a rate of 10 percent a year. FDI in Poland has also grown since 1989, although at a slower pace.
