Konsultavimas Europos Sąjungos struktūrinės paramos administravimo procesuose Lietuvoje

LTStraipsnyje nagrinėjamas konsultantų ir konsultacinių įmonių vaidmuo ES struktūrinės paramos administravimo procesuose Lietuvoje. Y patingas dėmesys yra kreipiamas konsultantų santykių su užsakovais bei suinteresuotais veikėjais problematikai. Konceptualų tyrimo pagrindą sudaro užsakovo – vykdytojo ir suinteresuotų veikėjų teorijų kategorijos. Jomis remiantis siekiama atskleisti ES struktūrinės paramos administravimo santykių lauką bei visų dalyvaujančių veikėjų vaidmenis ir įtaką. Kokybinio tyrimo metu (individualių interviu metodas) surinkti duomenys sudarė empirinių duomenų pagrindą.

ENUpon joining the European Union, Lithuania received a possibility to use the support programmes offered to the member states. The EU Structural Funds could be considered to be one of the most important support programmes. Even though this support could bring many benefits to the economic development of the entire country as well as improve the standards pertaining to the quality of life, its administration and adoption has been proved to be quite a challenge which requires competence, experience and creativity. Therefore, many of the support applicants choose external consulting services for the preparation and administration of the projects. The role of advisors and consulting firms in the administration processes of the EU structural support in Lithuania can be considered from several points of view. On the one hand, they can assist inexperienced applicants that seek EU support in preparing complicated technical applications and further project administration. However, on the other hand, advisors are business representatives who are interested in gaining profit and therefore, they may disregard the customers’ needs and influence the allocation of the EU support as well as distort the very nature of using the EU structural support. The goal of the study is to analyze the role of advisors and consulting firms in the administration processes of the EU structural support and to research their relationship with customers and other stakeholders. The first part presents the theoretical background of consulting services in terms of administration processes of the EU structural support. The main theoretical aspects of the relationship between principal and agent as well as the problems arising from such relationship are analyzed.Also, attention is given to the theoretical analysis of the stakeholders which reveals the relationship network of the EU structural support administration as well as the roles and influence of its participants. The second part offers a qualitative research on the role of consulting in the EU structural support administration processes in Lithuania. The results of the qualitative research show that the advisors and consulting firms that take part in the EU structural support administration processes in Lithuania may distort the nature of the use of the EU structural support. The advisors are business representatives whose activities are difficult to control. They prioritize their own benefits (higher profit margin). As they disregard the direct needs of their customers, the benefits from the EU structural support funds granted to the applicants may be smaller than the profit made by the advisors and consulting firms. Also, to ensure their own interests and to guarantee success for their prepared projects, the advisors and consulting firms keep informal relationships with the representatives of the project implementation institutions, politicians and other stakeholders, due to which the integrity of the adoption of the EU support funds is distorted.