This article was first published on the ENTREMIND project website.
Athletic careers end early. ENTREMIND is an Erasmus+ Sport partnership that works on what comes next: helping athletes turn what they built in sport into a plan for life after it, with entrepreneurship as a real option. As the news section of the ENTREMIND website opens, this post starts by looking back at what the partnership has done since October 2025, and then at what is still to come.
Where it started
The project began on 1 October 2025. Four organisations in four countries run it together: Young Entrepreneurs Society in Warsaw, which coordinates the project, Compass Academy in Türkiye, SpedTech in Belgium and ORCAS IF in Oslo.
On 3 December 2025, one representative from each partner met at CIC Warsaw for the kick-off meeting. The day covered who leads which part of the work and what comes first: research with athletes themselves.
What we have built so far
Three resources are ready, and all three are free to download from the ENTREMIND website.
The research report, January 2026. Before building anything for athletes, we asked them. One hundred athletes in Poland, Türkiye, Belgium and Norway answered a survey, and 12 athletes, three in each country, took part in longer interviews. The report shows what athletes already bring from sport, what they lack, and how the barriers differ from one country to the next. Two of its findings stand out: athletes rate their teamwork at 4.6 out of 5 but their legal knowledge at 1.9, and the main barrier to starting something is different in every country. Read about the report.
The assessment tool, April 2026. A self-assessment of fifteen to twenty minutes, written in the language of sport. It shows what sport has already given you, where the gaps are, and which area to work on first. See the assessment tool.
The training kit, September 2026. Stories of athletes who built something beyond sport, a catalogue of online courses, most of them free, and a directory of books, podcasts and talks. Open the training kit.
What comes next
Two more resources are being built and will be published on the ENTREMIND website. The research report recommends building the empowerment toolkit around four practical modules: who you are beyond your sport, low-risk ways to start, the paperwork in your country and the money basics. The supporting kit will point to incubators, funding programmes and mentors in the partner countries.
The partners also plan three online webinars under the title Unlocking the Entrepreneurial Spirit, and a workshop where athletes and coaches work with the tools themselves. Dates will be announced on the ENTREMIND website.
From now on, the news section of the ENTREMIND website follows the work as it happens: what the research found, how to use each resource, and what happens at each event.
ENTREMIND is an Erasmus+ Sport partnership co-funded by the European Union (project 101229842).
Co-funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.
