What Will CORE Ask You? From a Business Idea to Personalised Support

A Decision Support System can only provide useful recommendations if it first understands the entrepreneur, the business idea and the context in which that idea will develop.

This is why an important part of the CORE methodology focuses not only on what the system will analyse, but also on how it will communicate with young and aspiring entrepreneurs.

The principle is simple: no unnecessary jargon and no specialist sustainability knowledge should be required.

Instead, CORE will ask users clear and practical questions about who they are, what they want to build, who their customers are, how the business will operate, how it approaches sustainability and what kind of support may be needed.

The information requested from users covers several key areas.

Entrepreneurs will be asked about their business idea and ambitions, their customers and market, and the way their product or service reaches those customers.

They will also explore their circular and sustainability approach, including how environmental considerations are already reflected in the idea or where there may still be opportunities for improvement.

CORE will additionally consider operations, partners and revenue, together with relevant rules, possible funding opportunities and the entrepreneur’s own learning and skills needs.

Behind this accessible interface is a much more structured methodology. The CORE team has defined and validated a complete taxonomy of DSS user inputs, organised into nine thematic categories. These inputs are designed to be collected through a sector-adaptive and progressively disclosed interface, using plain and non-technical language. The system itself then handles the translation of the entrepreneur’s responses into the more technical concepts required for further analysis.

The objective is to make the process simple for the user while still generating meaningful and structured results.

Every answer provided by the entrepreneur will directly contribute to the personalised outputs produced by the CORE Decision Support System. These include a Business Model Canvas, Sustainability Indicators, SWOT Analysis, Sustainability Report and Training Needs assessment.

This approach is particularly important for first-time founders and young entrepreneurs. Sustainability reporting, circular economy concepts and business modelling can quickly become technical and intimidating. CORE aims to remove some of that complexity and allow entrepreneurs to begin with something they already understand well: their own idea.

The result is intended to be a more personalised form of support, where the entrepreneur’s own answers shape the recommendations and development path that follow.

For ITTI and the wider CORE partnership, this reflects a central ambition of the project: to make green and circular entrepreneurship more accessible, more practical and easier to act upon.

The CORE Decision Support System is being developed as part of the project’s wider effort to support young entrepreneurs in the fashion and agrifood sectors through practical tools, structured knowledge and personalised guidance.