Digital technologies play a key role in reviving the world economy. The EU has pledged to combine recovery support with resilient digital transformation. The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the lack of digitization in Slovakia and the shortcomings of digital skills in citizens and communication with institutions. Digital skills are important and should form part of educational policy. ICT skills can help people succeed in the labour market and improve communication with public administration. Digitization and globalization increase the importance to communicate through the Internet, applications, and other e-based gadgets. Digital skills are one of the essential parts of e-Government, so people can use e-Government services in communication with public administration. The current crisis is affecting citizens’ use of online services. Indices concerning the digital economy are analysed, such as the digital economy and society index DESI and e-Government digital skills (EGDI) from 2018 to 2021 revealed a stagnant state in 2018 and 2019, and in 2020, there was a decrease in basic digital skills. The next index is E-Government Digital Index. It focuses on human capital and digital skills in these indices. The paper analyses and identifies the digital skills of citizens in the context of e-Government development and describes the use of e-Government services by EU citizens with a focus on the Slovak Republic. The data were collected through a questionnaire survey of Slovak Republic citizens’ digital skills according to selected categories, the use of e-Government services as well as awareness of e-Government services. Solutions that improve e-Government in the Slovak Republic are gradually being implemented. Improving digital skills according to the National Coalition for Digital Skills and Professions in the Slovak Republic is one of the priorities of The Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic, which has adopted an action plan for 2019–2022 to improve the results in the DESI index by 2025 and focus on the digital skills required by employers. The survey revealed that in Slovakia, the majority of schools offer only weak support for digital education (about the EU-27 average of 68% and 45%, respectively). The research also revealed a decreased level of digital literacy among young people. These competencies are very important to gain a position in the labour market in the digital society. The projects aim to support the development of digital skills of primary and secondary school students, and the integration of new technologies into teaching.

This article deals with the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method, which can be calculated in several ways. The aim of the paper is to analyze and describe the AHP method as essential for strategic managerial decision-making to determine which method is efficient for the calculation and to set the proper order of criteria. In the contribution, we show how the AHP method can be used through different techniques. In the article, there are included methods that can be used in order to calculate the matrix in the AHP process for setting criteria. This study also focused on the accuracy of various methods used to compute AHP. The paper contains the procedure of using the Saaty method through the Excel program. The results of the research show that the most accurate method is the Saaty method. In comparison with the Saaty method is the geometric mean method with the slightest deviation (CI = 0.00010), followed by the Row sum of the adjusted Saaty matrix with deviation (CI = 0.00256), reverse sums of the Saaty matrix columns (CI = 0.00852), Arithmetic mean and Row sums of the Saaty matrix (CI = 0.01261). All of these methods are easy to calculate and can be performed without major mathematical calculations. The AHP method is often used with other methods such as SWOT, FUZZY, etc. The survey was carried out through an inquiry with managers who graduated from universities in Slovakia and showed that the respondents considered the Saaty method as the most complex and the most difficult. The geometric mean and average mean methods were regarded as the simplest methods. Respondents (44%) stated that they were able to use a program to calculate the AHP. Respondents (46%) had experience with some method related to the strategic managerial decision-making process. Managers (72%) regarded this skill as important for decision-making in their managerial position. The contribution of this paper is to show the advantages of the AHP method in its wide use in various fields.

The study aimed to determine the factors of social capital (SC) of enterprises that can have a significant impact on achieving sustainable competitiveness. In this regard, the study tested the SEM-analysis method for evaluating hypotheses regarding the influence of factors of relational, cognitive and structural social capital of enterprises on financial and non-financial indicators of competitiveness. Empirical data for the study were obtained on the basis of a sociological survey conducted by the authors of managers and owners of enterprises in Ukraine from December 2020 to March 2021. The obtained results and modelled relationships of factors confirmed the significant influence of factors of social capital of enterprises on competitiveness. At the same time, the results revealed the most essential influence of efforts to develop strategic partnerships with suppliers (as part of structural SC), efforts to form a positive image of the enterprise and satisfaction with horizontal relationships (as part of relational SC), general satisfaction with the psychological climate in the team, the establishment of corporate culture as well as own efforts to support and develop corporate culture (among the factors of cognitive SC).

The paper presents the results of a survey aimed at evaluating the attitudes of Slovak respondents toward eco-innovation purchasing power supplied on the Slovak market to propose an open business model that would support such purchasing power to increase sustainability. The primary method applied in the research was the Kano model, by which we determined the attitudes of the respondents to the issue. Based on the findings and using the analytical-synthetic method, we subsequently processed a proposal for a business model for implementation of ecological innovation in Slovakia. This model used innovative marketing communication tools to increase interest in eco-innovation and products, and created a learning algorithm to influence customers’ shopping behaviors. As a result of the research, we assumed that the main obstacles to increasing demand for eco-innovation and products were inexperience, cost, and lack of information held by respondents, and therefore it is necessary to build and improve customer relationships, in which, in addition to traditional forms of marketing, it is inevitable to use various innovative forms of corporate social responsibility to minimize these negatives.

E-Government is one area of digitization that has been under way for several years in European countries. In this paper, we focus on identifying different indices that are aimed at measuring digitalization or e-Government. The results of the analysis showed that there are several indices that focus on this area within the EU, such as EGDI, EPI, LOSI, DGI, e-Government benchmark, Eurostat—Internet use, GII, DSGI, Going Digital toolkit, and DESI. Subsequently, the index areas to be used in the DEA method to measure the efficiency of e-Government-related inputs and outputs within the EU were identified. Inputs and outputs were selected logically and then verified using correlation analysis. Among the input and output indices chosen were Internet usage, DSGI, GII, e-Government benchmark, and interaction with public administration online. From the analysis, three inputs and three outputs were used and the models were output oriented. After implementing the correlation, it can be said that the values between the selected sub-variables are suitable for DEA analysis. Two models were chosen for the calculation, namely the CCR and BCC models. The CCR model found 10 states to be efficient and BCC model found 13 states to be efficient. In addition, in the close analysis, we took a closer look at the CCR model’s inference. Countries such as Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Malta, and Portugal were efficient outliers. When comparing the regions within the EU, we can conclude that the countries of Northern Europe are the most efficient in the field of digitalization (e-Government). As many as four countries out of seven are efficient.

The aim of this article is to provide analysis and description of deposit and recycling system of disposable beverage packaging, which started in the Slovak Republic in 2022. The article provides the review of relevant literature with a focus on circular economy and Deposit Refund System (DRS), where analysis of refund systems was performed for this work. The proposed model involving reverse logistics describes how such deposit and collection system can work in practice, highlighting potential disadvantages, mainly the high investment costs. Therefore, the article also includes a financial analysis exploring potential cost of establishing said deposit and collection system. The number of necessary collection point for Slovakia has been determined and the total investment costs for the vending machines installations and service in Slovakia has been calculated.