Breaking news!

    follow me on Twitter

    Sunday, April 05, 2009

    Looking for the euro-entrepreneur

    During the workshop "Universities and companies: getting brains in business" at the European Business Summit the panelists identified the lack of entrepreneurs in Europe as one of the biggest thread for the region.

    So, they were sharing on how can the EU support young people to flourish the entrepreneurial spirit and gain the skills to be able to create value in uncertain environments.

    They mentioned the need of including entrepreneurship as part of the University careers, also to create more incubators for potential companies and increase the money available to investments.

    I wonder if those actions are tackling the root cause.

    In Western Europe, entrepreneurs don't have the same brand than in other parts of the world.

    In my mind, an entrepreneur is at the level of a rock star or famous football players. It is what you want to be. It is only achieved by the best of the best: the risk takers, committed, connected and result oriented. It is cool to be an entrepreneur!

    I would invest more on marketing. I see the need of re-shaping the perception young europeans have on entrepreneurship.

    I would connect entertainment, technology, arts and entrepreneurship. I would get right in the places where young people hang out and start building a new brand: the euro-entrepreneur.

    May sound fluffy but I think that marketing has been shaping what we value and what we care about and we haven't use all its potential as a tool for positive social change.






    3 comments:

    1. Myself being an entrepreneur, I do not think entrepreneurship is for everyone (in the same way painting is not for everyone). You have to enjoy stress and a large range of challenges for example. Otherwise one would probably add more value by being a specialist than an entrepreneur.

      I was part of a foundation that promotes entrepreneurship. We believed that there is no specialised training for entrepreneurs. So we built a peer support community for young entrepreneurs. They exchange experiences regarding the daily and/or strategic challenges they face. This way they have more success, which would stimulate more people to think of entrepreneurship. In the same time, the community allows the would-be entrepreneurs to get a tast of what entreprenurship is about, so that the would-be entrepreneurs can figure out if this would be their way. The community grew a lot (+800 people) and the process will probably continue.

      ReplyDelete
    2. Boss, sometimes you are so wise you scare me ;)

      ReplyDelete
    3. Dear Juan, this is Sze Yan, a Malaysian,who is now currently working in the art corporation.I am interested to know more about your idee to bring up , connection of technology , entertainment and art, of course , if it could link up with youth. I had been observing this trend , and this is a new trend perhaps in the era of web2.0 can lead to. perhaps you can email me your ideas to szeyan.tan@gmail.com. lets see anything can come up after this :)

      ReplyDelete

    Search This Blog