World Entrepreneurship Day, April 16 2010

What happened on WED 2010 in Egypt you ask? Well, LOTS of stuff, in both Cairo and Alexandria.

SIFE Ain Sham University celebrated in Cairo for the second year in a row, organizing an event that featured six keynote speakers made up of university professors and representatives of international corporations such as IBM and Itida. The Chief of the Supreme Council of Universities from the Ministry of Higher Education was also there, presenting seminars to ambitious students on topics such as:

• Entrepreneurship and its importance to the future generations,
• Innovation as an inseparable term from entrepreneurship,
• Service science management, its importance, its needs, and methods of presenting services; and
• How we can all collaborate towards having a smarter planet.

A representative from IBM Egypt and also from Itida Egypt spoke about how their corporations started and the direct link between entrepreneurship and service science management.

What came out of this? Well, agreements have now been formed with local associations and social funds institutions to give ambitious and promising young entrepreneurs loans for their start ups in order to engage them in real life business. Amazing! Thank you to the SIFE ASU team!

Check out the photos:

And then, as if that wasn’t already a spectacular WED in Egypt, closer to the Mediterranean the SIFE team at Alexandria University pulled together an amazing day on 29 April. But don’t take my word for it, thanks to them you can check it out yourself at their live upstream! We also love the awesome poster they put together:

More than 200 students, professors, academics and policy makers gathered at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering in Skopje to celebrate World Entrepreneurship Day in Macedonia.

This year, Macedonia joined the WED celebration for the first time, and we were thrilled with what the team there achieved! Several events were organized, the first of which being the promotion of a research report conducted on the topic “Women and Entrepreneurship”. This was presented by the “Capacity Building Towards Knowledge Based Economy” project, funded by the Austrian Development Cooperation in cooperation with the National Centre for Development of Innovations and Entrepreneurial Learning and BASME Consulting and Training. The research covered more than 200 students and 100 women entrepreneurs.

The main event of the day was an incredible Business Plan Competition for gymnasiums and art high schools in the Republic of Macedonia. This was organized by the National Centre for Development of Innovations and Entrepreneurial Learning in cooperation with the Business Start-up Centre at the Faculty for Mechanical Engineering and the Bureau for development of the education. This event saw the top ten high school teams presenting business plans in front of the Jury, with the top three receiving prizes from sponsors Saving House MOZNOSTI and the telecommunications company ONE.

The Macedonia team did not stop there – other events around the country also included:

• USAID Competitiveness project and the Capacity Building Towards Knowledge Based Economy project in cooperation with municipality of Strumica, and
• “Successful Access to Finance” workshop in Strumica and hosted by the Regional Support Centre.

The WED team would like to say a HUGE thank you to the amazing WED Macedonia volunteers who were able to pull together such a phenomenal day!

Check out the pics!

KCA University, a private university in Kenya with a student population of over 7,000 held a full-day  Creative Workshop to join the rest of the world in commemorating World Entrepreneurship Day (WED) at their main campus in Ruaraka. The university established a Centre for Entrepreneurship and Leadership in 2009 to spearhead innovation and technology transfer among the university community.

Despite being held during exam week, the workshop 60 students, who enjoyed the variety of the workshop content, the delivery and opportunity to be part of a global movement. Sessions covered included social entrepreneurship, funding of social enterprises and self branding, as well as various group activities, question and answer sessions and an exciting TED talk!

The WED Team thanks David Kairo and the KCA Centre for Entrepreneurship and Leadership for this amazing and inspiring event.

At 1.30pm on Friday 16 April 2010 students, entrepreneurs and business leaders gathered at Methodist University College in Ghana to celebrate World Entrepreneurship Day, discussing a variety of topics under the overarching theme of ‘Skill and Entrepreneurship: Bridging the Gender Divide’. 

Topics included:

• The Secrets to Success of a Persistent Entrepreneur – presented by Mr. Kwame Nyamkye, MUCG Entrepreneurship Lecturer and Entrepreneur
• Women in High Level Management, Intra-Preneurship – presented by Mrs. Brigitte Dzogbenuku, General Manager of the Aviation Social Centre
• African Women & Youth ICT Entrepreneurship – presented by Mrs. Sheila Bartels-Sam, Chief Executive Officer of Platinum Technologies & InCharge Global
• 8 Steps to Success TED Video – presented by Mr. Richard St. John, TED speaker
• The Making of “ToeTalk” (Who Am I) – presented by Mr. Prince Sackey, Chief Executive Officer of Toetalk
• SIFE & AIESEC contribution on Entrepreneurship in Ghana – presented by Edmund Akrofie, Programs Manager of SIFE Ghana and Mary Anna Coleman, AIESEC Alumni

This event would not have been possible if it weren’t for Ekow Kwansa Acquaye, WED Country Champion for Ghana, so thank you!

We can’t wait to see what will be held in Ghana next year!

What went down on World Entrepreneurship Day 2010 in Singapore? Only a truly inspirational and thought provoking WED event! The WED Singapore Facebook page has loads of amazing photos covering the event (such as below, thanks to Ms Mandy Pham Huong Giang from GNPhotography), which featured speakers such as serial entrepreneur and chairman of Buy1Give1 Paul Dunn, Bernise Ang, Alvin Lee, as well as Adrian Tan of Antenna Consulting.

The WED Singapore team collaborated with youth leaders network ASEANpreneurs, NUS Centre of Social Entrepreneurship and Philanthropy and the NUS Business School for an entrepreneurship workshop with everyone from the most experienced serial entrepreneurs to students and aspiring entrepreneurs.

The event was featured on Young Upstarts and the team also got out there and interviewed a bunch of people to get their views on entrepreneurship. See it here: World Entrepreneurship Day SINGAPORE.

What an amazing WED celebration!

World Entrepreneurship Day India collaborated with YourStory and IBF Media to host an innovative and inspiring event in Bangalore which saw entrepreneurs, students and would be entrepreneurs gather to exchange thoughts and ideas on entrepreneurship and innovation.

The speakers and topics included:

* Amit Singh spoke on his experience organizing “Startup Saturday” events for Headstart network and the new “Startup Buddies” initiative

* Sagar Gubbi from Ecoforge on “”Financing Renewable Energy and Green Businesses in India: Opportunities and Risks” .

* Jyoti Ramnath from craftmygift on “Women Entrepreneurship”: Avenues for Women to move on the path of entrepreneurship

* Srikrishna SridharMurthy from Sattva on “In search of a development sector ‘market’.”

* Namrata Shah on “Micro-preneurship in textile design” and showed slides about some of the interesting work she is doing. She also spoke about the British Council Young Creative Entrepreneur Program and how it has helped her in her business.

* Alban Leveau-Vallier and Olivier Cohen – de Timary will spoke about their journey to many countries meeting social entrepreneurs and had some really cool videos to share with the people gathered.

WED India’s partnership with YourStory also resulted in a series of interviews with entrepreneurs featured on their website throughout the week.

A big thank you to Vallabh and the team of volunteers in India who made this event such a huge success! Such an inspiration!

Wow, it’s hard to believe that WED 2010 was almost a month ago already! It was such an amazing success that I will have to restrain my gushing or we’ll be here all day. Over the next week the WED Team will put together a series of blog posts with details of some of the most impressive WED celebrations around the world.

But firstly, the entire WED team would like to thank absolutely everyone for their involvement and assistance in making WED the biggest and best yet. We already have some huge plans for 2011 and look forward to getting even more countries and organisations involved around the world.

WED has received an enormous amount of mentions in blogs, tweets and online articles over the past few weeks, which would not have been possible without the WED Country Champions and volunteers dotted around the globe, so a big thank you to everyone.

Now, let the stories begin.

This past Friday, April 16th, 2010, marked the 2^nd annual World Entrepreneurship Day, a 24-hour global initiative dedicated to spurring economic growth and creativity. Thousands of individuals in more than 30 countries joined together to recognize the heroes of modern society that are entrepreneurs.

To kick-off the global celebration, 250 entrepreneurs, designers, educators, and dignitaries gathered in the United Nations Headquarters in New York City on Wednesday evening, April 14^th, for the first-ever WED 2010 Kick-off Conference. Co-founder of World Entrepreneurship Day, 21 year old college junior Lauren Amarante, opened up the event by tagging the gathering as a “celebration of all things entrepreneurial.”  With a lineup of speakers that ranged from entrepreneur/cosmonaut Esther Dyson to fashion entrepreneur Marc Ecko and Chief Marketing Officer of GE Beth Comstock, all in attendance quickly agreed on the diversity of the event. Just as varied were the topics discussed, which covered everything from education and cupcakes to “championing innovation at the highest levels.”

Inc. Magazine wrote a story on the WED 2010 Kick-off Conference that really captured its purpose and overall impact.  Additionally, summaries of each talk will be made available on the World Entrepreneurship Day website in the coming week. Meanwhile, here are some samples:

“It’s about job creation. We call it unemployment. What you call wealth creation, we call poverty alleviation… it’s really two sides of the same coin – we just look at it through a different prism.”  - Amir Dossal; Executive Director, United Nations of the Office for Partnerships

“There is a genetic difference that needs to be recognized early on in entrepreneurs, and that is tenacity. That is the key genome… and it is about taking ten punches to the stomach and getting up for the eleventh.” - Leonard Brody, best-selling author and business visionary

“The mindset hackers have is optimized for discovery. When handed a device, an average person will say, ‘what does this do?’ A hacker will say ‘what can I make this do?’” - Pablos Holman, hacker, futurist, and inventor at Intellectual Ventures Lab

“In law school, Facebook and Twitter were seen as distractions. I remember minimizing the screen in class when my professor would walk by.” -Lev Ekster, founder of CupcakeStop, which relies on communicating with clients through tweets and other social- and location-aware media. Ekster began selling cupcakes out of a van after his legal job opportunities seemed bleak.

“I would love to be a 30-year-old in India or Brazil right now. There’s so much going on with the economy…there are huge opportunities in energy, transportation, health care…”- Beth Comstock, chief marketing officer and SVP of GE, when asked about new arenas ripe for entrepreneurship.

Those in the audience were of no less esteem, featuring guests ranging from billionaire Samuel Irving Newhouse Jr. (Owner of Conde-Nast Publications and Founder of Advance Publications) to New York Giants starting linebacker Gerris Wilkinson.

Lauren Amarante (co-founder, WED) and Samuel Irving Newhouse Jr. (Owner of Conde-Nast Publications and Founder of Advance Publications)

But the UN conference was only the beginning! 36 hours later, on World Entrepreneurship Day (4/16), thousands of individuals in 30+ countries joined together for a 24-hour celebration of entrepreneurship, innovation, and creativity. Below are some examples –

• Neil Huele, a 20 year old in the Philippines (the 12^th most populous country in the world) joined the efforts of his mentors, his peer leaders, and his community organizations to convene 5,000 people for an entrepreneurship convention in his country’s largest mall, the Ayala Center. WED in the Philippines concluded with a celebratory concert. Watch their promotional video here. Find WED Philippines on Facebook.
• Radmil Polenavik of Macedonia hosted a countrywide business plan competition and conference for all Macedonian high schools. Speakers include: Minister of Economy, Director Education Development, and the Minister of Education and Science. Find WED Macedonia on Facebook.
• Joel Bayubasire of the Demcratic Republic of Congo created the first-ever “WED Talent Show” to convene potential young cultural entrepreneurs to compete for a scholarship called “WED Prize” judged by entrepreneurs – the winners were awarded scholarships to attend the Arts Forum, a school where artistic youth learn how to become entrepreneurs.
• Ekow Kwansa of Accra, Ghana, in partnership with his local SIFE, CUC, and AIESEC chapters, organized a countrywide entrepreneurship conference and demo with distinguished entrepreneurial speakers. Find WED Ghana on Facebook.
• Tyler Metcalf of Arizona State University organized a full day of entrepreneurial activities that began with venture pitches and concluded with a conference whose speakers included two entrepreneurs that created billion-dollar companies, co-founder of Blackboard, and the co-founder of Coldstone Creamery. Find WED ASU on Facebook.
• Tran le Thanh Nhu of Singapore organized a speakers’ panel that included distinguished entrepreneurs like Jack Sim of World Toilet Organization, they interviewed community members on the topic of entrepreneurship, and they created multiple videos that brought awareness to the topic of entrepreneurship in Singapore. Find WED Singapore on Facebook.

World Entrepreneurship Day would like to thank its many partners, mentors, advisors, and supporters that have made all of this possible – they are the true heroes! … all of our advisors, especially Wendy Diamond of the fantastic Animal Fair Media, Inc., the United Nations Office for Partnerships, Amir Dossal, Suzette Limchoc, Bob Appel & Blaise Zerega of Fora.TV, Leigh Ferriss of GE, Christine Lagorio of Inc. Magazine, Mike Schreibman of Sweat Equity Enterprises, Steve Wozniak, David Pogue, Tim Draper, all of our Kick-off speakers (for having faith in us! ), Google’s Andrew Schulte, Alex Fielding, Alex Molde of Edloma Web Development & Design, Larry Benz of PhysicalTherapist.com, Arizona State University, all our team members, and OF COURSE all those who celebrated World Entrepreneurship Day – congratulations on your transformative work!!

Footage of the WED United Nations Kick-off Conference is available to view at Fora TV and photos are viewable here.

Videos made possible by our incredible partner, Fora.TV – click the image to see all WED Kick-off talks!

“A Celebration of the World’s Entrepreneurial Heroes”

Two weeks ago, WED was introduced to Amir Dossal at the United Nations Headquarters in NYC. Today, we are welcoming a crowd of 500+ entrepreneurial visionaries to their headquarters for a day of entrepreneurial brilliance and celebration! Scheduled for Wednesday, April 14th, this conference will be a kickoff to WED. All details may be found on our brand new event website.

Speakers include:

MARC ECKO – founder & chief creative officer, Marc Ecko Enterprises

MARIA BARTIROMO – CNBC, Closing Bell

BLAISE ZEREGA – CEO, Fora.TV

PETER THUM – Founder, Ethos Water & Giving Water
AMIR DOSSAL – Executive Director of the UNOP

HOWARD MORGAN – Partner, First Round Capital; Director, IdeaLab

ESTHER DYSON – Entrepreneur, Investor, Cosmonaut

WENDY DIAMOND – Chief Pet Officer, Animal Fair Media, Inc.

PABLOS HOLMAN – Futurist, Inventor, Security Expert, Hacker

SO many new supporters, plans for celebration, and ideas for WED 2010 came out of our recent WED National Tour. However, one of its most exciting results is the addition of Animal Fair Media, Inc. founder and Chief Pet Officer, Wendy Diamond, to the WED Advisory Board. Already, Wendy has had an incomparable impact on the progress of all WED initiatives. We are extremely honored to have her!

Wendy Diamond, Philanthropist and Chief Pet Officer (CPO), Founder and Editorial Director of Animal Fair Media, Inc.

Dubbed as “Canine Queen” by Forbes Magazine, Diamond is a cause-related entrepreneur who got her start in philanthropy helping homeless children and people through the Coalition for the Homeless. She wrote two best-selling cookbooks A Musical Feast and An All-Star Feastfeaturing recipes from top celebrities in the music and sports industries to benefit various homeless charities throughout New York.

After adopting her cat and dog from a local rescue, Diamond shifted her focus to helping homeless animals, creating the first-ever pet media empire dedicated to fairness to animals. In addition to releasing trusted, philanthropic pet content for over a decade, Diamond has created original fundraising events such as Toys for Dogs, Paws for Style (the first-ever pet charity fashion show), Mutt Makeover, Halloween Pet Costume Benefit, and Yappy Hour®. Over the last decade Diamond has raised millions of dollars to support local animal rescues and endangered species organizations. Recently Diamond has joined forces with the United Nations to help raise awareness for endangered species around the world. Throughout her career she been a spokesperson to many Fortune 500s, including Zyrtec, PetSmart, Pedigree, Cesar, Del Monte, American Express and Procter and Gamble’s Bounce, among others.

Wendy is the author of  a number of bestselling pet-related books including, How to Understand Men Through Their Dogs and How to Understand Women Through Their Cats. She wrote the foreword and is the face of the Chicken Soup series What I Learned from My Cat and What I Learned from My Dog. This year Random House released her latestbook, It’s a Dog’s World, a savvy guide to four-legged and currently she is working on her next business book, How to Train Your Boss to Roll Over!

Diamond is also a pet-lifestyle contributor to NBC’s Today Show and has starred in television shows on CBS, NBC, Style Network, FOX, and Animal Planet. Wendy and her rescued Maltese, Lucky Diamond were judges on CBS’ primetime hit show Greatest American Dog! Diamond is also regularly seen on The Early Show, The View, Fox News, CNN, Extra, Good Morning America, E!, VH1, MTV as well as publications including The New York Times, Forbes, Time, People, The New Yorker and Vogue.

For more information visit AnimalFair.com.

Check out the photos from the WED West Coast Tour! A HUGE ‘thank you!!’ to photographer Asa Mathat, wine-trepreneurs Rion Spoon & Chris Coleman of The 20 Wines and all of our fantastic hosts (Institute for the Future’s Marina & Matt; Dogpatch Lab’s Ryan, Kamal, and Ken; University of Southern California’s Rob, Elisa, and Dana; High Tech High’s Simi & Larry). More photos, videos, and captions to be posted in the following week… Enjoy!

World Entrepreneurship Day is coming to you! Join us in San Diego, San Francisco, Palo Alto, Los Angeles, New York City, or Washington D.C. for a WED Brainstorming Session to prepare for the big celebration in your community on April 16th. Click on the following pictures to learn more:

A modern entrepreneur has to be in-the-know on technology. That’s why, for the second year in a row, I’m attending the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. Surrounded by more than 110,000 peope, Steve Ballmer will update the world on Microsoft innovations, Ray Kurzweil will launch his new e-reader the Blio, AMEX OPEN Small Business will feature keynotes from Alltop, Small Business Trends, Mashable, and Zappos (review & take away materials). Around every expo corner shall be abounding opportunity—hopefully this coverage will help the WED network to recognize it.

But before I step off this Southwest 747 plane into the casino-style Las Vegas McCarran International Airport, I will have done some CES-prepping that I so wish last year’s trip had included. For those of you in Las Vegas, even those of you tuning in from home, this list of prep items will prove insightful. If you’ve attended CES, comment on this post with anything I’m leaving out (there’ll be a lot):

-       CES hosts 110,000 attendees and X sq. footage expo space. How can an amateur technologist recognize the trends? Read this CNN article, 8 Tech Trends to Watch at CES, in its entirety. http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/01/04/consumer.electronics.show.preview/index.html

-       But what about discovering the awesome products no one else knows about yet? Check out David Pogue’s 2009 Best Tech Ideas to understand the ingenuity behind the overlooked ideas of 2009 http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/technology/personaltech/31pogue.html?_r=1

-       Mark on this CES Map all the places you want to visit. Doubling your expo floor coverage (especially in high heels) is sooo not worth it.

-       Plan to check out:

• The Lake of Dreams at the Wynn Hotel. You’ll thank me.
• AMEX OPEN keynotes
• Apple iLounge

- Subscribe to updates from #ces10, @intlces, @google (they are supposed to make one appearance at a media event), @dell, etc.

And remember: what happens in Vegas (during CES), stays in Vegas.

…Except for the CD player, high-def TV, and Blu-Ray—that stuff spread everywhere.

NY Times Technology Columnist David Pogue’s quote on World Entrepreneurship Day was one of our favorites:

“Innovation is the spark that drives the economy—and in this economy, we need innovation and entrepreneurship more than ever. We’ve got special days to celebrate groundhogs, ghostly pumpkins, and dead presidents—why has it taken so long to celebrate entrepreneurship?”

In his last column of 2009, Pogue announced the 5th annual ‘Pogie Awards’—a collection of the year’s best tech ideas—not best products, but ideas—and here’s the verdict.

Entrepreneurs, take notice: Whether it’s a browser plug in that eliminates all annoying ads on any website or an online GPS-phone-locator, all the Pogie Award winners have one common feature: simplicity.

Happy Idea Hunting.

Space exploration, technology, & entrepreneurship. How should the three interweave? What does the future look like for NASA Ames? Why and how can a government institution establish entrepreneurial private-public partnerships? How can a government institution create an entrepreneurial work environment?

Dr. Pete Worden, Center Director of Silicon Valley’s NASA Ames Research Park, has all the answers—he blew me away with his innovation-oriented leadership style, his bold vision for the future, and his wild insight into the connection between space exploration & entrepreneurship.

Post-interview, I got a stealth tour around the campus. Laid my eyes on one of the fastest supercomputers in the world, even Segwayed around the ponds behind campus. The rest? Well, that’s top-secret.

Before WED, there were days to celebrate pirates, pasta, mothers, turtles, and smiles, but nothing for entrepreneurs! Then finally, on April 17th, 2009, the world took a day to celebrate its heroic entrepreneurs and innovators! 22 countries and 22 US states joined in the inaugural celebration. In the making, WED built a world-class team, including advisors from the World Economic Forum, endorsers like the co-founder of Apple Steve Wozniak and legendary VC Tim Draper, and global volunteers and interns from Australia to Senegal.

We are recruiting the following positions:

• Country Champion
• Global Recruitment & Engagement Director
• Enrollment Specialist
• Outreach Strategist
• Social Media Strategist
• Event Management Master
• Research Expert
• Design & Interactive Expert

To learn more about each position’s responsibilities and benefits, please see the application links below…

To learn more about a volunteer experience, take a minute to watch this video from WED’s Australia Marketing Director, Courtney Goes:

STEPS TO APPLY

Step #1 First, figure out if you will apply as a volunteer, intern, Country Champion, or Direct Study student:

Apply as an intern if:

• You have at least 5-10 hours of free time per week
• You are in high school, college, or graduate school

Apply for a Direct Study opportunity if:

• You are in college
• Would like to receive academic credit from your work with WED

Apply as a volunteer if:

• You are a working professional, between jobs, or retired.
• You are a student, but have little time and cannot add another structured commitment to your plate but still want to be involved.
• You have at least 2 hours of free time per week.

Apply to become a Country Champion if:

• You have at least 5-10 hours of free time per week
• Would like to focus on the entrepreneurial success of one country
• Can be a working professional, student, etc. etc.

Step #2 Download the application associated with your choice above.

• WED Country Champion App
• WED Direct Study App
• WED Intern App
• WED Volunteer Experience Application

Step #3 Set aside 20-30 minutes to give your application some careful thought.

Step #4 The application is due FEB. 1ST. To submit, save the application as a PDF and email it to team@worldeshipday, with your resume attached!

Step #5 If we feel you’re a great match for the WED team, we’ll follow up and schedule a phone interview.

NOT THE TRADITIONAL OPPORTUNITY

We are not looking for the traditional intern, volunteer, or team member. We are looking for initiators, people who can work both independently and with a team, and are not afraid to push the envelope in pursuit of their big ideas. As a member of our team, you’ll quickly see that a position with WED includes all of the benefits that one of those rare extraordinary opportunities should–experiential learning, personal interaction with global cultures, valuable connection-making with high-profile global leaders, and–rarest of all–the opportunity to have a profound, tangible, and GRAND impact on the world, when it needs it the most!

(contributed by Alberto de pablo)

On World Entrepreneurship Day at Santa Monica High School, we had a two part event – first an assembly in which we educated the Santa Monica High School campus about the devastating effects that are occurring in the Kenyan slums and the efforts that NextAid and the GO campaign are doing to help these children.

The second part was our International Entrepreneurship Fair where our Virtual Enterprise Class and the Project ECHO class researched over 35 different countries and learned about their major imports and exports, GDP per capita, business customs, and HDI’s (Human Development Index). After we learned these facts we share them with at least 2,500 other students on our campus.

In addition, we teamed up with a SAGE team in Uganda. They sent us products, like wooden sculptures, jewelry, and also some paintings. (featured in picture above) We held a silent auction, from which we have raised over $750 for the Ugandan team.

We applied for the Youth Venture Grant and received $1,000 for start-up capital. We have also raised almost $400 for the NextAid and the GO Campaign organization.

(Contributed by Omar Diaw, WED Senegal Host Organizer – picture below)

On World Entrepreneurship Day, we were looking for the opportunity to change the paradigm in Senegal, to change not only the way young girls here think, but also the way our culture feels about what African women can do. We have started a cultural revolution in SENEGAL against how girls are perceived in our culture. We SIFE students believe that one of the world’s most important resources is its young people. Education not only gives them a greater voice in their own lives, but ensures a brighter future for themselves and their communities.

Therefore, on World Entrepreneurship Day, we educated 192 young girls (aged 15-22) in Senegal (Africa) on the skills of entrepreneurship. The results were remarkable.

We followed this dynamic curriculum:

• Course 1: How to Be an Entrepreneur?
• Course 2: The Challenges of Youth Entrepreneurship
• Course 3: What is Leadership?
• Course 4: How to be a Leader in Your Community
  

The most important lesson we shared with these girls was: ”Every entrepreneurial project requires preparation, discipline and teamwork”

After we finished our training we asked them to assess our courses and their feedback was amazing. Aida, a 14 year old girl, said:

“This freely given training will change my life forever cause I couldn’t imagine it was possible to learn such things like how to create a company and run it successfully!”

The impact on the young students was remarkable. Imagine some of them already have ideas of creating an enterprise with the help of their parents. We awarded them certificates co-signed by SIFE and USAID.

Community Awareness

A society that wants more entrepreneurs to ensure its survival and long-term growth must work to develop an entrepreneurial culture in its community because entrepreneurs contribute to greater wealth creation. The effectiveness of government policies to support the creation and the resumption of business will only bear full fruit if all the actors of economic development – among which are the educators in our country – work together to develop creativity and new attitudes of young people who are feel unsafe to take risks or make change… With our help, these young people will be better prepared to create sustainable businesses.

(our SIFE team with the School Principal)

Our personal success

With the precious support of the school administration and the teachers we were able to train the young girls in a very comfortable atmosphere. The training sessions we did with the young girls had a very profound transformational change on the young girls and on us as well. Overall, we have inspired these young girls and they have inspired us as well. We were kind of role models for them and as a result, felt a profound personal growth and transformational change within ourselves…

“This has been an experience that we’ll

never forget for the rest of our lives.”

– Omar Diaw, Senegal WED Host Organizer.

From Bill Grant, Program Manager of the Technology Management Program at the University of California, Santa Barbara:

“World Entrepreneurship Day was a perfect way for us to highlight our many strands of Entrepreneurial DNA on the campus of the University of California, Santa Barbara. We created a new annual lecture series around it called “The Tomorrow Makers” which includes the story of  our UCSB serial entrepreneurs and  international guests.”

Guest keynotes included the following distinguished technology entrepreneurs:

Michael Crandell

CEO & Founder, RightScale Inc.

Kara Swisher

Co-Executive Editor, Wall Street Journal

Co-Producer & Co-Host, D: All Things Digital,

A major high-tech and media conference

Robert Siegel (Panel Moderator)

General Partner at X/Seed Capital Management

Stephen J. Golden, Ph.D.

Chief Technical Officer, Co-Founder, Director

Alison Perry

Vice President of Finance/CFO

Inogen, Inc.

Davis Brimer

Co-Founder & CEO

Active Life Technologies

Rodney A. Ferguson, J.D., Ph.D.

Co-Founder and Managing Director,

Panorama Capital (2001-pres)

Alexander Manu

Chief Imaginator

InnoSpa International Partners

“On the occasion of the World Entrepreneurship Day on April 17^th, Entrepreneurship Development Centre Tuzla, University of Tuzla and  Business Start Up Center within the University of Tuzla organized the presentation and discussion “The role of entrepreneurship in development of Tuzla Canton and importance of entrepreneurship in economy crisis overcoming“

Attendants were representatives of the University of Tuzla, governmental and nongovernmental, representatives, experts from the field of entrepreneurship, successful entrepreneurs, and students.

Speakers emphasized the role of the entrepreneurship in development of Tuzla Canton and importance of entrepreneurship in overcoming economy crisis. Useful materials on entrepreneurship were given to attendants after the discussion.

Entrepreneurship Development Centre Tuzla, University of Tuzla and Business Start Up Center within the University of Tuzla will continue to implement projects from the field of entrepreneurship and every year we will celebrate the World Entrepreneurship Day in appropriate way, with aim to remind everyone on importance of entrepreneurship for development of the economy.”

(WED Story contributed by Mirela Arifovic of the Entrepreneurship Development Centre of Tuzla University in Bosnia & Herzegovina)

“In Kenya, rains have been minimal this year and predictions are it will be worse this year on food security. Currently over 10 million Kenyans are faced with hunger. On World Entrepreneurship Day, my colleagues and I discussed how entrepreneurial strategies will be required to address food security issues in Kenya.

It has become common for the government to always appeal for donor assistance to assist the starving Kenyans and yet we have so much land that can be used to grow food crops! In the future, we hope to explore ways of assisting farmers in addressing the issue of food security.

The strategies must mix entrepreneurial strategies with social goals for long term and wider benefit to the public and not just private gain. This would entail availing credit and carrying out trainings to farmers and even issues of storage and market linkages. In financing, creating a fund that will help those with a wider public benefit will be given priority.”

(WED Story contributed by Mr. Carlos Chege from Kenya’s Center for Social Entrepreneurship & Accounting)

It is Monday morning after the inaugural World Entrepreneurship Day, and the stories continue to flow in! I think I can speak for all the entrepreneurial org’s that celebrated on Friday when I say how reluctant we are to let go of the inspiration & empowerment that was held on Friday worldwide. However, let us remember – we must celebrate & empower entrepreneurs everyday!

Here is one story that came from SIFE Egypt @ Ain Shams University, one of the greatest and oldest Egyptian universities. It was founded in 1950 and is home to more than 180,000 students and 5,000 staff members!

SIFE EGYPT’s Celebration on World Entrepreneurship Day, April 17^th, 2009

First: We thought it would be very important that as many people as possible should know what this day represents and how the world is celebrating …so our team (consisting of 11 members of teenagers participating in the carried activities) made circulars sharing:

• What the world is celebrating on the 17th of april,
• The meaning of entrepreneurship and importance of entrepreneurs’ services to the world.
• Plus some inspirational, success, and entrepreneurial quotes to brighten their day and make the recipient of these circulars rethink their careers to be one of the future entrepreneurs that the world is in need for.

This was distributed to 1,500 people of our community from teenagers to adults.

Second: we thought that talking with an entrepreneur and gaining from his experience and following his success story would be very valuable on such a day. So we went to a business owner (Copper Shaping), who started from scratch and became the owner of a big workshop and factory for copper and stainless shaping.

We interviewed him and partnered with a local egyptian magazine to publish the story so that all people would benefit from his experience and tackling with tough situations and life challenges. We as a team working on applying entrepreneurship and helping people start their own business have gained a lot that can facilitate our mission.

Finally thank you for giving us a chance to be a part of this world celebration and rejuvenation. We are hoping to contribute with all our efforts and energy for spreading entrepreneurship in our local community till next year’s day too.

WED-participants from Egypt have created this WED video to share with the world – their message is powerful, clear, and thought-provoking.

Fantastic job – YOU ladies are entrepreneurial heroes!!

World Entrepreneurship Day LIVE in action – it’s a worldwide celebration! Organizations from Mexico to Australia are hosting activities & events to RE-SPARK the innovative fire!

Here are a few outstanding examples of worldwide events happening today:

Canada ‘s Momentum Community Economic Development organization will host a dynamic networking event and educational keynote presentation for Canadian entrepreneurs.

California’s Santa Monica High School SAGE chapter will impact 2,500 students with an assembly, educational global trade fair, and a cultural carnival to increase global economic and social awareness.

Washington D.C.’s George Washington University will host their first GW Business Plan Competition on World Entrepreneurship Day, with oral presentations by the eight finalist teams (chosen out of over 200 teams that applied) to a panel of entrepreneurs and venture capital investors. They will be making an announcement about WED and the importance of entrepreneurship to the rejuvenation of our nation’s economy.

Tanzania’s Vision Saccos will host a large entrepreneurship conference offering training on microfinance and market research for their entrepreneurial members. They welcome any speakers, volunteers, and presenters from other countries.

Chicago’s “Diamonds in the Ruff” children organization will be “contacting all the youth that have come through the Diamonds in the Ruff Children’s Society, GEMS (Global Entrepreneurs and Management Scholars) program to find out the status of their businesses and to make sure they each recognize this day as the day they chose to make the World their marketplace.”

California’s UC Santa Barbara Technology Management Program will host three technology visionary keynotes in a dynamic “Tomorrow Maker” seminar.

Colorado’s University of Colorado will host Gov. Bill Ritter, who will announce information and communications technology (ICT) as a pillar of the Colorado economy, officially recognizing the importance of technological entrepreneurship to the state’s future prosperity alongside other pillars such as clean energy, tourism, education and transportation. They will close World Entrepreneurship Day with the announcement of the CU New Venture Challenge winners, the university’s first campus-wide business plan competition for students and faculty, with prizes totaling more than $12,000.

Chicago ’s Diamonds in the Ruff Childrens’ Society will celebrate “by contacting all the youth that have come through the Diamonds in the Ruff Children’s Society, GEMS (Global Entrepreneurs and Management Scholars) program to find out the status of their businesses and to make sure they each recognize this day as the day they chose to make the World their marketplace.”

In Kenya, youth unemployment is a key concern for Kenya as 75% of its population is youth and 80% of graduates are still unemployed. Last month, USIU SIFE held an entrepreneurship Conference to allow the youth to come up with those innovations necessary to enhance developments in the various sectors of the economy including technology, entertainment, clothing and design, etc. The winners of the Conference will be announced today to act as an incentive for more people to embrace entrepreneurship.

Cameroon’s Youth Business Cameroon says, “To be part of this wonderful initiative we’re going to organize an Entrepreneurship Development workshop involving students and unemployed graduates from Douala Universities and several other private Institutions in the town. Focus will be made on Agri-business and ICT.”

Virginia’s Bridgewater College plans to officially launch their new “Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization” and hopefully announce a new Entrepreneurship degree concentration!

California’s Chapman University will host several interesting and innovative events that day to promote entrepreneurship both on our campus and in a global manner also via postings on websites.

Tennessee’s University of Tennessee @ Chattanooga will be inducting two local entrepreneurs into the UTC College of Business Entrepreneurship Hall of Fame. Their induction dinner is will include 250 guests, including students, faculty, and members of the community.

Mexico’s Foundation Innovapyme will be hosting an event to “drive and promote innovation in the small and medium enterprises they are linked to.”

Tanzania’s Africa Biofuel organization will be hosting an event to “provide leadership to the development of the green energy biofuel industry in East Africa and facilitate independence on fossil fuel for rural East Africa.”

Wisconsin’s School of Business is hosting a Cupid’s Cup Business Competition – see live webcasts! Their event coordinator says, “ Entrepreneurship leads to innovation — it answers questions and provides solutions to real and emerging needs,” says Anne Miner, professor of Management and Human Resources at the Wisconsin School of Business and director of the G. Steven Burrill Business Plan Competition. “Through this annual event students have the opportunity to come together and create answers to society’s most challenging problems. We are so excited to share with the world these innovative ideas that will drive the future of business.”

World Rejuvenation through

Entrepreneurship LIVE in action!

…made possible by our heroic event

organizers around the world – thank you!

Take a moment to share your opinion in our polls. Results will be buried in our entrepreneurial time capsule tonight!

Who is the greatest entrepreneur today (2009)?

• Is it Richard Branson Creator of the revolutionary Virgin brand? I heard the Virgin airplanes have WiFi…
• Is it Steve Jobs? He created a little thing called the iPod. And something called an iPhone. I’m sure you’ve heard of them.
• Is it Oprah? A new Twitterer as of today, she’s impacted the world in every way – started schools in Africa and a child abuser database; the list goes on.
• Is it Sergey Brin & Larry Page? Google, keepers of the world’s information, creators of Google Earth, Gmail, etc.
• Is it Mark Zuckerberg? Father of Facebook, pioneer of the new user interface…

Who is the greatest INVENTOR today (2009)?

• Is it Alexander Graham Bell? Inventor of the telephone, which has revolved into the cell phone, which has revolved into the iPhone.
• Is it Steve Wozniak? Inventor of the Personal Computer -  The vehicle by which so many other inventions have been created, connector of people around the globe, launchpad for all new technologies.
• Is it Jonas Salk? Inventor of the Polio vaccine, saver of millions of lives..
• Is it Dean Kamen? Inventor of the Segway human transporter, inventor of the first all-terrain electric wheelchair, too. Hopefully I won’t have to thank him for that one! Inventor of the first insulin pump..
• Is it Bill Gates? Inventor of Windows, the language billions of people around the world speak? Outlook, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, the list goes on.

Good luck! May the best entrepreneur & inventor win!

And HAPPY WORLD ENTREPRENEURSHIP DAY!