Happy new year to you all!
I've just got back from quite an intense week in Boston, scanning, searching, debating, conceptualising. there's nothing like a business trip, with no distractions, to focus the mind on the problem at hand...[Though I did go to Sleep No More Again! for new readers see previous posts]
But I DID forget to post something about a conversation I had a few weeks ago. I was invited by a friend of mine to talk at the Erasmus business school in Rotterdam [apparently one of the top schools in Europe, I'm glad I found that out AFTER I spoke!]. The talk was about being entrepreneurial, but my revelation of sorts, was a train-meeting David from a global organisation called Youth Ventures, which has recently set up a 'franchise' in Amsterdam.
As we sat on the delayed train, after the Erasmus talk, during the first December wave of travel-ruinous snowfall, It was a fortuitous opportunity to learn about young entrepreneurs. Youth Ventures does what I believe country institutions should, but don't do. It facilitates young people's risk-taking spirit, desire for immediate action & wanting to change their & other's communities & environments.
What I got from our conversation was that it finds mentors for young people, to generate business & community ideas that can lead to a sustainable change. [It's a bit like the BBC's Dragon's Den]. Young teens/early 20's are mentored as they work-up a business idea, which they will then eventually present to a panel, who will then determine if they will get some finance to put it into practice.
What I love about it is that it works WITH privileged & so-called drop-out youth, rather than marginalises them. There was one example not particularly/overtly entrepreneurial, but refreshing all the same, that David told me about. Youth Venture would go into troubled schools/housing estates, put a panel together of kids & ask them to tell teachers/directors of the local governments, why there were 'urban problems'...But the format was that the teachers etc, could NOT interrupt the kids. They just had to listen to what they had to say.
What a simple but great idea to get people of influence to listen to REAL kids of influence. They weren't allowed to ignore what was going on, but were forced to confront it, in a controlled way. Now that's not to say that they will act on it, but surely any open-minded institute or company could see the worth of this method?
