When you think about professional success, what kind of organisation come to your mind? My impression is most of the people would answer a big company or an important governmental organ, as the status, eagerness for financial safety and planned career opportunities can catch the eye of the various profiles of people (different age groups, countries, etc).
However, we all know that most of the jobs are generated by small enterprises (in Brazil they respond for more than 80% of the jobs) and that some of the most admired places to work (such as Google) were recently started by young, creative and fearless entrepreneurs.
Considering that, I'm happy to get in touch with the work of two visionary NGOs which promote entrepreneurship as a life-style and as a respectable career option, as well as help entrepreneurs to build economically successful, socially relevant and environmentally sustainable organisations.
One of the NGOs is
Artemisia. It pre-selects entrepreneurs with good ideas and professional competencies give them extensive business plan training and selects the final Artemisia entrepreneurs, who will receive seed money for their projects, as well as mentorship and further access to knowledge.
In December, I had the honour to be part of a feedback team for Artemisia entrepreneurs’ applicants and was impressed with the passion, dedication and energy of the candidates. Two initiatives were especially brilliant, as they joint good strategy with an important cause. One created a Black Fair or
Feira Preta, in Portuguese - an annual event to commemorate the black culture - and the other, called
Ecotece, produced themed t-shirts with organic cotton for particular niches of customers. You'll hear about these companies.
More recently, I came across a big entrepreneurship mobilisation: the global entrepreneurship week, led in Brazil by
Endeavor. The idea is to articulate the main organisations working with the subject so that their programs and events are complementary and finish on the same week, in November. Therefore, the movement expects to involve 500.000 people in Brazil, have massive media coverage and prepare the terrain to deepen the issue on the following years - for more, check the
explanatory file and
Karen Kanaan's interview.
It will be interesting to see if the concept of success broadens in the years to come. Particularly, I'd love to see more smart independent people innovating in their small enterprises - so the people with "successful careers" in big hierarchical companies could spread those changes - but especially that people take the lead of their lives and be the entrepreneurs of their futures.
Labels: Social Entrepreneurship
