By Raph de Witte and Ahmed Aidurus
The project’s journey
We started this project because of an opportunity to work on our mutual interest in impact entrepreneurship. We started off by formulating and discussing what we were looking for and what exact complex problem we wanted to work on. At the same time we started the early engagement of professional networks and got a better idea of what we wanted to achieve with this project. The major part of this project we worked on engaging networks of experts to gain knowledge, answers, and new insights. At the end of this phase we decided that a report and poster would be the best way to organize the findings and information we gathered. Both of these products went through several development phases and feedback rounds to ensure the best possible creation. At last we had a discussion with educators, merged the insights from this in the product, and finalized the product which we now can send to the professional network we engaged with.
What we learned from this project
From this project we learned:
- To engage and work with a professional network
- To use relevant existing theories and adapt/use them in our project
- How to turn the findings and insights from research into a framework
- How to deal with uncertainty
- How to effectively work with your team through technology
This network consists of mostly impact entrepreneurs and a few educators who teach impact entrepreneurship or related courses. We came in contact with these people through contacts of our coach, personal contact, online research, and snowball approach networking. Each of the experts in this network is related to the concept of impact entrepreneurship.
Ralph
I got to learn the essential skills of impact entrepreneurship and how this field is currently emerging into a bigger phenomenon. Impact entrepreneurship is getting more widespread popularity and, in my opinion, serves as a good solution to achieve many Sustainable Development Goals. An interesting insight I got from this project is how you can learn, develop, and acquire skills in more effective ways. Furthermore I learned more about educational tools, higher education, and facilitating effective conversations/discussions with a network.
Ahmed
I realized through impact entrepreneurship we can start caring and making a systemic change that is suitable for the planet and its people. Because impact entrepreneurship is an alternative solution to the concept of business as usual, therefore we should not accept it in the 21st century. Besides that, I have come across a lot of networks that are supporting students and young entrepreneurs to create an enterprise that has a meaningful impact on societal needs and the environment. Finally, it was truly inspiring for me to engage in a conversation with experts in the field of entrepreneurship, education and entrepreneurs during this project.
Final result of our project can be found here:
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