News From the European Union
Entirely submitted by Daniel Schaubacher
EBBF was represented by Daniel Schaubacher with EBBF member Sylvia Karlsson attending as Academy Research Fellow at Turku School of Economics at a high-level conference held at the European Parliament, November 19-20 in Brussels, on the topic of “Beyond GDP – Toward the Well-Being of Nations”. In addition, Sylvia served on an "experts’ meeting", and was the guest of honour at a November 21 dinner hosted by Myriam and Daniel Schaubacher for Club of Rome members, and Ruta Pavel, from People to People Estonia. The conference provided outstanding opportunities to renew or establish contact with important international players and business executives, including with the staff of the Global Reporting Initiative and Transparency International. Quoted below is a short report on the outcome of the conference from Sylvia Karlsson:
‘Beyond GDP’ was the bold and promising title of a conference attracting over 600 people, organised by the European Commission, the European Parliament, the Club of Rome, WWF, and OECD and hosted by the European Parliament 20-21 November 2007. I attended the preceeding workshop for experts which addressed the same theme, and was joined for the conference by Daniel Schaubacher who was representing EBBF.
From an EBBF perspective, which constantly discuss the value of a successful company as something much more than just by its profit, the deliberations of this conference should be of considerable interest as it addressed the same issue on society and country levels. The earnest question on the table was how to get away from the economically narrow indicator of GDP as the primary measure of a country’s welfare and expand it to encompase the social and environmental dimensions sustainable development. Indeed, they went so far as to make serious referehces to subjective measures of well-being by citizens, often referred to as measures of ‘happiness’ or human well-being. This is clearly indicating that one is looking for something on mere material prosperity but the subjective measures have the limitation of being very indivdiual oriented forgetting the dimension of the well-being of communities.
Much progress has been made in the research community in the past decade in exploring such ‘Beyond GDP’ measures, objective and subjective, but this has by and large not been picked up by policy-makers. This conference may be an indication that something is changing. While this theme has been discussed earlier in the political circles at national level in some countries to a limited extent also at EU and global level, it has hardly reached this level of political momentum with Mr. Baroso, two other commissioners and the president of the European Parliament addressing the conference. Furthermore, the OECD has already tried to take leadership of a process of developing such indicators so there seems to be some healthy competition ahead! This is not only welcome but extremely timely as EBBF is also setting out on the path of how to develop indicators for such ‘beyond profit’ values in the coming years, including at the the joint EBBF/IEF annual conference 2008.
Sylvia Karlsson
For those interested to find out more, most talks and presentations are uploaded on the conference website www.beyond-gdp.eu
Ashok Khosla, CoR Co-President, Hans-Gert Pöttering, Hazel Henderson
EBBF at Entrepreneurship Education Conference at European Parliament.
Brussels, November 21, 2007.
EBBF was represented by Dale and Shoghi Emerson, and Daniel Schaubacher at a high-level conference on educating for entrepreneurship organized by the European Enterprise Institute, November 21, at the European Parliament in Brussels. Education, Culture and Youth European Commissioner Jan Figel, Members of the Parliament, Jiri Plecity, Member of Cabinet of European Commission Vice-President Günter Verheugen, DG Enterprise and Industry, Microsoft Chairman Jan Muehlfeit, NGO and business representatives addressed topics such as : ways to increase support to education in the European Union, role of innovation in knowledge-based society, CSR and responsible entrepreneurship, sustainability education, children and youth education in entrepreneurship, good practices and specific business cases, as well as the role of mobility, cultural diversity and corporate internships and exchanges.
EBBF participated in the discussion citing its partnerships in inter-generational coaching with AIESEC, JADE/Jr entrepreneur students, and the importance of addressing the gender issue by providing superior educating opportunities to girls and women and tapping the resources of the female entrepreneurial mind. In matters of cultural diversity, when viewed as a societal enrichment, EBBF mentioned the potential and contribution of minority and social enterprise to social cohesion and to the general prosperity of society.
The European Enterprise Institute, - an NGO promoting entrepreneurship and competition in business, offers three-month internships to young business, law and political science students and other trainees. See www.european-enterprise.org/items/internshipprogramme/ EBBF member Shoghi Emerson is presently one of the three interns employed at the institute’s offices in Brussels. He actively contributed to the organizational logistics of this conference and invited EBBF to share invitations with some of its partners and contacts, in particular with youth and business education. As a result, a Generation Europe representative and the student entrepreneur JADE European President, among others, participated in the conference.
EBBF Workshops at AIESEC Belgium’s Training and Motivation Seminar
Tongerlo, Belgium, November 9, 2007. EBBF Brussels was invited by AIESEC Belgium to give two workshops on “Values-driven Leadership – Responsible Entrepreneurship – Making a Difference” at the AIESEC NTMS (National Training and Motivation Seminar), November 9, at the Tongerlo Sporta Centre. Some 300 students in economics, business and law, or sociology, from 13 Belgian universities, faculties and colleges in seven cities participated in the conference.
The NTMS is an event where AIESEC in Belgium (which among 100 national organizations won a coveted award for excellence in its programs) exposes its new and potential members to topics related to world issues and how the professional world (corporate and non corporate) works to solve or deal with them. With its conferences and training seminars, AIESEC’s aim is to develop in its membership a sense of loyalty and service to this, the world’s largest student organization, as well as a strong commitment to leadership, cultural diversity and a unique set of values many of which AIESEC shares with EBBF.
Seven outside organizations, among which EBBF under a learning partnership agreement with AIESEC, were invited to run concurrent workshops, and to address twice the plenary meeting. Over three hours, the interactive EBBF workshops given by Dale Emerson and Daniel Schaubacher provided 41 young students with a good opportunity to apprehend major societal developments affecting the business world, and concepts such as cultural diversity, the gender issue, CSR, responsible or social entrepreneurship, sustainability, fulfilment experienced through a new approach to work and work/life balance, and stewardship of our common resources.
In the closing plenary meeting, the workshop presenters were given an additional opportunity to expose the objectives, vision and principles or programs of their respective organizations. Those giving presentations included the International Union of Public Transportation (on sustainability); Microsoft (on CSR); CH Robinson (on entre/intra-preneurship); Vlerick Ghent Management School (on business entrepreneurship); Ashoka (on social entrepreneurship), and Electrolux (on the company’s sustainability commitment). This exercise led to good new, personal acquaintances, not only with the present AIESEC leadership, and motivated, talented students, but also with corporate workshop presenters.
Entrepreneurship Survey, Job Creation and Education
November 8, 2007. At a seminar on entrepreneurship policy held in Brussels, Christian Weinberger, Head of the Unit Entrepreneurship at the European Commission’s Directorate General on Industry and Enterprise, presented the findings of a survey conducted in Europe on entrepreneurship and job creation. A 47-point “Agenda for Entrepreneurship Education in Europe” on fostering entrepreneurial mindsets through education and learning is obtainable in the form of a checklist from him, as well as charts on this study. The agenda is based on a conference held in October 2006 in Oslo in which relevant stakeholders from 33 countries participated. Even though the recommendations presented in this agenda do not necessarily represent the views of the European Commission, they resulted from a broad consultation involving national, regional and local governments, business associations and entrepreneurs, business schools and economic promotion agencies. More at :
ec.europa.eu/enterprise/entrepreneurship/support_measures/training_education/oslo.htm
