CEO story: Joyce Rommelaar

I was born in a family of entrepreneurs in a city in the eastern part of The Netherlands. My parents had a shoe factory; from them I learned a lot about business. I was always doing homework at the office and you catch on quick there. At dinner we discussed everything about being an entrepreneur, personal challenges, etc. But also the importance of real personal contact. Four years ago I did a special course in the US. One of my classmates from India asked me if I wanted to give a TEDx talk. Sure! It was on my bucket list! I was standing on the famous red dot for eighteen minutes in Chennai, India. That was quite a unique experience. In my TEDx talk, the bottom line was: how do young people find a balance between the online and offline world? Because it is so easy to hide yourself behind text messages, Facebook, and avatars instead of making real live contact.
Link to Ted Talk https://youtu.be/DpnOuNBlOWI

Jump in at the deep end
That's why I have such a strong believe in the power of entrepreneurship education. Entrepreneurship is about adventure, to communicate, to think critically and to work together. Actually, I believe very much that everyone has their own unique entrepreneurial attitude in their DNA. The only question is: what is your unique talent and how do you deploy it? Any company that looks at its own employees, sees how great it is when they have an entrepreneurial attitude!

The power of social entrepreneurship
Social entrepreneurship is a particularly interesting new development: to challenge young people to get started with the contributions to a social purpose in combination with a good business model is very important. Thus they not only build their own entrepreneurial future but also the future of our planet. The SE360 programme provides young people with the opportunity to experience social entrepreneurship in real life. My advice to you all: grab that chance and discover your entrepreneurial talent!