This Wednesday, April 20, 2016 was held in the amphitheater of UGB 2 a panel on Student Entrepreneurship whose theme questioned the need to do business when you are a student.
This Wednesday, April 20, 2016 was held in the amphitheater of UGB 2 a panel on Student Entrepreneurship whose theme questioned the need to do business when you are a student.
Indeed, this event rich in interventions and advice brought together personalities who showed real motivation in front of the students. These panelists from different business backgrounds delivered hearty speeches that had the merit of arousing great interest among the audience. Relevant questions were raised and the debate was posed in a pleasant framework for discussion and sharing.
SONATEL, the official sponsor of the 25th anniversary of the UGB and which, through its foundation, has accompanied the university since its creation by investing in its equipment, was represented by Ms. Maïmouna DIOP. The latter is mainly expressed in the field of ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) by encouraging students to create startups and develop a myriad of projects. She says that these very innovative small businesses, which create few jobs but a lot of wealth, easily provide effective solutions to problems. She notably summons the example of Marc Zuckerberg, the creator of Facebook who at the outset was moved by the idea of an intra-school network, to insist that as a student, ideas must be sown , test them, develop them in the form of startups, resell them if necessary and start over and over again.
Following him, Mr. Demba DIOP, director of employment at the Ministry of Youth, Employment and Citizen Construction, who is also a former member of Sanar, began his speech by welcoming the leadership of the UGB which has distinguished itself a lot through national competitions.
Relying on the fact that Senegal applies the free market, he challenged the assembly by saying that the state is not intended to provide jobs but that it is responsible for regulating the market. He also recalled that with a workforce of 128,000 employees in the public service and 300,000 employees in the private sector, Senegal does not even have 500,000 employees to financially support its 14 million inhabitants.
Quoting Mahatma Ghandi who said “Be the change you want to see in the world”, Mr. DIOP advises students to know how to get up early – the business is a long process – and to emerge from anonymity like Bill Gates and so many others, to develop leadership to achieve their dreams of greatness and change. He urges everyone to take care not to increase the rank of the 200,000 new unemployed people registered every year in the country by finding a useful area for the country in which he can succeed and achieve it. Also, he entrusts these words to them: “Create your business, the genius is in you. ”
Mr. Babacar NDIONGUE, responsible for the archiving center of OMVS (Organization for the Development of the Senegal River) which is one of the sponsors of the event, confirms the words of his predecessor by noting that the large employer that is the state hardly recruits and companies too. This suggests that entrepreneurship is an alternative to success.
However, he raises a question to which the entire audience agreed on the relevance: “Are the students prepared to undertake in their courses? ”
He emphasizes the problems of complexes which constitute a block for students when opportunities for integration into entrepreneurship arise but they are not very rewarding. Only, to brave the ladder you have to start somewhere. This is why he encourages students to take the plunge and take risks by agreeing to learn from their mistakes. Recipe ? There is no ready-made idea: you must share ideas with those around you, your peers, structures empowered to provide support and supervision, and try to find financial partners.
Mr. Badou KANE, President of RISE (Risk Innovation and Social Entrepreneurship) which in French means Social Enterprise for Innovation and Risk Management, was able to shake up the room very positively by addressing the assembly with lively energy .
In perfect agreement with the speech of Mr. NDIONGUE, he sets his own on these words: “There are no jobs in Senegal; we need to be taught how to develop entrepreneurship. “He loudly declares that it is imperative to think like future employers because in this world,” everyone sells; on the other hand, the class how to sell does not exist. Defining himself as someone who “changes lives”, he reports that in 3 years, he has released 4,000 young people from unemployment, 10 of whom have become multimillionaires. He bases his vision on three essential points: spiritual development, personal development and professional development revolving around honesty, self-confidence, knowledge of body language, among others.
The last speaker in the panel on youth entrepreneurship is Mr. Ibrahima WADE, the Director General of BOS PSE (Operational Office for Monitoring the Emerging Senegal Plan). The latter strongly urged students not to wait for incubators to start up, but to create their own entrepreneurship clubs to avoid being late.
All the panellists agreed that students must systematically “think about the project” and do everything possible to carry them out. It was an extremely interesting panel which will have had a very positive impact.
Malado Woury KA
Leave a Reply