Kurtz 1 Lauren Kurtz Professor Hugh Turner BMGT198F Social Enterprise Symposium April 5 2010 Transforming Business for the Global Good On the evening of March 25 2010 I attended what would be my first Social Enterprise Symposium After attending this event I was certain that it would not be my last I believe I was at an advantage going into this event because the interest I had in actually attending exceeded the feeling of being forced to be there for a school assignment In addition to this my friend was one of the main students organizing the Symposium so I was very excited to see all of her hard work pay off I was also able to help her register the panel speakers preceding the event The extent of this job hit me when I saw these speakers presenting in front of hundreds of students mere minutes after I had made small talk with them For the most part they were all very pleasant patient people and were happy to comply with whatever accommodations had been provided for them After talking to them one on one I was even more inspired to realize how truly powerful these speakers minds and businesses were The first speaker Stanley Litow was one of the last to check in he was also one of the most entertaining He began the Symposium with a tasteful interesting explanation of IBM s outlook on social responsibility I have faith that Litow is a genuine executive and I was very interested in what he had to say about the global business world He mentioned how crucial the language barrier between cultures is because it is just as essential for a company to convey the Kurtz 2 same image globally as it does locally in the United States In order to be socially responsible worldwide it is important for a company to remain open minded Litow was a great choice for a keynote speaker because he was very easy to listen to While he did a wonderful job of keeping the audience s attention for some reason I found myself comparing him to people like Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling Although I do not believe that Litow is a bad man it was very easy to be deceived by Lay and Skilling who seemed like honest people as well These big time executives who are responsible for such large corporations are always extremely eloquent but in the case of Enron we saw that they can also be extremely deceiving Ironically one of my favorite part of the IBM presentation was a part that was not spoken out loud it was the quote in the Symposium pamphlet that said On a smarter planet the question is not what can we do the question is what will we do How will we improve business society our communities and the human condition We can improve the quality of life by building a smarter planet Are you a forward thinker and will you join us Together we can re imagine the world This type of mind stirring philosophical view is my favorite attitude to live my life by I take pleasure in this ambitious mind set so I enjoyed discovering that IBM supported this kind of vision It was this kind of vision that I found in the next session s speakers as well True Life I m a Social Entrepreneur was by far my favorite part of the night I believe that a large part of this opinion had to do with the ages of the speakers at this track I was aware of Mike Wenger s ambitions seeing as he is a New Jersey native like myself he is also acquainted with my friend who was organizing the Symposium At the age of twenty five he was the youngest of the three speakers Although the other two men Casey Golden and Trevor Kurtz 3 Young had more awards and stable businesses and accomplishments to speak of I was the most interested in Wegner s thoughts His business OpenAction is a networking site for businesses or social projects with common goals to connect One can create a profile and post pictures videos and blogs to bring their story all together There is a focus on a geological aspect of life and as their mission states OpenAction was born out of a desire to leave this planet better than the way we found it It is about being the change you want to see in the world I found this company and website inspirational because my entire family is very environmentally conscious and interested in saving the world in the same way My older brother and I are particularly passionate about traveling the world and doing what we can to improve it With that said it is no surprise that we have already reached out to Mike Wegner to see what we can do to help him with his projects As of now my brother who is double majoring in entrepreneurial studies and web design is going to help Wegner re design his website in exchange for alternative services that Mike can provide for my brother s personal projects It felt very accomplishing to network with someone who was so inspiring mission was These new generation socially responsible businesses remind me of the case study we discussed about Timberland Commerce and Justice It was the first case we did that opened my eyes to see that not all corporations were corrupt and evil in some way Timberland s focus on giving back to the world and partnership with City Life was very moving I was especially touched by this case study when someone recently asked me to do community service work in coordination with City Life and I was able to immediately understand what the company s Kurtz 4 The last track that I visited was Mobil Technology Connecting People Transforming Lives Although this workshop did not grasp my attention as much as the first I was still intrigued by the speakers I was taught that in Kenya something called MPESA allows people to send and transfer money through a cell phone This caught my attention because I am very interested in studying abroad in Kenya Knowing that people are more commonly spending money at rural local stores due to this new invention was very useful in my research about Kenya They can also now use the cell phones to pay bills The other speaker Don Riley spoke of his travels and gave some essential advice He told us that seeing something in person is more sentimental than simply hearing about it Witnessing it yourself affects you in a much different way I can testify to this because I have traveled to do service work in Dominican Republic which has completely opened my eyes and Ultimately this Social Enterprise Symposium was informative and fascinating Not only will I return for it in following years but I will definitely be a part of its construction and changed my life production
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