Here are a few ideas for events, activities or workshops you can organize during Global Entrepreneurship Week. These are the basics behind each idea, and every organizer or host may put their own spin to them. Happy Global Entrepreneurship Week!
EVENTS IDEAS
- Women in Entrepreneurship Panel
- Bring your community together to inspire future female entrepreneurs, innovative thinkers and potential investors by putting together a panel of women who are successful entrepreneurs, experienced investors, community development leaders, or corporate partners who support entrepreneurship.
- Women in Tech Workshop or Conference
- What are the challenges that women face in the technology industry, and how can they overcome these barriers? A Women in Tech Workshop or Conference is the perfect way to bring local pros together to inspire and educate potential founders and innovators.
- Speed Network the Globe
- The object of Speed Network the Globe is to catalyze as many speed networking events as possible across your country during Global Entrepreneurship Week. The event is exactly like it sounds, an easy way to network and meet people in your community who may be able to help you crowdsource solutions to questions or problems, connect you to resources and to provide support along your entrepreneurial journey. SNTG is one of the easiest GEW events to organize and replicate in any community because it's generally free to host, it can happen anywhere – from a classroom to a large meeting room – it also highlights and helps improve networking, a basic but fundamental entrepreneurial skill, and it's an efficient way to expand the participant's network, which is valuable for both butting entrepreneurs and those with existing businesses. Download the Activity Guide.
- Startup Crawl
- Work with local startups and co-working spaces to put together a “Startup Crawl” and set up tour times for participants to learn about local startups and businesses in the community, and get to know the different accelerator, incubator or co-working spaces in the area -- and what they have to offer budding businesses.
- Lunch With A Entrepreneur
- You or your organization can host ‘Lunch with an Entrepreneur’ in a number of ways -- from making this an inclusion event to feature entrepreneurs from underrepresented populations in your community, to making this a panel event where your participants happen to eat lunch. The purpose of the event is for local entrepreneurs and business leaders to share their experiences, failures and successes to inspire future innovators.
- Policy Dialogue
- How can your city, state or country break down barriers to help entrepreneurs start and succeed? Organize a policy roundtable with local or national officials to discuss one or two hot topics in your community regarding entrepreneurship or economic development.
- Trade Show / Exhibition
- Rent a local community center or shut down a block off a central street through your downtown city, and encourage local startup founders, business owners, and entrepreneurship support organizations to set up a booth at a trade show or startup exhibition to raise awareness of the startup community in your city, as well as the goods and services your local startups have to offer.
- Startup Expo
- Showcase your community through a startup expo and invite startups to exhibit their business in one large location. This is an opportunity for startups of all stages to showcase their company to local investors, accelerators, students, potential hires, city government or any other local partners.
- How to Navigate Business Law
- Engage local attorneys or business law experts in your community to host free workshops for business owners, startup founders and others interested in learning the legal side to starting their own business or company. This event could encompass a workshop night or a series of mentor hours during GEW.
- How to Pitch the Media
- Put together a panel of reporters from the local newspaper, television network or radio station, as well as public relations managers from successful companies to discuss the best ways to engage local, state and national media in a startup or venture.
- Mitigating Risk + How to Speak to Investors
- Invite experienced investors or local business loan officers to host a workshop or mentor hours to help startups in your area learn ways to mitigate risk for investors, and perfect specific pitch points to secure investment.
- Business Plans 101
- Successful startups often start with strong, thorough business plans. What are investors looking for in a promising startup and their business plans? Hold an information session during GEW to help startups in your community grow.
- Startup Expo
- Showcase your community through a startup expo and invite startups to exhibit their business in one large location. This is an opportunity for startups of all stages to showcase their company to local investors, accelerators, students, potential hires, city government or any other local partners.
EVENTS FOR STUDENTS
- Alumni Entrepreneur Lunch
- An alumni entrepreneur lunch is directed toward colleges and universities to engage entrepreneurial alumni who have either started their own business or work/have worked for a startup. It’s a great way for current students and community members to get inspired by experienced entrepreneurs from university community.
- High School Startup Day | Powered by Conductor, Arkansas, USA
- The object of High School Startup Day is to give students a platform to identify and analyze real-world problems and collaborate with their peers to conceptualize tangible solutions. HSSD takes anywhere from dozens to hundreds of high school or secondary school students and gives them one day to achieve one goal: solve a problem students face in high school or secondary school. The intensive workshop teaches everything from financial literacy, market research and customer discovery, to thinking creatively and building teamwork skills. High School Startup Day was created by the Conductor of Arkansas. You can follow Conductor on Twitter @AR_Conductor and follow their conversation at #FullSteamAR. Download the Activity Guide.
- Student Demo Day
- Engage local elementary, junior high and high schools to host a Student Demo Day -- challenging students to think creatively to pitch a business or product idea to their class or the student body. Team up with a local business or tech company to award prizes -- which could range from a certificate of achievement to a university scholarship.
- Girls Who Code
- Team up with local elementary, junior high and high schools to sponsor a “Girls Who Code” activity during GEW -- teaching young female students how to create basic code, as well as opportunities computer sciences and STEM fields may open to them.
- Students Run a Business for a Day
- How do you start your own company? How do you make a profit? Students can have the chance to be their own boss, and learn what it takes to create their own company in a classroom workshop or simulation.
- Entrepreneur Exchange Lunch
- Engage local entrepreneurs to do an “exchange lunch” where they are partnered with a local high school or college student that is interested in starting their own company or owning their own business one day. What classes should they be taking? What is the toughest challenge the entrepreneur faced in their journey? Entrepreneur Exchange Lunches are a great way for business leaders to give back to the community and mentor the next generation.
- Entrepreneurship Lecture Series
- Host a lecture series on entrepreneurship. Encourage university departments with entrepreneurship programs to organize an open lecture/seminar for students on campus, so they can better understand what the program is about and what avenues and possibilities entrepreneurship can open for them.
- Getting a Head Start: Launching Your Career Before Graduation
- This session will benefit both students studying consulting, entrepreneurship or business administration, as well as entrepreneurial business leaders needing a change. Provide students with the opportunity to show businesses their “new” way of consulting and how it could benefit established businesses. Each student consulting firm will present their ideas to a business leader to receive feedback.
- How to Become an Entrepreneur in 10 Days Program
- Each “day” within the program will be a new step in the direction to becoming a mogul in the business world. Ten separate stations will represent each “day” during the one-day event, allowing for a self-guided experience. The “days” will be decided on by experts who have taken the steps to build their empires and be successful in the business world today.
- Music Festival: To the Beat of Your Own Drum
- Organize a music festival that will showcase local talent in all genres of music, allowing students to perform as well as help with backstage needs. Artists can showcase their talent on stage in front of a large audience, demonstrating how entrepreneurs come in many different forms.
- Shadow an Entrepreneur
- Seek out local entrepreneurs and ask to observe them on a typical business day. Ask the entrepreneur to share their insights into what it takes to become a successful entrepreneur.
- Lights, Camera, Action: Spotlight on Entrepreneurs
- Host a film festival showcasing enterprising individuals. Have students create and submit videos on the theme of entrepreneurship and hold a film festival showcasing student work.
- Art + Entrepreneurship
- Organize an art show featuring artists who explore the basic themes or characteristics of entrepreneurship: opportunity recognition, creativity, problem solving, risk taking, resourcefulness and passion for ideas.
- Student Entrepreneurship Competition for Social Good
- Business is a place to not only make our lives easier, but also to make our world a better place. Organize a competition in which students submit a plan that will not only make money, but improve the world around us. This program will introduce the concept of corporate social responsibility and demonstrate that financial outcomes do not exclude positive outcomes for the environment and social performance (the triple bottom line).
- Taking Initiative
- Organize a session for students to brainstorm possible entrepreneurial and business ventures. By the end of the session, students should have a business plan that includes how to enact it with their current resources (We recommend establishing a common resource list for all the groups participating). Challenge students to make it happen.
- Business Venture Competition
- Intended for high school business classes, this competition requires dividing a class into several teams that compete to formulate a money-making business venture. Each team will be expected to select a product to sell for one week (as well as manage the finances, look for investors, conduct market research, etc.). The team that makes the most product revenue by the end of the week wins the competition.
- Parents Day / Weekend at University
- Host a parents day or parents weekend during GEW at your local university, and invite entrepreneurship students and their parents to complete a business plan or pitch a startup idea together, and host workshops or lectures on the benefits an entrepreneurial education can have on securing a job or career after college.
- Entrepreneurship Career Fair
- Invite businesses and entrepreneurs from your community to your local school, whether that is primary, secondary or a college or university, to host an Entrepreneurship Career Fair. Teach students about what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur, and inspire a new generation of innovators in your community.
