On November 21, At 12 PM,(GMT 5+45), Hult Prize at IOE and NxtGen successfully completed their Level 7 of the Entrepreneurial talk series on sustaining your business along with the completion of Semifinals of the much-awaited event of the year, Hult Prize 2021, Food is Good challenge. The hostess, Suprima Shrestha, and Tunisha Gyawali greeted the audience, guests, judges, and contestants. Level 7 of the entrepreneurship talk series had more women speakers, which marks the women's growth and grip in various industries. Moreover, the series brought insights about Nepali media and its impact on entrepreneurship.

S in Shawntel Nieto stands for sustainability

With the establishment of BMB Solutions, Miss Nieto has continued working on educating and informing the public about the need and the simplicity of sustainability. Miss Shawntel Nieto is the founder of the Society of sustainability practitioners and Sustainarumble in Philippines. She was the speaker for this series. Her philosophy is that every human being deserves a dignified life. Her expertise in working as a social entrepreneur, guided by her philosophy, reflected the hidden tricky side of social innovation.

Further, she shared that balancing an entrepreneurial venture's social, economic, and environmental aspects is a major concern. According to her, there are 3 major pillars to sustain a business. They are:

• Find your anchor

Finding the purpose of your venture is the first thing. Not only that, the venture should have answers and contributions to the world, be it solving a social problem or saving the planet. Purpose, Network, Governance, Ownership, and Finance are essential areas to think about while pitching the niche.

• Ensure all side of the deck

Your survival counts more than help for others. Thus your focus on sustainability should include taking Governance and Social goods, thinking about Environment Impact, and checking on Economic Viability. The go-to formula to attain sustainability is to know more about revenues, the impact your venture will make on environments, and know the details of the target market.

• Feed your crew

A good team always makes successful projects. Thus it would help if you remember that it's not only about enterprise; it about the entrepreneur and the team.

Miss Nieto gave a pro tip to get the hands dirty and get into the game; never let the fear prevent you from experimenting, exploring, and experiencing. Further, she quoted winning a Hult Prize can be a foundation to start your venture but not a defining one. Thus gaining more prizes in terms of support as well as sales should be a priority for your entrepreneurship.

Media personnel's take on entrepreneurship

 Rojika Pokharel's thoughts on leadership in media

Miss Rojika Pokharel is a beauty-title holder who is now working as a TV presenter. Her connection with pageants brought her the opportunity to be the host of the Beauty Journey show on Nepal Television. Miss Pokharel thoroughly believes in the visualization of dreams and efforts to put on. Moreover, she says when you do something, it marks your effort but staying numb or giving up the dreams will make you feel guilty for the whole life. She says failures do impact our career but make it the turning point. Further, being true to self and the customers can be a win-win situation for any entrepreneurial venture. Opportunities in the media sector are immense, all you gotta do is be confident, lead the team and make your passion to fuel yourself

Modest and Bold Malvika Subba's take on media and entrepreneurship

Malvika Subba has been rocking the Nepali media with bold, confident, logical, and impactful speeches. She had started her TV career at the age of 21. She gains around two-decade-long expertise in the media industry. She holds the Miss Nepal, 2002 title. Malvika is into teaching entrepreneurship to young people via her organization, Ideas Studio Nepal. She has been reinventing and going with the flow, which has undoubtedly made her a role model for many young girls. She strongly believes that rethinking, re-educating, and rebuilding your ideas to address the need of the time and improve customer service should be acknowledged by the aspiring and existing entrepreneurs.

Malvika believes that a great leader has sharp observation like an eagle, can understand the body language, be empathetic, and delegate the work according to his/her employees' traits. According to her, an entrepreneurial venture must be launched and taken forward with the intensive as well as extensive market study and being precise with where to invest and how much to invest. Staying confident makes the communication process more manageable. Being open to constructive criticism is another primary concern for the youths who are making efforts to convince investors. She also advocates LGBTQI inclusion in media and getting them more opportunities. She believes that an individual's work and effort should be a basis for judgment rather than gender.

For instance, she expressed that the Covid-19 pandemic has heavily influenced the media industry. First is the mental stress to be susceptible to the virus, second cut down on salary and third and worse losing the jobs.

Malvika shared some tricks and tips to be vocal while pitching ideas. Here are some of them.

• Try to keep your body calm
• Keep your standing position like the cat
• Strong eye-contact with the audience
• Practice a facial exercise to loosen face muscle
• Keep yourself  hydrated (Not much coz we need to speak, not make runs around the bathroom)

Relating to the food for good challenge, she encouraged youths to get their venture on indigenous cuisines and have a good design on the packaging. One should not miss projecting nationalistic feelings in their projects.

Shree Pandey's views on media responsibility

Shree Pandey is a news-reporter in Kantipur Television. Shree believes that media has a strong influence among the youths; however, social media has been an active agent to circulate fake news and rumors among them. News house is here to clear all these issues forwarded by social media. She also told the audience about the pre, during, and post working mechanism in the newsroom.

Shree has become stronger and recovered from the Corona infection, but her passion has not made her take a step back from the media. In the media business, doubts are exhibited on the new-comers, making them get fewer opportunities. Shree believes that new faces in news-reporting can inspire and motivate a large number of the population seeking success in the media business. Adding to this, Shree says the 3Cs of today's youth: Choice, Convenience, and Comfort have been obstructing their chances of getting a grip on the job for a longer time.

What happened in the Semi-Final?

Around 3 PM, after the discussion with the guest, the Semi-Final of Hult Prize 2021, based on food for good challenge was conducted. The competition was fierce. The judges for this segment were Ani Choying Dolma, Alpha Sennon, Ahmad Farhad Sarwari, and Er. Aditya Raj. The competing teams were so devoted to projecting their ideas and views. The teams ensured their presentation to be their best and make a good impression on the judges. It was amazing to see such innovative and unique entrepreneurial ideas from these young entrepreneurs/entrepreneur aspirants. Among them, 20 teams were selected for the finals.

Summing Up

Hult Prize at IOE and NxtGen's 7th level on Entrepreneurship Talk series brought the professional social entrepreneur Ms. Shawntel Nieto, Media personnel, Rojika Pokharel, Malvika Subba, and Shree Pandey. Listening to their views and experiences and interacting with them was a great experience.

Ms. Nieto’s quote of Sustainability is not complex, marks the need of proper planning, execution, and maintenance in every entrepreneurial venture. Every entrepreneurial venture must ensure to have support from the government, public, and stakeholders as well. Investing in a strong team is another big thing for entrepreneurship to sustain.

Media is an inextricable part of an entrepreneurial venture to gain better exposure and enhanced communication. The optimum use of social media to flourish and develop entrepreneurial ventures is the second gift that COVID-19 could give us besides natural healing. However, the lack of patience to rise and succeed in lesser time can affect one’s career. Continuous effort and focus on media marketing is another big thing to address.

The semi-final was another exciting segment. Listening to the ideas devoted to making optimum, better, and unique ways of using food for the entrepreneurial venture was truly mind-blowing. We could see the hard work and efforts every team had put up in their research and planning.

Expectations have risen now. We are more excited to know the winner of the 2021 Hult Prize. Not only that, We as an audience, have an equal amount of excitement to enjoy the next session of the talk series, which is sure to bring us a variety of guests and speakers.

Do check out the live video of Level 7 of Entrepreneurship Talks: Sustaining Your Business.

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