Articles by Amy Gillett
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Guest Articles
Thursday
June 20
2019Amy Gillett / Kristin Babbie Kelterborn
When Failure is Not an Option: Understanding – And Accelerating – the Success of Refugee Entrepreneurs
This World Refugee Day, the global community is experiencing the highest level of displacement on record. Though entrepreneurship can provide a route to livelihood for which resilient, community-oriented refugees are particularly suited, they often struggle to surmount barriers of language and discrimination, on top of the high failure rates that are typical of small businesses. Amy Gillett and Kristin Babbie Kelterborn at the William Davidson Institute share lessons from support programs helping refugees overcome tough odds to economically enrich their host countries.
- Categories
- Entrepreneurship
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Guest Articles
Monday
May 20
2019Amy Gillett / Kristin Babbie Kelterborn
Pitch Perfect: Five Tips for Designing Effective Business Pitch Competitions for International Entrepreneurs
The television show “Shark Tank,” in which entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to a panel of potential investors, has brought the pitch concept into popular culture. But in many emerging economies, not everybody is familiar with pitching. The William Davidson Institute's Amy Gillett and Kristin Babbie Kelterborn provide some lessons to help global entrepreneurship development leaders organize effective pitch competitions. Among their tips: Consider a more encouraging "dolphin tank" approach instead of a cut-throat shark tank, and work to leverage local entrepreneurial customs.
- Categories
- Education, Entrepreneurship
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Guest Articles
Thursday
March 14
2019Preparing Students to Launch: What Needs to Happen on the Ground to Get Social Enterprises Off the Ground?
Social entrepreneurship is a relatively new field that’s attracting a new type of business leader, and educational approaches to it need to be nimble and inventive. Amy Gillett, Vice President of the Education sector at the William Davidson Institute, chronicles a different type of immersive education – one that brought together more than 400 students in the U.S. and Middle East/North Africa through a “virtual exchange.” The students designed more than 70 businesses - many of which will not be virtual - to tackle real-world challenges.
- Categories
- Education, Entrepreneurship, Technology
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Wednesday
May 9
2018Kristin Babbie Kelterborn / Amy Gillett
A Recipe for Understanding: How Food Entrepreneurship and Gastrodiplomacy are Bringing Syrian Refugees and Turks Closer
Nearly 6 million people have fled Syria's brutal civil war, with many settling in nearby Turkey. These refugees, as well as millions of other migrants around the world, often open restaurants and other eateries, drawing upon their cultural heritage to earn a living. The Livelihood Innovations through Food Entrepreneurship (LIFE) project was created to help these business owners – some 240 entrepreneurs will receive business support services offered at two food incubators.
- Categories
- Entrepreneurship
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Friday
February 16
2018Why the Next Steve Jobs Could Be From Pakistan
Author and professor Elmira Bayrasli sees a big shift taking place among entrepreneurs in developing markets: They're seeking opportunities in their home countries, instead of fleeing to Western nations. In this video dialogue with WDI's Amy Gillett, Bayrasli, who wrote the book “From the Other Side of the World: Extraordinary Entrepreneurs, Unlikely Places,” offers several other insights on what startup founders are really looking for and what they need to achieve it.
- Categories
- Entrepreneurship, NextBillion Originals
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Friday
May 5
2017Amy Gillett / Nathan Rauh-Bieri
Three Social Business Lessons from Detroit’s ‘Grassroots Entrepreneurs’
The self-determination that characterizes many Detroit entrepreneurs is a powerful paradigm for emerging markets, say authors Amy Gillett and Nathan Rauh-Bieri, and would-be providers of social entrepreneurship interventions should note a lesson learned: Make sure what you are offering is requested by the community, customized for the community and implemented with the community.
- Categories
- Education, Entrepreneurship
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Wednesday
March 1
2017Amy Gillett / Dinah Pura T. Depositario
Power, Individualism and Indulgence: How to Leverage Cultural Factors in Entrepreneurship Training
Cultural factors can influence just about every aspect of an entrepreneur’s journey. Using a cultural dimensions tool, the authors compared how cultural background influences entrepreneurs in the USA and the Philippines. After finding large differences across three dimensions of culture, they explored how these differences might affect entrepreneurs in the Philippines and how entrepreneurship training can be tailored accordingly.
- Categories
- Education, Entrepreneurship
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Thursday
June 9
2016With Few Resources, Cuba’s Resourceful Entrepreneurs Find a Way
There are some 500,000 entrepreneurs today in Cuba, up from 150,000 in 2010. President Raúl Castro has called the huge state sector “bloated” and has declared private business a key part of Cuba’s new economic model. In May, the communist government passed legislation allowing small businesses to become legal entities, thus making the private sector official. Previously, entrepreneurs were classified as “self-employed.” But when we visited there in May we found that, despite resource constraints, entrepreneurship is booming in Cuba.
- Categories
- Entrepreneurship
