Hi dear students,
This is Alejandro Villegas' background. He has kindly accepted to have a chat with us to share some of his experiences and knowledge about how to become an entrepreneur. According to the dictionary, entrepreneur means "a person who starts a business and is willing to risk loss in order to make money” or “one who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise.” But I want you to understand that being an entrepreneur is not only about busines or money, it has to do with attitude, decision, responsibility, creativity, intelligence and willing to do great things. That's why I have invited Alejandro to speak with us!
Who is Alejandro?
Regarding my background, I am a mechanical engineer graduated with honors from the University of Queensland, Australia. I started my degree en Colombia, but interrupted it to go to Australia. Regardless, I consider myself an engineer from the UNAL.
During my days as student, I worked as draughtsman in a small company of machinery, and later as a tutor at the University of Queensland. I also had to work packing clothes in trucks during night shifts and sometimes cleaning offices and glass windows at the beginning, when my language skills were not strong enough to enroll at uni. Surprisely, I was able to pay my tuition fees with those part-time jobs!
Once graduated in 2014, I moved to Dubai, as the lure of working in the aerospace and automotive industry with cutting edge technology and top notch technical personnel was greater than the financial benefits of working in the mining industry in Australia.
In Dubai I realised that the dreams that I had back in Colombia of having my own company of research and development of materials could be indeed achieved. Somehow I grew up with the wrong idea that coming from a Latin American country would be a barrier, but as most of the barriers, they are only in our minds.
Homework assignment:
Please, write in comments the questions you have for Alejandro
Please, write in comments the questions you have for Alejandro
Larry Andrés Matta Plaza.
ResponderEliminarQuestions:
You say that most of the barriers are only in our minds, but if it is about to be a entrepreneur in Colombia, do you think there are many obstacles beyond our control? Is it harder to be an entrepreneur in Colombia than in another country? If so, which of these difficulties it should combat primarily.
We know that the ingredients of success are: be disciplined, be passioned ...,but, what skill do you prefer over others?
Having had a remarkable mathematical education, because you are an engineer, do you think that mathematics can play a more substantial role in the future than it has been offered so far? Or, rather, do you think science can be more accepted by the general public?
What do you think about the scientific and innovative development in Colombia? Do you think we need a lot of time to compete with the power countries?
What book would you recommend to someone who wants to start a entrepreneurship life?
Hey Larry.
EliminarGreat questions mate, let's see if I can answer them good enough.
1. Well, I did not have the opportunity to create my own business in Colombia, but I am sure that the big picture would not have been very different. There are always variables that we can’t control, and to be honest, most of the variables considered are tend to be against us. What really matters is that one can “go with the flow”, become resilient and shape an idea considering the context before investing the time and effort in developing and implementing a plan.
It is true that the successful idea that somebody has in certain country will not yield the same results in a different environment (market, culture, regulations, laws, etc.), and that is the reason why the multinational corporate world is so complex and unsteady.
I believe that managing your own business in Colombia or in another country is equally challenging.
2. To that recipe I would add creativity, energy, passion and luck; heaps of luck. And by luck I mean hard work, because although luck is not a skill and may be classified as an obstacle beyond our control, often we attribute success to a convenient output from random when we have been tireless working to achieve it.
But if I have to choose only one, I would be inclined towards passion. With passion comes commitment, energy and fun.
3. I find hard to believe that science is not being accepted enough by the general public. The current society relays on scientific developments, and any of those are linked with mathematics. At the end of the day is mathematics the language of science.
Mathematics already plays a substantial role among us, but perhaps the general public perceive the practical side of it much easier than its theoretical core. It is easier for somebody to understand a pragmatic concept, such as magnetism, rather than the Maxwell’s equations that allowed us to design hard drives for computer and levitating high speed trains.
4. I'll go back to my previous point of taking into account the context.
The fuel for development are needs, and every country or region has different ones. We are already making a difference in certain fields, such as medicine and materials science. I also think that it is not a matter of time, but also a matter of culture and general perception. We seem to be more focused on political rivalry than in anything else.
5. I have not read many books on the topic, but recently I finished Tinkertoys, by Michael Michalko. It is an entertaining book about creativity. At the end of the day, a good idea and opportunities are what we require to lead our own company/project.
María Camila Jaramillo Hernández
ResponderEliminarAt the beginning of our conversation, Alejandro told us a little about his life, the decisions prompting him to study mechanical engineering and their experiences studying in another country. He didn’t finish his career here in Colombia, however, when he moved to Australia he didn’t start at the same level where it was, although it was already finishing his studies, he must retake certain specific courses needed to be at the right level demanded college. This allowed him to face new challenges such as speaking a new language, especially to understand it and practice it, that is, correctly pronounce a word, form sentences that make sense and have skills to develop a conversation; also know a country, its culture and customs; turn and face their studies from another form of teaching and from another language, with the complications of having to get part-time jobs to achieve finance his career. He tells us that Australia is an excellent country to live, what most attention is the concern of people for the care of animals and the measures taken to protect them, and also they have a great interest in sports, and that all people there doing one. His stories are about situations that are presented when he was learning a new word and its pronunciation, along with his experience as a Colombian abroad and all the stereotypes that this brings, as are the concepts of drugs, drug trafficking and violence. Although there were only these thoughts, Australians consider Colombians as a really hardworking people and struggling to achieve what they proposed.
And in the context of entrepreneurship, the limits to propose, create or innovate something, are only in our minds, when Alejandro makes the decision to realize his dream of having his own company research and development of materials, obviously on his mind there is fear of trying, but it isn't an obstacle to do it. He mentions us that the skills to be a good entrepreneur is to be disciplined, responsible, persevering, and above all, have the ability to communicate with other people and demostrate confidence, security and empathy. And in case of being successful, he told us that much depends on what we could achieve with our capacities, that the success goes of the hand of the skills that we develop as we confront to the challenges that they present in the life, in the sense of the things that we want to do by means of the innovation.
Finally, he mentions us the importance of learning English, not only because it is considered the universal language, but because it opens too many doors for the future, especially if we want to develop our entrepreneurship.
Este comentario ha sido eliminado por el autor.
EliminarGreat summary Maria. Quite impressed with your English, I wouldn’t have been able to write in that way when I was studying English at the UNAL.
EliminarNow that you mentioned studying in another language and the difficulties of getting into the academic environment, I remembered an amusing situation that happened to me at uni:
I had to take a first year course called Introduction to Engineering, or something along those lines. The final project was an analysis of different energy generation solutions for communities well under the poverty threshold in India. I had to stand in front of the class and present my part of the analysis, which of course I developed with the engineering tools I had by the time. Besides being my first presentation in front of a purely English-speaking audience, I completely overkilled my task and presented physical simulations and mathematical models that those guys would have never seen before and that perhaps are only used for researches.
By the end of the presentation I could only see confused faces. I could not understand if they actually did not understand my notorious accent or if I just had stuffed up with my poor syntax. It turns up that even the tutor was a bit confused and had to give me full marks for the presentation.
The chat with Alejandro was a good experience for me because i learned about his story and about he is true example of entrepreneurship, since he goes for a extranger country and he was adapted to other culture finish his college here, learn to talk english, change part of the esteriotypes about our country with his hard work and responsability thank to this has been achieved get a job in Dubai and want release his own company. He is a good example for life cause i really like work in other country like canada, australia or chile and i know what important is know another language to acomplish this achievement.
ResponderEliminarThanks Luis, it is great to be considered a good example to follow.
EliminarFor the countries that you want to visit I could guess that your profession is mining-related, am I right?
Canada seems to be an amazing country to live and work in. Although I have not had the possibility to visit it, I would seriously consider a job over there.
Watch your language skills, French is a must is some of the mining regions.
PEDRO PABLO LOPEZ GOMEZ
ResponderEliminarIn general the conversation with alejandro was about his experiences at the time that he decided to go to australia for continue the university studies that he started in the National university of Colombia, how is the culture in the countries that he to lived, the differences between the education in australia and the education in colombia, what the people of Australia and Dubai think of the colombian people, his experience in Dubai and other things.
Alejandro talked to us about why he decided to study in Australia and the reason was the quality of the education and the opportunities that have Australia and the most important, that one part of his family live in Australia, Alejandro talked about the large number of sports that are practice in Australia and in special talked of his experience when he did not have a good english but nevertheless he started to study and work half time for him to pay his expenses.
To conclude Alejandro said the importance that have speak english in general for the live but more for the entrepreneurs and that to despite of the bad image that have Colombian people in the past in the present we are recognized for to be very hardworking in the world.
Good one Pedro.
EliminarIf you are into sports, have a look at AFL. It is a sport from Australia and definitely only practiced there. It is a contact sport like rugby, but much faster. In fact, it is the sport with the largest number of injuries per year in Australia.
Mauro Davila
ResponderEliminarQuestions : Why did you decide to go this way to create your own company ?, what are the obstacles that you think that can occur when starting a company ? What are the important characteristics in the personality of an entrepreneur future? You think the idea that there is a better future out of country? What do you mean exactly when you say that the limitations are only in our minds ? What do you think about how little attention is paid to the development of new technologies and research in Colombia ? What should you consider when you're professional and enter the labor market?.
Hey Mauro! Quite a lot of questions! I’ll try to answer a couple of them.
EliminarWell, the idea of creating my own business was fuelled by the desire of making a positive impact on the industry and subsequently on everyone’s life.
I have been always fascinated by engineering and how we apply science to get nature to work on our side. Nevertheless, being an employee in a private company imposes a great limitation on how, where and when to invest time and effort. Often I found myself performing tasks that were repetitive and easy enough to be considered as “boring to death”.
After reflecting on this for some time, I realised that those exact boring tasks were the ones I used to dream about in the past. I understood that I needed constant new challenges, and when you feel that your work is on your way you have to simply go over it. And that is when and why I decided to conceive my own project.
Juan Diego López A.
ResponderEliminarThe coversation with Alejandro was about his experinces in Australia while he was studying and Dubai where he is working.
He told us why he decided to finish his studies in Australia and then go to work in Dubai, the main obstacles he had when he arrived as language and some of his anecdotes. He also told us that there is a huge difference among Colombia, Australia and Dubai with regard to culture, education, language, among other things. And initially the stereotypes about colombians, like “colombians are illicit drug users” or “colombians are good at salsa dance”; were noted but as time passed it changed.
Finally Alejandro told us we should speak English because it is a language that open many doors so he recommend us to dedicate two hour a day to learn the language, and if we have a good and viable business idea accompained by a lot of perseverance we can become a succesful entrepreneur.
Thanks Diego.
EliminarI am glad you retained the main message I wanted to send: speaking English brings countless opportunities, and not only professional ones.
However, I don’t remember recommending to practice English for two hours a day. What I would recommend, though, is to constantly engage with people using the language. Write to them, speak to them and listen to them. I bet that a 20 minutes conversation would be more effective than 4 hours of grammar exercises.
Mauricio Parra
ResponderEliminarThe talk with alejandro was a good experience, he shows us how succesful you can be in those countries even if you are form colombia, He told us about his experience, the university etc, We also asked him the questions we decided to ask, in genereal was a good experience
Thanks Mauricio.
EliminarThe phrase “Even if you are Colombian” seems to be the norm now. I believe that our self-steam has reached rock bottom and sadly we started to consider our background as a disadvantage.
In my experience, people from developed countries are not biased in regards to other people’s background. Resumes are written without including pictures or stating your nationality
Let’s avoid the phrase “Even if we are Colombians”, stereotypes are being demolished as new generations take the lead of society.