During these uncertain times, we find joy in recalling memories of past events and amazing plans of life before isolation. One of our projects in 2020 were the Aspire International Hubs, one-day events in different countries around the world.
The International Hubs are an integrated part of Aspire’s plan to expand its reach in a number of countries. The Aspire Hubs have their roots in similar events organised starting with 2016 in Chisinau, but at a smaller scale. Year after year, the project grew and, starting with last year, we organise one-day events in Georgia, Armenia, Ukraine, and Moldova. This year only the first two of them took place at the beginning of 2020 due to the coronavirus outbreak.
“Now we manage to reach bigger and bigger audiences with every edition” (Tudor Gaitan, Project Manager of the Aspire Hubs)
Aspire started with the idea that we need to educate, inspire and empower youngsters. Eastern European countries have not seen significant changes in education for the past decades and we felt that we can have an impact on youth growth and their development into confident leaders. We started organising the Aspire International Hubs with the aim of helping the youth in the Black Sea region develop skills such as entrepreneurship, leadership or critical thinking. We also hope that our one-day events will provide a glimpse into what Aspire has to offer and will encourage them to apply for our summer programs and become part of our global network of alumni. Thanks to our partner in the region, the German Marshall Fund through the Black Sea Trust, we have the means to offer multiple scholarships and opportunities that would help youngsters discover and unleash their potential.
This year’s topic was Mastering Inner Tools with sessions revolving around emotional intelligence, leadership, critical/creative thinking and personal development. Before the coronavirus crisis, we met more than 80 participants through our events in Georgia and Armenia and our Project Manager, Tudor Gaitan, shared with us some of the main takeaways:
What happened at Aspire International Hub in… Georgia?
One of our speakers, Ekaterine Babunashvili, coach and business trainer, explored emotional intelligence and its role in leadership development for the young generation. Together with the participants, the speaker dived into the four dimensions of emotional intelligence and showed them:
· how to identify their emotional patterns;
· how to convert “negative” emotions to resourceful states;
· simple life hacks and instruments for self-regulation and achieving desired results;
As emotions significantly affect the everyday decision-making processes, developing emotional hygiene skills, positive outlook and persistence are crucial for today’s leaders in a VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity) world.
What happened at Aspire International Hub in… Armenia?
The Armenia hub tackled topics such as finding your purpose, crafting your future, getting to know your opportunities or development and improvement in education. One of our speakers, Hayarpi Sahakyan, trainer at the Intellectual Training Center and Curator and Lead Organiser at Fuckup Nights Armenia, discussed with our participants the role of failures in the educational process and how we can translate such challenges into strong assets and personal wins.
All these sessions were designed to help the participants get a deeper understanding of themselves, of what Aspire stands for and to enhance leadership abilities. We believe in diversity and inclusion, therefore we developed entrepreneurship programs for young leaders around the world. We aim to inspire them to find their life goals and join our proactive, energetic community with common interest and values.