Youth from Latvia and Finland take part in Leadership Camp

It has been a month since Social Business Academy participants took part in the Leadership Camp. On April 8th-9th, the young people from Latvia and Finland met in Riga to get to know each other and get inspired. Throughout February, they had been working on their social business ideas and trying out what it means to develop a business idea.

Over two intensive days, participants improved their teamwork skills, gained inspiration, and learned a lot about leadership, design thinking, and ideation. Social entrepreneurs from Latvia and Finland – Gustavs Upmanis (Visas Iespējas), Liene Reine-Miteva (Ligero), Sami Ekmark (Commu App), and Marja Ahola (Gimara Ltd) – shared their experiences and practical insights. Business consultant and professor Iiro Jussila, as well as business coach Eduards Krūmiņš talked to the young people about management and leadership, while Elīna Bušmane and Čārlzs Bušmanis (Design Elevator) led a workshop on ideation and design thinking.

💬 Emīls (22), a participant from Latvia, shares his experience: “When I applied, I had no idea what a social entrepreneur was and what they did. Now, I would like to start a social business because we came up with a very cool idea that would solve a pretty critical problem in our society.”

Participants have the opportunity to move on to the next part of the program – the Innovation Lab, where, over the coming months, they will develop their social business ideas under the guidance of professional mentors.

🤝 The project is implemented by Reach for Change Latvia, Radošās Idejas, Juvenia, and Lahden Diakonialaitos.

This activity was supported as part of “Social Entrepreneurship for Youth Empowerment in Finland and Latvia”, an Interreg Central Baltic Programme 2021-2027 project co-funded by the European Union (SocEntYouth ID CB0100057). The activity is financially supported by the Society Integration Foundation from Latvian state budget funds allocated by the Ministry of Culture.