Has the School’s associative life been brought to a standstill? Not really. Since lockdown kicked in, NEOMA students have doubled their efforts and their imaginations to remain in touch with their members. As Déclic Entreprendre, the association responsible for the promotion of all forms of entrepreneurship, demonstrates.

1/ What is your strategy for coping with lockdown ?

The question of doing nothing never arose. We’ve always said that we wouldn’t just stop, that we would do whatever we could, even if it meant working on new projects. We have to be innovative, there are so many challenges, but we’re happy to face them. We continue to think things over and adapt.

2/ What kind of online organisation have you set up?

Every two weeks, we set up “Kawas” of Café conferences that are normally held in a café in Rouen. The events involve three professionals who discuss a problem in front of about thirty participants. We managed to convert this to an online format very quickly and the small numbers mean participants  can easily ask questions. We opened three breakout rooms on Zoom with the speakers moving from one group to another. The format worked very well. But we’ll revert to a face-to-face format as soon as we can.

3/ Has having to do everything online opened up new perspectives?

We would like to organise a European hackathon on the theme of sport: The European Sport Innovation (ESI). This is a joint 2020-2021 Déclic Entreprendre-Sports Office project . It would be interesting to hold this online for a first event. The logistics are easier to manage remotely. We are discussing this with YES (Young Entrepreneurship Society).

4/ What have you had to cancel or postpone ?

The Startup Safary since the idea is to visit an eco-system, in  a city in France, in Paris, abroad. Paris has been postponed until February. We are waiting to be able to travel in Europe.  The Open Innovation Game too, which cannot be held in remote format as it’s an entrepreneurial challenge between engineering and business school students,. It had already been put off until December and is now scheduled for mid-March.

5/ What have you learned from this experience?

You develop different skills, such as online event management or communication. You have to know how to stand out: there are so many online events. We miss the human contact, of course, but generally everything has gone well.

Thanks to 

Yoann le Nan, President

Chaïmaa Benallal Akhdar, Vice-President

Kenza Dos Santos, Vice-President

Margot Cottebrune, Vice-President