Asia Pacific Youth to Business Forum 2014: Youth Leaders That Really Mean Business!

Wazzup Pilipinas!

The youth that you see dancing to a few popular music beats is our future entrepreneurs and businessmen who will soon lead and make up our economy. They are our future business and thought leaders that will soon shape the world.

Just like their previous International Youth Leaders Conference (IYLC) 2014 event a few days ago, the Asia Pacific Youth to Business Forum (APY2B) 2014 organized by AIESEC started off with the traditional series of dance moves where these young leaders showed off some of their awesome moves with very little inhibitions and a lot of motivation because they are after all among their peers.

Your friendly neighborhood pambansang blogger was ecstatic witnessing an amazing spectacle of how alive our youth are, or this particular group of youth leaders under AIESEC - an organization that is focused on providing a platform for youth leadership development which offers young people the opportunity to participate in international internships, experience leadership and participate in a global learning environment.

AIESEC is run by young people for young people, enabling a strong experience to all its stakeholders. You can really feel the energy among them, and what was more wonderful is the fact that these crowd is made up of both local and foreign delegates making it a global event.

The Asia Pacific Youth to Business Forum is an activity that is aimed to provide young people with the chance to contribute to the world's biggest chalenges and demonstarte what youth leadership can do to push the world forward. The youth leaders are able to engage with some of the brightest minds from around the world. The event aims to generate ideas and turn them into action integrated with value-based leadership.

With outstanding guest panelists like Jonathan Yabut, Kol Preap, Amor Maclang, Penh Huynh and Nelson Mendoza sharing their experience and thoughts on leadership, the forum was very informative and filled with realizations that the attendees can use as their guide as they eventually join the community of business leaders.

Amor Maclang, co-founder of Geiser Maclang Marketing Communications Inc., acted as the panel moderator after sharing information about her company and their alignment with advocacy movements geared for disaster-affected areas like Tacloban and conflict-saturated areas of Mindanao like Zamboanga who recently just rose from the siege and on its way to a building back a better Asia's Latin City.

Pen Huynh, the Chief Financial Officer of Bacardi  Southeast Asia revealed her transition from being a girl with vices to finally an authority figure in the corporate world. I am one of those that were not addicted to vices like smoking and drinking alcoholic beverages but I have my share of vices in collecting comic books and sci-fi and animated movies.

Jonathan Yabut, Apprentice Asia season 1 reality show winner and now Air Asia Chief of Staff of business mogul Tony Fernandez, shared how his "grit" turned him into someone great. He taught us how to channel our street smarts to becoming a great leader. With the quote pertaining to youth as a perishable talent, it made me realize that I should have achieved the most success I could possibly have while I was still young.

 

 
Kol Preap, the Executive Director of Transparency International Cambodia, highlighted how corruption is prominent among our leaders, and encourages everyone to stray away from greed. He has enumerated the impacts of corruption in businesses like promoting unfair competition, scaring away good and long-term investors, and attracting bad companies for rent seeking.

Nelson Mendoza, Founder of Bless Microfinance Corporation, shared his admiration towards her daughter who is very well-motivated doing advocacy programs because of the AIESEC organization. He has elaborated how his company has been helping small businesses who couldn't normally get a loan from the big banks and other financial institutions.

The afternoon was mostly spent with the delegates being divided into three groups and attending separate talks focusing on different topics.

I attended the session where a second set of panelist composed of Anna Oposa, curator of Manila Hub Global Shapers Community of the World Economic Forum; Chely Esguerra, Managing Director of ChannelGood and co-founder of Girl Matter; and Quyen Nguyen, intern at ADB and an AIESEC Alumna discussed about women empowerment.

More photos of the event soon at the Wazzup Pilipinas Facebook Fan Page: https://www.facebook.com/wazzuppilipinas

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