Voices of Leadership: Insights and Inspirations from Women Leaders

Cultivating an Entrepreneurial Spirit: Camelia Nunez on Curiosity, Innovation, Continuous Education and the Future of Work

• Bespoke Projects • Season 1 • Episode 18

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In today's episode, we talk with Camelia Nunez, a self-proclaimed "profpreneur" who blends her entrepreneurial spirit with a deep passion for education.

We talk about why she believes building a culture of curiosity and continuous learning around education is important and how it will affect how we live, learn and work. 

Camelia shares her experiences growing up in Romania, witnessing life before and after the revolution, and moving to Canada as a teenager to complete her education.

Starting her career as a Spanish professor, Camelia's entrepreneurial drive led her to co-found an EdTech startup. With over 17 years in higher education, she has held roles in teaching, administrative leadership, research partnerships, innovation, entrepreneurship, and operations at Wilfrid Laurier University, University of Waterloo and now Conestoga College.

Camelia emphasizes the importance of continuous learning and adapting to a rapidly evolving workforce. We discuss innovative solutions like yearly membership fees for education to maintain relevant skills and challenge the outdated concept of a fixed career path.

We talk about all kinds of entrepreneurs, but Camelia highlights the resilience and persistence of non-tech entrepreneurs and how those traits are significant in achieving long-term success.

Camelia shares insights on inspiring youth to develop an entrepreneurial mindset, offering real-life examples of creativity sparked by personal pain points.

Connect with Camelia
LinkedIn

Resources
Conestoga College
Play-a-Latte
Youth Creativity Fund

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Camelia:

The future work is all about flexibility, in my opinion, and curiosity, right, knowing what you're curious about, because sometimes that's hard, like what am I interested in, what am I curious about? And just kind of following that is more important than ever. To summarize it, it really just means you know, being curious, looking for opportunities and taking action.

Amy:

Welcome to Voices of Leadership, the podcast that shines a spotlight on the remarkable women of the International Women's Forum. I'm your host, Amy, and I'm inviting you on a journey through the minds of trailblazers. Each episode is a candid conversation with women leaders who are reshaping industries, defying norms and being instigators of change. Through these conversations, we aim to ignite a fire of inspiration within you, whether you're a budding leader, a seasoned executive or simply someone with a passion for growth. Today, we welcome Camilia Nunez, a self-proclaimed profpreneur who is an entrepreneur at heart, with a deep passion for education.

Amy:

Camilia is currently a professor and program coordinator of entrepreneurship and innovation at Conestoga College. Camelia shares her immigration experience, having moved from Romania to Canada as a teenager, and she talks to us about what it's like to raise first-generation Canadians as immigrant parents and the unique perspectives and experiences that come with it. As a prominent advocate for education, Camelia talks about the importance of fostering a culture of curiosity and continuous learning, and how it impacts the way we live, learn and work. Hi, Camelia, Hi Welcome. Thank you, I'm so excited you're here. Me too. This is our second conversation because we spent 20 minutes catching up before we started.

Camelia:

Yeah, I wouldn't have it any other way. No, you. And.

Amy:

I know each other quite well. Our kids have gone to school together, but you and I can have a conversation about trying to fix education. How do we make entrepreneurship better for younger people all day long?

Camelia:

Yes, we can, and it's always so much fun. So I love being on the podcast, but also just seeing you, so thanks for having me.

Amy:

So you are fairly new to IWF. Why don't you tell us how you got involved?

Camelia:

Yeah, I'm actually very new. I just joined in December the Waterloo chapter and a bunch of women that I admire, you know, I've been noticing on LinkedIn. They were talking about, you know, the IWF and I was like what is this thing? So I just kind of looked into it and then I found out you were on it. So, hey, that was my final cue to join. So finally I joined and now I get to spend even more time with you.

Amy:

That's fantastic, and you came to the Christmas event, which was fun, and you knew more people than I think you thought right.

Camelia:

Yeah, that was weird. Yes, it was great, it was a lot of fun. I didn't know what to expect going there and then, you know, I went in there and a lot of people I knew were there, so it was great. It was nice to catch up and have some good conversation wine, you know Always.

Amy:

Great time, that's right. So you and I have talked about this a little bit, but I always love hearing you talk about it. Can you tell us what it's like to leave Romania as a child and what it felt like coming to Canada?

Camelia:

Yeah, I mean honestly, I think my immigration story is a little bit different, because I really love Canada I came here to visit at 16. So anyway, just a bit of a background story. My dad left Romania in the late 80s, so about 87, 88. And then my mom and I were supposed to follow him here. But in 89, there was a revolution in Romania which dethroned the communist government. So you know, we became a democratic country just like that. And anyway, all that A long story, short to say that my mom decided that she doesn't want to move to Canada anymore because we now live in a democratic country.

Camelia:

So I didn't end up moving here until 10 years later, but I think some, somehow my mom must have known in the back of her head that I would one day end up here, because as soon as we were allowed to learn another language other than Russian, she put me in private English classes. So my whole childhood I studied English. So when I first came to visit my dad at 16, which was 10 years later roughly I spoke really good English. So it wasn't very hard for me to make friends here, you know, get, get into the Canadian vibe, and I decided that I was going to come here, finish high school and go to university and then see what happens.

Camelia:

I came here and I was very proud of myself because I didn't go to ESL when I joined grade 11. Sorry, it was grade 12 when I when I joined, but back then we did OAC also, so I did two years of high school here, but anyway I didn't get to go to ESL. So I felt so proud of myself, um, until I realized that it was actually harder. I was like, oh no, I'm in these classes with all these Canadian kids and I have this accent and they're looking at me like I'm from another planet, uh, so, anyway it was. It came with challenges, uh, but I think I generally had a good attitude towards it and, um, yeah, I mean, I don't regret it. I love being Canadian now and living here. It's the best decision I've made, I'd say.

Amy:

I love your story. I love the idea that I know somebody that actually lived in a communist country and when you talk about it, it's still such a foreign thing to me about waiting for bread and not being able to learn a language, and it's foreign to me.

Camelia:

It is. It is crazy. I mean, yeah, like just some, some stories. Mind you, like I said, I would have been in grade two when the revolution happened, so I was very young. But I do remember that you know my parents, everything was portioned. So you know you could only get, let's say, I don't know, I don't remember exactly, but like, say, one kilo of sugar per month per family. Milk was only available on certain days. I remember my, my dad, he wouldn't get up super early, like I'm talking 430 in the morning to go line up to get milk, because if you weren't there early enough and they ran out too bad kind of thing.

Camelia:

So yeah, it's wild, it's really wild when I think about it now. But it's weird because in my childhood I never like felt deprived, I don't know I because it was just how it was. Yeah, it's almost surreal to me too when I think and I tell my kids these stories and they think I'm joking or they think I'm telling them some sort of you know made up thing. But I do have to say that in my son he decided that in grade 11, his history project was on Romania and communism and he actually started digging into it himself and doing his research. And then I'm never going to forget this because he came. He's like mom. There's so many people on YouTube saying all these stories that you've been telling me they must be true. And I'm like did you think?

Amy:

I was lying to you. What?

Camelia:

goes to show that the parents, whatever we say, is not good enough.

Amy:

Well, if it's on YouTube, it must be true.

Camelia:

I'm glad I had YouTube to validate my story.

Amy:

Well, on that, you do have three lovely children, but what has your experience been like as an immigrant parenting kids in Canada?

Camelia:

Oh man, yeah, that's a. That's an interesting one and I think that's pretty similar across cultures. For immigrant parents, the rules, the Canadian parenting rules, are super lax. When I heard some of my Canadian friends telling their kids that they have choices you can do this or you can do this, and for me it's like no, you can do what I say, you can do so anyway. And this is kind of across cultures and you don't really question your parents so much and you're not.

Camelia:

Like you know, if my mom said to do something, I just do it, whether I liked it or not. Like you know, we're not negotiating that. I have to do the dishes or now. So anyway, it's hard. It's been hard on the discipline aspect of it, because you know they go to school and they see different, different styles and they're like Mom, but Tonto can't do, can do all these things. Why can't I do these things? And I'm like well, no, because it's a rule you know. So, like we don't do that, they're like why? It's like, why You're Canadian, we don't need to follow Romanian rules or whatever. And I'm like these are not Romanian rules, these are just the way, you know, no-transcript. It's like well, what do I drop from?

Amy:

our celebration.

Camelia:

Like I, can't celebrate everything. You know we can't do all these things. So you know it can be, it can be interesting from that point of view, but I say this all the time like Canada has so many opportunities for all the different immigrants that we have here. Like you can have a church or a mosque or you know in your own language and a club where you can celebrate your own things. But at the same time, I'm really keen on just opening your mind to all other things while you're here. You know you're not, we're not in Romania, we're not in Brazil, we're, we're in Canada and Canada is multicultural. So just kind of embracing different things is cool.

Amy:

Well, I love all of that. This podcast is for entrepreneurs and women and mostly adults, but I think maybe the kids should listen to it and they might appreciate that we're not the strictest parents on earth.

Camelia:

Yes, I think so. They should. You know what? One day, if they become parents, they'll appreciate how cool we were.

Amy:

So I'd like to talk a little bit about what you're doing now. You have been many, many things from a professor to an educator, to an entrepreneur but you are currently at Conestoga College, so how about you tell us about your role there?

Camelia:

I mean, I love my job. It's uh, it's so, it's so great. Um, I've always been an educator at heart. I've most of the work that I've done has been an education. Um, I wanted to be a Spanish prof. Well, that's what I started off doing.

Camelia:

And then, while I was doing that, I realized that there was a business opportunity to take the Spanish sort of teaching to a new level through technology. So, with a couple of co-founders, we started EdTech Startup, you would call it right. So it was an online platform to provide on-demand opportunities for people learning Spanish to practice, because that's one of the biggest reasons why people are not successful Well, not people, but more adults are not successful at learning another language. So we thought, hey, using, you know, ai, machine learning which I don't know much about, but my co-founder did why don't we create this platform to help people who want to learn Spanish, starting with Spanish? But then, you know, the idea was to expand to other languages. So I moved from my PhD in linguistics to doing that. I became, you know, full time CEO of an ed tech startup and just kind of embarked on this entrepreneurial journey and that sort of opened my mind to a whole world of different things right. So through that I met a lot of really cool people, other entrepreneurs, just people in the entrepreneurship space that have really shaped my career in one way or another. And yes, and then from there I moved on to working in a startup incubator and just spend a big chunk of my future years in just the entrepreneurship world. The startup didn't work out in the way we hope we were going to bring it forward but, like I said, it had opened doors for many new opportunities for me, which I took, and it's been amazing. So I just sort of build this relationship entrepreneurial career, always with a focus on education.

Camelia:

Later on, I started another business, which was a summer exchange program for international high school students in Canada. So I always kind of had an entrepreneurial gig on the side, along with other things that I've been doing. So anyway, all of this to just give a bit of background of how I ended up at Conestoga last year and why I think it's amazing and I love my job because that's what I started with. So, anyway, conestoga launched a new program called Entrepreneurship and Innovation. It's a postgraduate program, so when I saw the prof opportunity posted, I thought this is it. This is the job. That kind of encompasses all the things that I've done with my love for education and teaching.

Camelia:

And there's a lot of international students at Conestoga, as you know. So that entire sort of angle that I always appreciate, you know, exposure to new cultures, new people, was also in there. So it just felt like it couldn't have been more perfect. So I'm just getting started an opportunity to do so many more things. So the program is now going to be open to domestic students. So eight months opportunity to kind of immerse yourself in entrepreneurship and learn about, you know, managing, innovation and things like that. So it's suitable. It's not an undergraduate program, so it's suitable for people who are at a crossroads in their career, want to kind of inject some innovation, entrepreneurship in their lives and their professional lives. So I'm looking forward to having some domestic students in the program and mix in with the international students and have that awesome like exchange between between ideas, between perspectives. So I'm really excited about that component.

Amy:

It sounds like a great program and Conestoga College is starting to do a lot of these post-grad programs. Now somebody asked me this the other day and I didn't know. The answer Is an undergraduate degree required to take the post-graduate programs at Conestoga.

Camelia:

College? No, it's not. You know, we have people coming from different fields. Some people have a master's degree, some people just have an undergrad, others have a college degree or just a lot of work experience have a college degree or just a lot of work experience. It's really a mix of things, which I think makes it the more enriching, because, you know, it's never a good thing when everybody thinks the same in an entrepreneurship program. Correct, yes, so you want to have that variety of things.

Amy:

And so the program is fairly new. What, in your vision, would be next for the program, or how would you expand or enhance it?

Camelia:

Now that it's one year old, that's the next step, Like actually we can bring in domestic students and expand to other campuses. Yeah as you know, conestoga has, I think we're at eight different campuses in a bunch of different cities. So I think that one of the next campuses that it's going to be offered at is in Brantford and then maybe having sort of a joint front with, you know, all these different campuses like a showcase or something. That'd be cool. Oh, I like that.

Amy:

I like the sound of that. So, now that you are at the forefront of what's next in education, what are your thoughts on education in the future of work?

Camelia:

Oh man, this is a complex one. I mean, people talk about it a lot and sometimes, you know, when you talk so much about something, it can become overwhelming. And to me, I don't know, it's about flexibility, it's about just staying open to opportunities. And I don't know, I've always kind of led my career from a curiosity perspective, like if something felt interesting, I would, you know, explore it, even though maybe it wasn't aligned with my undergrad, or like I mean, I have an undergrad in Spanish and Latin American studies. So you know, I think that, more than ever though that is going to be the case, I don't think it's. Obviously you're going to need a foundation of you know, skill and knowledge, and but that's, you know, that's something that you're constantly going to have to work on, improve, adapt. You know, change. So you know, the fact that you you finished an undergraduate degree in four years doesn't really guarantee that what you learn is going to be relevant. You know, four or five years down the road. So you know, I think that both education and the future of work kind of need to change at the same time. You know, four or five years down the road, so you know, I think, that both education and the future of work kind of need to change at the same time. You know there's there's people out there who may be considered crazy at this point, but you know the idea of, you know, instead of this whole four year undergrad, what about kind of like, instead of like a four year sort of university tuition, what about like a yearly sort of membership fee to university, to continuous learning, kind of thing, right? So these are some of the interesting conversations that I'm hearing. So you know, like, how do we decide that? You know, after four years we're done, we're ready to go into the workforce. So you know, I think that needs to adapt from an education perspective and from a workforce perspective. I think it's going to need to be a lot more supportive towards continuous learning.

Camelia:

Like I said, people that are maybe at a crossroads, maybe you know their jobs are not needed anymore because we all talk about automation and all these things, right. So maybe those, maybe those people should be supported in going back to school, finding, finding a new way of doing things. So I think the future work is all about flexibility, in my opinion, and curiosity, right, knowing what you're curious about, because sometimes that's hard. Like, what am I interested in, what am I curious about and just kind of following. That is more important than than ever. That also requires kind of staying up to date with what's going on out there and just not getting comfortable. I think it's really important because this whole you know, I have a job for life is less and less of a thing. So really the future of work is being curious, being flexible and, you know, not falling behind of what's going on out there.

Camelia:

You know, I don't think we have the luxury of just letting the institutions figure out our career path kind of thing which before used to be a lot more common. Right, you'd work for a big organization, there was a clear career path. If you did X, you would make it to Z and so on and so forth. Now not so much. Now the onus is on us as individuals and sometimes people can see that as daunting. I see it as exciting. I mean, you know, no corporations will tell me what to do. I know by what I think is interesting, but it's kind of cool, like sometimes it can be scary, I agree, but I think that it's a time of opportunity and it's a matter of putting yourself out there and just having an open mind towards work and the future of work.

Amy:

Well, I love all of that, and I will tell you that the theme of we will not have one job for 40 years has occurred a few times on this podcast so far. So, yes, it's a reality that we'll have many different jobs, which I also see as fantastic, and I am a curious person and a lifelong learner. The membership ideas intrigued me because going back is hard. If you leave for a long time and you want to go back for whatever reason, that's a difficult and daunting task. But if you did a little bit along the way, then you would just be able to say I like that course, in that course, I would be all in for that.

Camelia:

Then you would just be able to say I like that course and that course, I would be all in for that. Yeah, for sure. I mean, I don't know how, like how, did we decide that? You know, four years, you're ready to go? I mean, I'm definitely all for a foundation, like we all need a foundation to build on, but you know, why not have a more kind of open door education system? I don't even know if that's the right way to say, but anyway, I was going to say you're a great example of a lead by curiosity career. You went from history to car dealerships. To look at you now doing all these podcasts and learning new things, it's awesome.

Amy:

Yes, I was going to relate to your comment because my master's is in history, which is nothing, but it is foundational. I agree with you, and I think sometimes we forget that those four years are not just in the classroom learning. There's the adulting that's being learned and the growing up that needs to happen in a safe space, which I think helps as well. But then the continuous learning maybe could be for what you're actually curious about or what you want to do next.

Camelia:

Yes, I think you touched on a key point and I try to convey this to the students all the time. Sometimes it's easy to get wrapped up in the grades and the academics of it and and I get it right Like there's certain average, you need to keep to stay in co-op or you know all kinds of academic requirements, but a lot of the learning actually happens outside of the classroom and that's something that somehow is becoming more and more of a challenge, especially after COVID. You know these personal interactions, I don't know they're changing quite a bit. So I'm hoping that the students kind of get back to working together, getting to know each other, because the power of creation comes from ideas and people talking to each other in person. It's always nice to see that.

Camelia:

I always, I always give this example. I give an assignment in class, you know, and, and then the students. It's a group assignment I assigned to groups and then they automatically connect online, Although we're in the same room, in the same classroom. I'm like seriously, no, let's try, let's try some movement here, get off your seats, find each other in person, but anyway, yeah, it's old school.

Amy:

This could be a course in and of itself.

Camelia:

Now, probably, probably- yes, yes, yeah, it's interesting. I mean, covid has changed the dynamics of communication quite a bit.

Amy:

So on the subject of communication, did I see correctly that you have started teaching Spanish again outside of Conestoga College?

Camelia:

Yes, yes, it's something that I'm doing for fun. Actually, I wanted to teach my daughter Spanish and I thought, you know, it'd be so much more fun if she did it with some other kids. And there's this other boy in the neighborhood who wanted to learn Spanish, and so now I'm tutoring them Spanish, of course, after Jackson.

Amy:

I feel like we started the Camellia Spanish tutoring project.

Camelia:

Yes, that's true, you guys are really awoken bad because, yeah, when you messaged, I was like I think it was Stephen had messaged and he's like, do you know someone that could tutor Jackson? And I was like, oh, should I do this? I don't know if I have time, but I miss my Spanish background, so I decided to do it and, of course, jackson's an awesome kid, so I had a great time, so it was easy to decide okay, I'll continue doing this for fun. And now I'm tutoring my daughter, who's eight, and another boy who is almost six, so I'm having a good time.

Amy:

What a great example, though, of saying I love doing this and I'm just going to do it outside of what I normally do, because it fulfills something inside of me.

Camelia:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's a lot of work sometimes because you know, you're, I'm trying to keep it interesting for them. As you know, sometimes kids, it's hard to keep them engaged and but I have so much fun. I feel, after that one hour with them, I just feel so, I don't know, refueled. This is good. I put in some work, but it's just great, you know, and it's a good time with my daughter. You know, it's a good time to spend together. I think she'll remember it at some point.

Amy:

Well, that just shines through your entrepreneurial spirit and, as we talked about earlier, you've been on both sides of entrepreneurship, from the mentoring to the being the entrepreneur You've been. You've left out your time at Laurier and Waterloo. You've been involved in educational institutions. What do you think is the evolution of startups and the entrepreneurial ecosystem?

Camelia:

entrepreneurial ecosystem. I am proud to say that I have worked at all three post-secondary institutions in Waterloo region and I think we were just talking about this a little bit earlier. It's you know, sometimes we talk a lot about tech entrepreneurship, which is great. I mean, we're fortunate to live in a region where there is a lot of that and we've had a lot of successful case studies and companies that have done really well. I was exposed to a lot of that and we've had a lot of successful case studies and companies that have done really well. I was exposed to a lot of that when I was at UW, even at Laurier, working in the Scale Up program. But now that I'm at Conestoga, I'm seeing the other side of entrepreneurship, which is more, you know, small to medium sized businesses. There's a lot of like manufacturing, medium sized businesses. There's a lot of like manufacturing. There's a lot of different type of businesses that sometimes they don't talk as much about. But I think that is important to remember that, especially for me that I'm teaching, you know, entrepreneurship in the classroom, that entrepreneurship is not just about tech. You can be entrepreneurial in many different ways and there's different types of entrepreneurship. I just kind of want to put it out there that it's not just tech entrepreneurship, even though we talk about that a lot. We also tend to talk a lot about successful entrepreneurship. You know they call it the overnight success kind of thing. You know what I mean. I won't name any names, but when I was working on my startup, I was fortunate enough to be able to have a few conversations with one of the successful entrepreneurs in town and he told me that, you know, he had been working at his company for 10 years it was a tech company for 10 years before anyone even wanted to talk to him. And then all of a sudden, you know everybody wants to talk to you because you know you've got some traction and are demonstrating some success. So I think that you know.

Camelia:

As far as entrepreneurship, I think it's important to think. You know tech is great and I think we can use it to our benefit. I think every type of company needs to adopt tech in one way or the other. But it's not entrepreneurship, it's not just about tech. And you know, success is not an overnight thing, it's not. And sometimes I think that we set the standards a little bit unrealistic for students, because I work with a lot of student entrepreneurs and sometimes they you know the smallest setback, they think it's all over, and I think it's kind of a little bit the narrative that they hear. Right, they're like the Zuckerbergs and the Bezos and it's like, yeah, do you know how, how much time it took for them to get where they got to? And there's also the environment that you're in and all kinds of things. So, anyway, I think that, yeah, that's it's. It's really shifted my perspective on entrepreneurship, having joined Conestoga and kind of seeing the other side of things.

Amy:

You call it a couple of very interesting things the idea that it doesn't happen overnight, and that is unrealistic. I assume that students may get frustrated if it takes more than the six months that they thought. Do you see that sometimes?

Camelia:

Oh, very much so. So that's part of the issue that I'm seeing with students working on business ideas. So the rhetoric around entrepreneurship sometimes doesn't help. Talking about success and successful founders and successful companies along with their sort of immediate gratification expectations, I think it sets unrealistic expectations and then it becomes something that they don't want to pursue. They give up too quickly. You know it's like no, that's not how it goes. This is supposed to be hard, it is supposed to take time and you know you might even fail at it.

Amy:

I can't imagine what ideas could be missed because of that.

Camelia:

Yes, exactly. So I think that that giving up too quickly is never a good thing, and I think that they need to start thinking about. You know what I'm going to gain some learning out of this, no matter what the result is going to be. So I might fail, like, for example, my own startup like I told you, right it was. It didn't really end up going anywhere and I invested about three years of my life into building that, you know. I mean you can call that a failure.

Camelia:

To me, it was the experience that hope opened many different doors to where I am today. I wouldn't have met a lot of the people that you know have influenced me in doing what I'm doing today. So, you know, I think that that it's it's important not to give up on something just because it's hard, and that to understand that, no matter what you end up doing, you will learn from that, and those learnings are are things that you don't know where they're going to take you right. It's like I tell my students all the time it's like you know, you can sit there and plan and plan and plan, but eventually you're going to have to take some action and it's only really through doing things that you're going to get somewhere.

Amy:

That's great advice. Everybody outside of your students should listen to that. The second thing I liked that you talked about was that there are entrepreneurs that are not tech entrepreneurs, and I relate to that. I'm originally a bricks and mortar entrepreneur, so can you tell us some examples of the entrepreneurs you've worked with or seen that are not tech? What industries are they in? What are they working on?

Camelia:

So we just had a guest speaker in one of my classes and he was the founder. A guest speaker in one of my classes and, um, he was the founder. Well, he is the founder of a company called uh, play a latte, uh, which is, which is the you know, I don't know if you heard of it no I haven't, but it sounds yummy.

Camelia:

It's a. It's it's. They have yummy lattes, but it's also a playground. So it's a. It's a combination of a playground and a cafe. So the idea is that when you're a new mom and you kind of want to go somewhere to enjoy yourself, have a latte, and then there is a space where your kids can play safely and someone supervises them and, like, has organized activities for them, and so on and so forth.

Camelia:

I thought that was a really cool idea because this person in particular was also very much involved in sort of the like, the tech entrepreneurship you know, through like velocity and other things. And he spoke about you know how maybe sometimes the expectation are different, but you, him and his wife, ended up creating this business because it was a point in their life where they thought that was a need and they themselves had this need and nobody was fulfilling this need. So they decided to create the spice, and what better way to do something than when you actually understand the pain, because you are actually understanding your target market. So he spoke to my students about that quite a bit and I think that that's that's important to realize that sometimes you know if you have a pain point, and if there's something that you want or you need and you find it's not available, how about you try to create that? I'm involved with the Conestoga Entrepreneurship Collective and they have an award for entrepreneurs that I was just a judge for, and you know one of the students who was a welding student at Conestoga. He wants to kind of take it up a notch and you know I can't talk about his idea too much but, like you know, combine it with some technology and his skill in welding to build a company on his own, and that was all.

Camelia:

I talked to him a little bit just last week at the ceremony and he was saying that, you know, this was all driven by the fact that he doesn't like to work for other people. He doesn't like people telling him what to do and he has very high standards for what he. You know how his work needs to look and and he just kind of wanted to do his own thing. And it's really important to keep in mind that entrepreneurship can come from any, anywhere. For example, at Conestoga, there's another, there's the program in aesthetics, right. Those are also people that are more sort of solopreneurs than anything else, right? So learning some of these entrepreneurial skills and the entrepreneurial mindset is really important in these types of programs as well, so you can be entrepreneurial in really any kind of industry. It's a matter of the mindset that that you are embracing, and I think that's kind of what we're trying to sort of teach and challenge people to do in in the program that I'm in at conestoga. So it's pretty cool, I'm excited those are great examples.

Amy:

I could have used a play latte back in the day for sure.

Camelia:

That's a great idea I know me too right and it's so. So it was very cool because Ronak, he was talking about you know how they came up with the idea and the location and all of that stuff, and I think it really resonated with the students that when you have that problem yourself, you are a step ahead in understanding your customer because you are the customer as well. So I think that that really resonated with the students Because sometimes you know when, when you're you have you notice a gap or something you're, you're not automatically thinking, oh, how do I fix it. It's kind of like how can I find someone that's working on this or can help me fix it? But hey, why not fix it yourself or create something yourself? So it was really cool.

Amy:

Those are all great entrepreneurial lessons you've imparted on us.

Camelia:

Thank you so much.

Amy:

So, on that, I'm going to ask you what is your advice for young entrepreneurs, because I know that that is another passion of yours is working with young entrepreneurs and encouraging them to do things perhaps at a younger age than society expects them to.

Camelia:

I think that, yeah, I love. I mean maybe because I'm also a mom, as we were talking about earlier, and you know I have a young daughter too, and teenage boys and I I think that you know this entrepreneurial mindset is a way of life and a way of living, like we can't afford to not be entrepreneurial in our thinking. So this is this is why I am so passionate about young kids and developing this mindset in them and what that means. People also always ask what does that mean? It doesn't necessarily mean start a business. It just means I mean to summarize it it really just means, you know, being curious, looking for opportunities and taking action. And the reason why I think there's there's a lot of talk around all this and why I also feel very strongly about it, is that we've our kids and and the young kids that I'm working with today have grown up in a pretty comfortable society. So when you're very comfortable, you're not necessarily going to be entrepreneurial because you're kind of thinking that things will work out. You know there will be job opportunities. I don't know, maybe my parents are going to be there, whatever, right and sure, that may all be true, but there will be a point in time where you're going to have to figure things out for yourself, because you know what your parents can help you with or what they know is probably not as relevant to how things are working today, and they're also trying to figure out what's going on. The way that society works, the workforce changes, the technological advancement all of this is impacting how the world operates. So you can't really afford to be comfortable. You need to be entrepreneurial because if you're not curious, if you're not looking for opportunities and if you're not taking action, you're going to fall behind. And if you're not taking action, you're going to fall behind. You're not going to be able to, you know, thrive and have the life you want to have in entrepreneurship. So my advice is you know, be alert.

Camelia:

I always say, be alert to my students and they're looking at me like what does that even mean? You know, like sometimes just a basic thing. Like they I go to, you know, the student area at the college or at UW, when I was there, or at Laurier, anywhere. You know I see there's a cafeteria or there is a student area, you name it whatever and you know most people are on their own with their headphones, on their phones. So to me, that's not being alert. To me it's being in your own head with your own things.

Camelia:

And sure you may be listening to a podcast where I don't know, like you're probably learning something, but the point is that what about all these people around you? Like, just simply looking at what's happening around you, you know like what, what people are doing, what they're wearing, what their interactions look like. You know these are, these are things that, um, that you should be paying attention, attention to like what? How does the world function around me? That's what I mean by being alert. You know what I mean.

Camelia:

So even on the train, like I take the train to go to work, you know it's like nobody pays attention to anyone, no one talks to anyone. I never put my headphones on because I'm just making a point of being alert, following my own advice, but, yeah, like no one talks to you on the train because everyone's just in their own thing and you know how. How are you supposed to exchange ideas and have these conversations if you're not like alert and in your environment? Not even gonna get to my classes, because people wear headphones in the class sometimes and you're like, are you serious right now? Because this is not cool. This is not how you're alert to your environment I have to say I love that being alert.

Amy:

What a great way to explain it and to understand what you're talking about to find opportunities.

Camelia:

I haven't thought of a better word but I know it's great, it's great sometimes I'm like how do I explain that?

Camelia:

but, yeah, I, I mean, I have to say I'm going to put a plug in for the two organizations that I volunteer with. One is Technovation, which helps girls as young as grade 7 all the way to grade 12 learn coding skills and then basically building an app which they learn to commercialize, so through entrepreneurship. And then the BEP, which is the Business Education Partnership. We have a youth creativity fund which supports young kids some as young as grade five, I have to say yeah in taking their ideas or passion project to something more tangible. So you know, there's funding there that the kids can get to work on their ideas. So these are two organizations that I think are doing really great work and I volunteer with. So I had to put a plug in for them because of course they're yeah.

Camelia:

So if you have kids and you're listening to this podcast, check these out. They're really cool organizations to work with.

Amy:

They are, and I think it's great to have a place for young entrepreneurs, an outlet for them to learn and grow, and we will absolutely put those in the show notes so that everybody can have access to them.

Camelia:

Yeah, I think so and, like you were saying earlier, it's important to start training this entrepreneurial mindset earlier, and sometimes when you give the kids a little bit of money, it teaches them some responsibility. And just the fact that they have to put together a budget to request this money and that kind of stuff, right Like we don't normally have that type of financial support at a young age it's, you know, mostly for adults and startups and things like that, but it's, it's been a really neat learning. I've been involved with this youth creativity fund for about a year and it's been really cool to see, you know, the learning curve of these young people, how they are going from. I just have this idea and I want to do something to putting together a budget and thinking through. This is the money that I'm going to need and and anyway, it's just great. I think it's great.

Amy:

Well, I love that. I mean you've just taken us from entrepreneurship at age five all the way up to entrepreneurship, to continuous learning, so you've given us so many things to think about and imparted so much wisdom about it, and what I've taken from it is that you can always be entrepreneurial and there is help and learning at every stage.

Camelia:

Absolutely. I think that you know it's all about learning and, like I said, all about being curious. And if you're curious you're going to want to learn and then you're going to want to do something with that learning, hopefully, and you know entrepreneurship is doing do something, you know, be curious, look into it and then do something.

Amy:

I love that. Thank you so much for joining us. I had so much fun, as we always do when we're talking about big thinking issues.

Camelia:

Yes, it's awesome. It feels like another coffee conversation. That's right so thanks for having me. Hopefully, other people enjoy this as much as we did.

Amy:

Thank you for listening today. If you enjoyed this episode, please take a moment to rate and subscribe to our podcast. When you do this, it raises our podcast profile so more leaders can find us and be inspired by the stories our voices of leadership have to share. If you would like to connect with us, please visit the voices of leadership website. It can be found in our show notes.

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Amy Schlueter

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