"Alice envisions the Future", a mentoring experience to cherish forever.

Let me start with the phrase well highlighted by one of the speakers of “Alice envisions the future” , Alex Glod

"Finding your voice and making yourself heard is a daunting task, but it’s definitely worth fighting for"

The past weekend, 130 girls found their voices and made themselves heard; they came up with ideas that tackle the most stubborn challenges such as environmental, gender quality, health & well-being and educational. Their ideas turned out to technical mockups (really impressive what they did within 48 hours!!); and then they pitched their ideas to an experienced jury committee. The majority of the girls had no prior pitching experience, nevertheless they made it perfectly. We speak about high school Romanian girls (14 -18 years old); Personally speaking, I got inspired of how courageous, mature and self-confident they were.

Let me go back at 2016, where I was first hired by Microsoft Romania to manage the Romanian startup ecosystem. It was again a weekend that I committed myself to go and learn more about startups. Somewhere there, I remember I got captivated by an enthusiastic young entrepreneur, namely Flavia Oprea with a powerful medtech solution (10 times cheaper than the traditional ones). When she pitched to me first time, I said “Man, that’s going to be huge success”, So, I remember emailed her and encouraged her to submit her idea at Microsoft Imagine Cup. Months later, she was in the World Cup Finals and they had as an opponent a Greek Team (where I come from); it’s first time in my life that I supported openly other national team (other than Greek) because I felt so connected with Flavia and the solution and I believed them from the very beginning. They won and they had a dinner with Microsoft’s CEO, Satya Nadella. What an experience for this team. The most important result of this story is that tech industry won a great talent, Flavia

We need more Flavias in tech industry; we need these courageous girls to stand up, speak up and walk us see the world with their eyes. We do not need women in tech just to meet HR metrics for diversity, we need women because they bring another point of view, they see things differently and with more empathy.After this weekend, I promised to myself that I will commit even more weekends and part of my free time to encourage and empower girls to pursue a degree in STEM or/and follow a career in tech industry either as employees or as entrepreneurs.

Main highlight : During a break, I met a colleague of Microsoft, Adrian Marinescu and I thought he was mentor; his badge's description was Accompanying Person (Parent); so his daughter was participating and by the way demonstrating high energy at her group discussions. It was super emotional. By that moment, I thought fast forward how it will be to have my daughter, Maria participating in such an event. Similarly, I witnessed son of Didem who was so passionate to help the girls in his teams. So, I felt so connected that I still have goosebumps when I am thinking about it.

Thanks to Violeta Luca Didem Un Ates  Kostas Loukas for their executive sponsorship and overall leadership #PureInspiration

Thanks to Microsoft regional and local team Dmitry Turchyn Petronela Goel Ana Maria Stanciuc and Denis Chiurtu for the execution.

Thanks to Sorin Peste & Alexandra Ciortea for their great technical support overall. Thanks to the technical advisors Marina Stoian and Ovidiu Pismac to the teams, I was business mentor. Thanks to many other mentors such as Ileana, Catalin, Adelin who were there both days to support and create a meaningful mentorship with the girls.

Special thanks also to Elena Sinel

My 2 cents: Being a volunteer in such an event should not be considered a sacrifice, but rather as an investment to young generations ?? We should all be committed in such inspirational events despite any family emergency. We all have family emergencies, but we should understand that we serve something bigger than our families.