Youth Entrepreneurship Symposium

Went to YES09 on Wed and Thurs.. Finally its over!! It is a very tiring symposium.



Day 1:
Super inefficient registration
Ice-breaking games
A few interesting talks and some other boring ones
A discussion forum
industry visit (to talentpreneur hub and the hive)

We found out we need to have a presentation of our business plan on Day 2, thus my team (which is me and ruiying ONLY, instead of 4 people) decided to stay back after Day 1 to at least plan the structure of the powerpoint slides. We stayed till 9 plus 10 when the event ended at 1830.

Day 2:
Apparently, i was lucky enough to have 2 more members escaping from the symposium they left 2 lonely souls (me and ruiying AGAIN) in the team to compete with 6-members teams in the YES CHALLENGE.

Ruiying was new to business plan writing so the pressure was very much on me. Quite miraculously, we came out with our presentation with 2 hours! wow wow wow.. we are good but obviously, not good enough to get through to the finals. The judges commented that our ideas are good but need more statistics, our slides are also better than the team before us, but we still lost to the last team who has much more pictures than us. They got through to the finale but were bested by other teams.

Interesting Things that happened:

Christopher's team won the 3rd prize and he won an individual prize as the most outspoken participant. The two of us had some catching up with each other during the meals.

MingHan's team won the 2nd prize, brought glory to our club =D

I made a few friends from NYJC, ACJC and another one from VJC


I met a few people that i lo0k up to:


Mr Kelvin Lim: At 36, Kelvin is the only Master Certified Coach in S.E.A and 1 of 4 in the whole of Asia. Within 2 years, he single-handedly produced 12 internationally certified coaches recognized by the International Coach Federation based in the USA.





Ms Adeline Tan: She is an evangelist in SMU, one of the advisors of the YES09 team and also one of the judges in the YES CHALLENGE. She is a very friendly lady who is very approachable. I sought for her advice when i met her along the hallway. She even handed me a namecard and tells me to contact her whenever i require advice beyond this event.




Mr Soon Loo One of the kick-ass speakers, lecturer of SMU, adviser and judge of the YES09 Team. he is super eloquent. Shortly after he graduated (from HARVARD), he worked with 2 schoolmates and raised US$38M, starting an IT venture in Silicon Valley. He later became the one of the youngest Vice President in the regional office of AXA Japan & Asia Pacific. And finally, joined the adjunct faculty in SMU and has his own coaching company.




At 21, Eileen raised a total sum of S$150k within 7 weeks and in less than 2 months, set up a well-received fashion brand and business that operates out of the trendy Haji Lane.

Eric, at only 26, has achieved such phenomenal progress in his career that he featured in The Straits Times as Singapore’s 25 Top Alternate Achievers (2006), and Top 25 Young Entrepreneurs of Asia, Business Week 2007.




Their surname is FENG! They are brother and sister! This is sooo sweet! i attended a talk by Eric and Eileen was there too. He was saying he knows a girl who earned S$150k in 7 wks and he pointed at Eileen, "there she is, and she is my sister." the whole seminar room was taken aback. Whatever blood is flowing inside their body, i want it too! both are freaking successful! !$@%#^$%!@%!%@







And coincidentally, Mr Soon, Mr Lim, Eric and Eileen are all under a coaching company called "live a mark". I reckoned that Mr Soon roped all of them in since they knew each other beforehand. so the coincidence is not that true after all.

And finally, the speaker of the 1st positioned team was the best participant i know of, in the symposium. He is like another Darren who just keeps going on and on and on so fluently without any awkward pauses or words. His presentation is the only time that the whole conference hall was actually listening attentively to. And when Louise said someone is like a successor of Darren, he is definitely good. Currently the two of them are the only youths that i really salute to in terms of their presentation skills. No joke. Ask my seniors in HYSS entrepreneur club. Darren is GOOOOD. They have a bright future ahead.