Poland Day in Silicon Valley

On Thursday I’ve attended a ‘Poland Day’ in Stanford, organised by US-Polish Trade Council. It was a big deal for me. Here’s why:

Poland Day

1) I left Poland as soon as I could, 2 days after my final high school exams I bought myself a one-way ticket… There used to be a lot of talk about all those young people leaving, being selfish and not caring about the country. I really didn’t care what politicians, economists and journalists had to say about it. Poland could not offer me life and career I wanted at that time. I does not mean that I didn’t care. I still have family and friends in Poland and I care about them a lot, I want life to be better for them. I contribute to Polish economy by brining money into the country and whenever I have a choice to buy something locally in Poland or not – I’ll buy it there. I wish I could start a cross-border business, but the bureaucracy scares me away. However, whenever I come across a Polish entrepreneur, I always try to help. So it was great to be part of a group of Polish expats, with similar stories, all wanting to help.

2) Few years ago I started noticing how entrepreneurial Poland has become and how many startup accelerators were popping up around Poland to support ever-increasing demand from startups. At that time, I was in Dreamstake, running an accelerator for London startups. We organised a Startup Weekend, followed by a Global Startup Battle, where I’ve met Polish representation with really great startups. I even joined one of them as an ambassador (My Guidie, it was ran by an amazing Ola Sitarska and closed down a year later). That’s where I met Piotr Wilam, who’s running an incubator and accelerator Innovation Nest in Krakow. Piotr is one of the very few Polish entrepreneurs who’s run multiple startups, which went on to be extremely successful (including the biggest Polish news portal Onet). We don’t get many serial entrepreneurs in the digital space. Piotr is using his skills and experience to help other startups achieve the same – and again, with great success. I keep hearing about his portfolio startups around the world. Certainly: the world is their oyster, no limits.  It was a great pleasure to catch up with Piotr and hear how well all those guys are doing.

3) I was just amazed how much US-Polish Trade Council is doing for Poland. They have a co-working space for startups setting themselves up in Silicon Valley or just visiting. But what is most important is the support they provide to Polish academics. They run ‘Top 500 Innovators’ programme in Stanford, which brings Polish professors and academic staff to Stanford for couple of weeks. Why is it so important? Well, universities around the world engage in knowledge and technology transfer. What it means is that once they do their own research, they write academic paper to literally transfer the knowledge they possess to anyone who would read it. Similar ‘transfer’ occurs with technology. If through research, they come across a new technology process or product, they are able to patent it creating intellectual property. It can transferred to anyone (individual, organisation) by sharing the details of the patent in return for a licencing fee. This is an important source of income for most of universities around the world. However, not so much in Poland, as Polish universities are publicly funded and as a result there is not much pressure for their academics to innovate and create income for their university. Bringing Polish academics to Stanford and inspiring them to action by showing how the process works in US, is creating a ripple effect. After few weeks in US, they return to Poland and not only change their own actions but also educate their colleagues. So far 320 academics have been trained in Stanford. How incredible this approach is! Instead of changing policies and hoping for the best, this creates a real bottom-up impact.

 

There are few more reasons why Poland Day was such a great day for me, but I will share them as they become a public knowledge. Well done to the USPTC team for running such a great initiative. I am now inspired to get involved in similar activities in UK and if you are a Polish startup and coming to London – Holla at me and I’ll try to help you succeed!

 

Entrepreneurs underestimating the value of education?

I am always shocked how many entrepreneurs underestimate the value of education. Many genuinely have talent and such a good idea that they just have to abandon studying and pursue it – and that’s fine. But there are others that clearly despise those in higher education and I truly do not understand why. I often hear it is a waste of time. Really?

My own case couldn’t be different. Quite frankly, during my 2 years of MSc in Business Innovation I have learnt so much that I can compare it to 5 years of learning on the job. During the final year I had to mostly focus on my own research and I read so many books and papers that I feel like I have leapfrogged a major part of my own self-development. I just find it mind-blowing that for most questions you have, someone out there has done their research into it and has got answers ready for you. You just need to find them.

Some will argue with me that modern degrees are outdated and there’s nothing you can learn that can be applied to today’s entrepreneurial world. That’s also wrong. Academic research helped me actually understand better how the whole innovation ecosystem works. One day for instance, I have learnt about Absorptive Capacity. In simple words: it has been proven that the more you know and experienced, the easier it gets to do new things. Seems obvious, right? But that also explains why so many copy-cat startups fail or will never become as good as the original. The original team has got a superior absorptive capacity – the sum of their experiences, their knowledge, approach to business, all of which combined is very unique and almost impossible to recreate. The copycat business has only got an idea, without the same DNA of the team, it will never create the same business.

Alright, that’s it for today’s banter. I look forward to you thoughts on this topic!