Stories

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This blog is a story about a public servant who was never supposed to be an entrepreneur but nowadays tries to grow entrepreneurship as an entrepreneur in the small Kemi-Tornio area.

MY CHILD MY COMPANY

I own a company called iLme innorooms. ILme is a Finnish word which means “looks”. ILme innorooms is an innovative office which is focused in doing ExperiencePath. Okay, first question is: what is ExperiencePath?  ExperiencePath is a product what brings a company alive. You can feel, see, smell and hear what the business company is. Customers can feel that they are part of the company and relay their experience to others. Companies look different and they know what their competitiveness is. But as much I love to tell about my company i have to change to topic.

I started my own company 2,5 years ago. Before that I was a kind of a public servant. I worked as a coordinator for creative industries in Kemi-Tornio regional development agency.  My job was to make sure the ground fruity for the culture person and creative business so they could grow their business on our industrial area. I helped entrepreneurs and associations to develop their business fields. I also collected new ideas from different ways and I tried to write application for new projects what would make our region more attractive and easier to work there.

Ok. When you are trying to collect five different municipalities functions together it isn’t the fastest way to get results, or what do you think? Imagine a person who has short temperament doing a job which results starts to appear after a few years. For how long can somebody do it? Regional development is very important job to do, but I couldn’t do it.

3 years ago I was in situation that I decided to develop our region in a different way. I wanted to help little companies with their business growth by helping them to differentiate themselves.  I wanted to spread “new way of thinking” to companies in the northern area. I thought that is not a problem if the customer and co-workers feels their time pleasant in the companies. So I decided that I could help more our small region by doing development work as an entrepreneur. I gave birth to my own company.

YOUNG INNOVATIVE ENTREPRENEURS

I am very thankful that I got opportunity to work in Kemi-Tornio regional development agency. I could create there so good networks when I needed help for starting my own business. This isn’t obvious even long term companies. That´s why it is very important that there is like YIE projects which can help new companies during their startups to find necessary contacts.

Yes, I said I had good networks when I started my company. Yes, to the public authorities - but not the customers. I didn’t have a single one customer when I started my company.

That’s why we need these projects. For example YIE project has helped me to connect with other entrepreneurs so now I got two potential companies to do co-operation. They both are from Finland, but this is only the beginning.  Maybe next contact might be from Norway, Sweden or Russia?

These kind of projects also helps us entrepreneurs to look wider. It is refreshing to see the change in my attitude with these projects. When I started my own business, I was thinking how frightening is to do international business even with Swedish. This YIE project helped me to see that there is a same kind of persons who are the same situation like me. Now it is just a matter of time when iLme is doing international business.

MORTEN BRUGÅRDS CHILE CASE

As I mentioned, YIE project has so many goals where to help us. We tiny entrepreneurs, who have so much knowledge but can’t make the money of it yet, need all help that we can get. Mortens´ Chile case sounds the right way of growing new innovative ideas and giving these creative persons opportunities to getting real their dreams.

I think there is need to use so much more creativity with writing and making these projects. There has to be an innovative way and creative things to implement these projects that people want to be part of it. And the only carrot isn’t always the money. With fresh ideas people get enthusiastic and want to be a part of collaboration.

OH, I FORGOT LOCAL POINT OF VIEW

When I graduated from Tornio as an artist, I moved to south for a few years. I wasn’t thinking that I was coming back. This industrial region seem too clumsy for me, but after I started to hear rumors that IKEA was coming to Haparanda, all of sudden my negative thinking changed to positive thinking. My home town could maybe offer me something. People need positive examples, and giant IKEA with effective working methods was that for me.  So now I’m growing my business in a small area so maybe I can be that positive example for someone someday J

A very small entrepreneur with big thoughts (and bad English)

Elina Stoor

iLme innorooms Ltd.