Jonathan Akass

Connector, Entrepreneur, Idea generator, Social entrepreneur, Student

I graduated from the University of Southampton with 2:1 honours BSc in Economics and Finance in summer 2012. For the academic year 2012-2013 I will be continuing at the University as a postgraduate in the MSc programme ‘Strategic Entrepreneurship.’ I am the Commercial Vice President for Enactus Southampton, formerly known as SIFE Southampton. Enactus is an organisation that gets students to build social enterprises to empower people in need. In my role I oversee three separate businesses that generated over £15,000 profit in the 2011-2012 academic year to fund our social projects. I have put in to action a strategy to increase this figure, and we are well on target. I was part of Enactus during my time as an undergraduate and have previously been on the committee as a social project leader and the sponsorship executive. With Enactus I have been part of the presentation set up and was part of the team that won the 2011 and 2012 national competitions along with many other awards and honours. This gave me the opportunity to go to both Malaysia and Washington D.C to represent the UK in the Enactus World Cup against around 40 other nations. For the competitions, teams are judged on their projects by business leaders after a presentation and scores are given to each team. We placed in the top 8 at the 2012 World Cup, the highest ever position by a team from the United Kingdom. I will be holding the first TEDx event held at my University in early 2013, and have been approved the licence. I spent the summer break creating a team to help deliver the event which includes senior members of the University as well as fellow students who are passionate about TED. As an undergraduate I was invited to be a founding ambassador for World Merit* and I have been working on it over the past several months. It is an organisation that looks to inspire future leaders to create a positive impact on society. It is created by the Smaller Earth foundation and is partnering with some of the largest organisations from around the World. I have secured several internships and placements during my Undergraduate studies. This includes working for the CFO of Brinks US as a market researcher and for a Smartphone application looking at reviving high streets in Britain. Other placements have also been secured, such as at Entrepreneur First, a McKinsey start up, and for Media Citizens in association with Mazars. I spend my free time attending trips and events. Some highlights include a World Challenge expedition to Costa Rica, talks and conferences including the Emerge Conference, INTERREG,TEDx events, Economic conferences at the Lloyds building London, London Business school events and Vince Cable, Calvin Mackenzie and Richard Dawkins talks and debates among many others. This has been done whilst working part time and temporary jobs, which I have had during term and holidays, and being involved in a variety of sports and activities such as Sky diving, squash, football and skiing.

I was introduced to TED by a friend whilst in a society during my time as an undergraduate. I was browsing through one day and noticed that there was an event in Portsmouth so I immediately told some of my friends and we all bought tickets. My friend even started talking to the organizer about a solar lamp micro finance project that he was running and ended up speaking at the event himself. I enjoyed the event and were inspired by one of the talks which outlined how with each hour that passes, you are less and less likely to act on an idea so I applied for a TEDx licence that night! Since then it has been almost a year to get the event together and along with other keen TED fans at the University, have built the event in to a reality that will be held in mid March!