CyberWatcher - the company I am working for

I am working in the company called CyberWatcher since the middle of October. It is the part-time job (15-20 hours a week) which allows me to study in university, develop professionally and have stable earnings. The latter is important when you live in one of the most expensive countries in the world :)

CyberWatcher is a small Norwegian company established by AIESEC alumni, Morten. AIESEC has actually connected two of us. I'm generally quite happy with the way I manage to capitalise on my AIESEC connections and my network (and it is just one part of what has AIESEC experience given to me!). Morten has established and is CEO of the company.

As the name of the company says, we watch the cyber-space there :) And that is actually pretty much concised business-model of the firm: any client who wants to be updated with certain news about certain things from certain online sources, can get such service from us.

Since the time I was studying Journalism and Communication in Estonia, I have been interested in information management as well as effective information and communication skills (in terms of organisations rather than individuals). The work in CyberWatcher gives me opportunity to learn about the ways people and organisations can have more effective information management thanks to certain software platform. What is good about our service is the fact that it can be implemented everywhere in the world by everyone who speaks English.

As I am not the man created to work in big organisations, I very much like the fact the company has nine employees in Norway together with me (in additions, few more people in Sweden and the United Kingdom). It gives me opportunity to work on different tasks and projects. In fact, I don't have any precise job title or job description. Latter would be rather a disturbant factor for a freedom-loving, independent and critical person like me :)

Another nice coincidence is that Morten, the head of the company, has graduated from the same business school I am enrolled in (BI Norwegian School of Management). He respects my studieds and my AIESEC experience and gives me quite a lot of freedom.

It is actually a working culture in Norway in general - people are not being pushed or overly supervised. My colleagues all come and go in different times of the day, in case of neccesity they work from home. I find it all very welcoming - this is one of many aspects why Norway is so well-developed and quite harmonic society (compared to vast majority of other countries), in my opinion.

Women will save the world

I currently live in Norway, which is one of the wealthiest countries in the world - it has among the highest GDP per capita. Recent Global Gender Gap Report by the World Economic Forum reveals that Norway also leads the world in closing the gender gap between men and women. I live in the country which provides the most equal opportunities for women in social, political, economical and health terms.

Coincidence?

The report shows that by far not. Although not 1:1, there is a very clear evidence of correlation of prosperity of the nation and its ability to close the gap between men and women.

I have recently spoken to one smart Norwegian businessman/traveller/anthropologist (he has probably visited over 100 countries during his life) in his 50s. He said he did not believe the society was able to advance very much on the long run if women were not given opportunity to influence events there. Indeed, women save by nature - social welfare, state harmony, social security - all that is rather typical for females. Conquest, competition and risk - those are words rather typical for men. As one my male friend from Latvia put it in a straightforward way: while women care about agreement and harmony, men simply put their d***s on the tables and start to compare their size.

All in all, it is not that black and white, but I am a firm believer that no society will ever achieve a peace and harmony within itself and with the others unless women there are given opportunity to fully participate in the social, economic and political life of the country.

Interesting: Estonia has 37th rank, Kazakhstan 45th and Croatia 46th rank among 130 countries which have been assessed. Croatia dropped dramatically (I wonder where this drop is coming from?). Kazakhstan scores almost the best in this list among the countries with predominantly Muslim population, which is yet another example of how big potential this country has if things will be led in the right direction.

What I follow and what I don't

Today I had chance to write an email to one very good person who is not afraid to think and act in different way. His question was:

"How hard was it to make the important decisions that brought you to places inside and outside yourself where you have never been before? How much insecurity and doubt did strike you before, during and after such a decision? And which factors lead to everything turning out well in the end?"

My answer was pretty much about following:

• Don't follow the crowds. Crowds are stupid and ignorant, even if there is majority of them.

• Don't follow simple solutions. Simplicity often cuts the way to larger paybacks and larger picture.

• Follow smart people, people smarter and better (in something at least) than you.

• Act and speak in such a way that others would eventually start to follow you (in something at least).

• Follow your dream(-s). If you don't have one, make an effort to work on its creation.

• More than anything else - follow your heart. If you believe you are ultimately a good person, your heart must be good advisor to you too.

I like to take the risk. A calculated risk, to be sure. Because if this risk is sustained with a confident belief and power of focusing, there is nothing unachievable, I believe. There are always doubts and reasons to say "no". In any case. But problems and personal miseries allow you to develop your empathy towards hundreds of millions of people who are suffering similar challenges.

One day it pays off.

How rich are you?

I like intellectual challenges. I like especially the kinds that challenge your mental picture of the world and your own place in there.

And it is just excellent if such intellectual challenges are for a good reason.

We all have heard about highly unequal distribution of incomes in the world. But how comprehensive it really is?

And how rich every one of us really is?

How rich are you?

Well, you can find out your place in the Global Rich List.

A beautiful song from Kazakhstan

...and beautiful video from beautiful country too.

I am an AIESECer!

I am going to be popular among students in Estonia and in Kazakhstan. Big posters below will be distributed in universities there. It was nice to be recognized in this way by AIESECers who are organizing new members' recruitment at the moment.

Well, if my face and words would attract to AIESEC at least some proactive and amibitious young people in Estonia and in Kazakhstan, it won't be a waste of colour and paper. My mom will be proud of me anyway ;)

Feel stupid? Make most of it!

It is great to feel stupid again. Because when I feel like that, I have the urge to do everything possible to eliminate this feeling. Usually the way to do it is through learning.

I am now in the period of my life when this learning is institutionalized. In other words, I spend a lot of time in the learning institution.

This institution is called BI Norwegian School of Management (Handelshøyskolen BI), where I am pursuing two-years degree of Master in Innovation and Entrepreneurship. One of the leading business schools in Scandinavia, one of the few private institutions of higher education in Norway has to manage to attract good students, while they have chance to get their education for free in any of Norwegian public schools. When one competes against others who have certain natural advantage, one has to be better in certain things.

I definitely feel that studying here. The school itself is very innovative and studying-friendly. I have never had that good conditions to study. The university building is one of the most beautiful and impressive I have seen in my life. I have access to all kind of business books and all kind of scientific databases around the world. Connections between university and business sphere are very strong and learning methods are very practical.

Coming back to feeling stupid - I have subjects such as Financial Management and Theories of Business and Economic Development, which are very intensive and require a lot of dedication. I have a bachelor degree in social sciences, therefore, I literally felt stupid in some classes. - I just didn't understand many things as they were said. This has led to many hours of reading, exercising, writing and thinking afterwards on my own and talking to my class-mates with previous financial education. Sometimes I have the feeling that I would be a great accountant, should I study like that for some time more :)

My first three weeks of studies have taught me enormously much about financial and business world. Interesting conclusion I have come to is that, in my opinion, it is a good idea to receive a business education after a social one (or maybe vice versa). Because, in fact, these two are like two different worlds.

Social paradigm of the world is all about humans, their behaviour, their interaction, institutions they create, societies and communities they participate in, policies and structures they think of to make the world easier to grasp.

Financial/business paradigm of the world (in its pure setting) is all about profits, earnings, rational investment, innovations to create more value.

And it is interesting to see that there are two distinct types of people who think in one or another paradigm. It is also interesting to ask yourself which of them is governing societies and the world as such. If you don't have money, you cannot build society or any kind of relationship, can you? Can anyone say for sure what kind of impact on societies have had people like Warren Buffett, one of the world's greatest investors?

Anyway, I am glad BI gives an opportunity to open up another paradigm of understanding the world.

Another interesting discovery is that it is really great to be a Master student after having lived and worked in different countries for three years without being enrolled in university. I feel I understand much better what I want and what I need from my studies. I can focus my attention on what truly interests me, not on what is "good to learn". I can judge the things being learnt in my classes from perspective of my past real-life experiences.

The soft-skills and the world-view which I have acquired thanks to AIESEC, are of a great importance. To work on presentation in a group, to drive fast conclusions, to hold a presentation in class, to have a broad perspective on learning material, to set clear objectives for your studies - I feel my AIESEC experience has helped me enormously to make all of that better and easier than if I would not have had AIESEC career behind me. Global perspective of thinking is another valuable asset I have acquired thanks to leading AIESEC chapters in Estonia and Kazakhstan, interacting with hundreds of young leaders from all around the globe.

I suppose I will fully grasp the importance of my AIESEC experience in years from now, after some more discoveries of how cool it is sometimes to feel yourself stupid ;)

"Hotel Rwanda" - for those who are not ignorant

Lately, this blog is turning into movies' review diary. In general, I watch movies rather rarely. And if I watch some, I usually pick something worth doing that in order not to waste my time.

I like history. I admire brave people. There is one movie which speaks about both of it. "Hotel Rwanda" it is.

People are generally ignorant if they don't feel that something happening does not impact them in any way. That's how many events around us are perceived. Everyone is aware of the conflict in Iraq, because a world superpower USA and oil are involved there. Everyone is aware of the conflict in Georgia, because a wannabe superpower Russia and oil are involved there. And it seems like people (at least in what is considered to be West) are concerned about these events. They protest, they create different groups in the Facebook "Supporting X against Y" etc, which is good to some extent, because it shows their civic attitude.

But how many people protest or create groups in the Facebook against atrocities happening currently in Sudan, for example?

In 1994 a Central-African country Rwanda did not have major world superpower involved there. Neither did it have oil. According to estimations, more than 800.000 people were slaughtered during three months of 1994 during what is now referred as genocide. This seemed like another bad news from some failed state in Africa back then.

I remember working as a summer reporter in the biggest Estonian daily "Postimees" in 2004. I was then involved in foreign news department. Once my task was to write about 10th anniversary of genocide is Rwanda. I comprehensively researched the topic, wrote quite a good article which was supposed to become a main story in foreign news the next day. But few hours before giving materials to final editing the main editor approached me, apologized and said that I need to cut the story till just 4 paragraphs, because the main story will cover the visit of Estonian prime-minister to neighbouring Latvia. It stroke my mind then - I lost my chance to really show people what happened there because of their own ignorance...

And what happened is an extreme example of what can be result of hysterical nationalism and manipulation of people with the help of mass media. By 1994 there were two main ethical groups in Rwanda - Tutsi and Hutu, while the difference between these two was created by outsiders, former Belgian colonists, who divided people to two group according to their looks (length of nose) and gave different passports (along with different priviliges, while Tutsi got more of them in 20th century). So, basically, it was the same people speaking the same language who were divided into two groups.

Eextremely-minded nationalistic Hutus grabbed the military power in the country and started to strengthen anti-Tutsi sentiments in the beginning of 1990s . Mass media was used heavily for that. A special militia (killing force) was created and being trained. After some incident mass-killings started. Everyone who had a temple "Tutsi" in their passports would not escape the death, incuding small children. It was a true ethical cleansing. Around 70% of Tutsi living in Rwanda in that time were killed during these three months.

The movie "Hotel Rwanda" tells a story of one hotel manager, Hutu himself, who was married to Tutsi woman. Despite threat to himself and his family, he saved a few thousand Tutsis who could cover themselves in his hotel. I recalled "Schindler's List" when I watched this movie.

The movie is excellent. The actors' play is excellent. The story is amazing, yet scary. Because it was a reality.

It is obligatory watching for everyone interested in history and everyone not willing to be ignorant.