Welcome to Ottawa! Welcome to One Young World! This is what I just read getting off the plane. Despite being ten hours away from the last goodbye to my beloved ones, I know everything is fine!
And I know it, because I still remember this same moment last year when the Bangkok's airport was full of light blue placards welcoming us to what were the most interesting 4 days of my year. 4 days of a great conference, great debates, and meetings with amazing people. This all made me discover how my contemporaries see life in so many other parts of the world, how they are taking action and have impact in their closest ones, and how easily, with opportunities like the one this Summit brings us, they can spread their initiatives and make them global.
I also remember how excited I was, when I came back to my country after One Young World Bangkok. Since then, my hands don´t have enough fingers to count the projects I have started. During this Ottawa Summit I mainly want to join forces for one of them: the Millennial Network Telefónica, which I co-founded together with 6 colleagues back in February. Millennial Network is a global initiative to empower millennials within the company and encourage them to lead projects that make us more millennial- oriented company, one that millennials want to work in and be clients of.
I am sure the Ottawa program is going to inspire me again, and recharge my batteries. More than that though, my aim this year is to discover how other companies and organizations are dealing with millennial employees and customers. I want to encourage delegates to keep on sharing their best practices with us by participating in external meetings we are willing to organise in 2017. I am confident so many good initiatives are going to come out of this One Young World Summit.
My recommendation to those experiencing One Young World for the first time, and one that I am already exploiting: benefit from the digital!
Join our Facebook groups in order to make announcements and calls to action. Use the Convene app for an efficient networking- it shows where we all come from, and what our background is. And use these also back home to keep the momentum!
We have great tools to make the One Young World effect last further after the Summit, and this is exactly what we are expected to do: to feel empowered and take action!
Carlota Calvo Cotado works for Telefonica in Spain and is a Returning Ambassador at the 2016 Summit in Ottawa. She is the Coordinating Ambassador for Europe South. You can reach her here.
