Accelerate business ideas

Kristjan Kristjansson, CEO for "Innovit Entrepreneurship Center", Iceland try to help Entrepreneurs to accelerate their business ideas through various means. Everything from mentoring, networking as well as teaching them to help them selves through useful tools.

 What is your background?

I majored in marketing and international business at the university, writing my final thesis on the "the characteristics of successful entrepreneurs". During university I got highly influenced by student politics programs and a few entrepreneurs within that community that wanted to change the way companies are built in Iceland. I also learned a lot of skills and tools as a former bank employer.

Why do you work in the creative industries?

First and foremost I believe that Entrepreneurs are the main cause of value creation within communities. I thank that by focusing more on that sector, especially by creative means, we can significantly change the way we think and work in the future.

What have been the biggest challenges in working within the creative industries?

Thinking more global and getting Entrepreneurs to pivot things that don't work.

What do you think traditional business can learn from the creative industries - and vice versa?

A lot of the bigger companies have been losing market shares to Entrepreneurs who have figured out ways to offer similar services with a better value proposition. If bigger companies don't use creative ways by finding the Entrepreneurs within their own companies they might significantly fall behind in the market to new emerging startups.  

How do you see the development / the future of creative industries in the Nordic countries?

The best thing that could happen within the Nordics, would be to get more FDI within the sector. The vision of the community should be that by getting foreign investors, we will get new kind of mentorship, networks and mutual interest in joint venturing to new growing markets. The challenge is to make people believe we are creating a "bigger pie", instead of the common misunderstanding that foreigners are taking shares that belong to the Nordics.

I also think we need to improve the way we allocate capital into the community. A lot of programs receive a significant amount of financial support from governments and companies without having high impact. Getting this financial support directly to the Entrepreneurs who create value and often take a huge financial risk in doing so, should be the goal.

If you could change / affect one thing in the creative industries in the Nordic countries, what would it be?

People should think about what they want to make in the future, not what they want to do. We need more people to work on their ideas and create global success businesses. To make this happen we need to have a lot more talented people trying themselves out as Entrepreneurs instead of taking secure corporation desk jobs. To make that shift we need more inspiring programs, more incentives, better methods of sharing our current knowledge and expanding co-operation on global level.