Ég er viðfangsefni í frumkvöðlarannsókn Santeri Halonon við Oulu-háskóla í Finnlandi. Þetta blogg um mig sem frumkvöðul skrifaði ég fyrir hann en það mun birtast á síðu skólans.

I suppose I might have always been an entrepreneur, but I only realized it by chance when I was recently nominated for an international award for social innovation.

Throughout my career, I’ve been given various labels—author, journalist, community artist, scholar. However, having spent forty years as a creative writing facilitator, my primary identity has always been that of a teacher.

For most of my career, I’ve been self-employed. For example, I spent fifteen years among peers at the Reykjavík Academy, a coalition of independent scholars, where I developed my writing courses and creativity workshops. But one day, I felt I was becoming too intertwined with the academy, so I moved my desk from the east end of Reykjavík to the west. There, I found that the Iceland Ocean Cluster, an innovative hub for the blue economy, also welcomes self-employed teachers with various job titles, like myself.

Listening to the people at the Ocean Cluster, I realized that despite our different fields, we share the same challenges. And it dawned on me that my forty years of developing creative, empowering, and inclusive teaching methods are as much of an innovation as the work showcased across from where I sit, gazing over the harbor: „100% of the fish is processed into valuable products.“

My creative work in the social sector also produces 100% valuable outcomes.

For decades, I’ve created community art with the goal of fostering understanding among people, especially regarding the conditions of the marginalized and vulnerable. I have given a voice to the voiceless. One of my greatest fortunes was getting a job as a cultural educator in the 1980s in the then-fragile communities of northern Sweden. As a young teacher, I was given the opportunity to learn how to influence community development through art. Later, while out of work during the uncertain gig economy of the pandemic, I seized the chance to lead a collaboration on community and participatory arts in a project called FOR THE BENEFIT OF ALL.

Around the same time I moved my desk from the academy to the Ocean Cluster, I also took advantage of an opportunity offered by the Association of Businesswomen in Iceland to have a mentor. I was fortunate to be paired with one of Iceland’s most experienced female entrepreneurs, who immediately recognized me as the prototype of an entrepreneur. One day, as we discussed the challenges of my business, she asked, “May I nominate you for the GlobalWIIN 2024 prize?”

Thus, just a few months after the thought first crossed my mind that I might indeed be an entrepreneur, I was invited to London for the prestigious Global Women Invention and Innovation Network award ceremony. My only concern was what to wear.

There used to be a subtle difference in the casual dress styles of my previous roles, but among entrepreneurs, I had noticed that they dress as if they might bump into a wealthy investor at any moment. So, I went shopping. A week after my 67th birthday, I received recognition for my life’s work in a gown with a plunging neckline.

The future didn’t wait, as it immediately reached out to me in the form of a Finnish scholar wanting an interview with the “accidental entrepreneur.” I described to him what I believe characterizes entrepreneurs: creativity and courage, resilience, resourcefulness, adaptability, vulnerability, good health (never a day off), personal skills, sensitivity to societal changes, and endless belief in oneself and one’s calling in life. A little later, in a radio interview, I was asked whether innovation necessarily needs to be socially beneficial. I hope I answered, „Maybe not, but surely innovation recognized with an award must be FOR THE BENEFIT OF ALL.“

Björg Árnadóttir runs the one-woman education company Stílvopnið – Empowerment and Creativity in Iceland.
www.stilvopnid.is