Leading EU & MENA entrepreneurship workshops.
Saleem Najjar played a key role in leading the European Union's "EU MED Means Business" initiative, designed to support entrepreneurship across the Mediterranean region. The project brought together entrepreneurs and global business leaders.
What made this initiative hard to run?
- Diverse opinions and perspectivesEntrepreneurs and participants arrived with genuinely different views of what the region needed.
- A large number of attendeesCoordinating multiple workshops across a high-volume programme.
- A short time frameActionable recommendations had to come out of it, and quickly.
How were those challenges overcome?
As a core member of the "EU MED Means Business" conference, Saleem led workshops alongside industry experts and policymakers. These sessions focused on investment and entrepreneurial development across the Mediterranean region.
- Effective workshop managementMore than 30 workshops, plus mentoring programmes and 1:1 training sessions, equipping business owners with the tools to work in the digital economy.
- Overseeing strategic recommendationsA training methodology designed around the needs of local SMEs, emphasising digital skills and business management.
- Empowering entrepreneurs and expanding job opportunitiesA results-driven strategy that engaged over 3,500 participants from a wide range of industries and backgrounds.
What did it change for the business landscape?
The work contributed to shaping forward-looking policies that promote investment and entrepreneurship in the Mediterranean.
- 12 strategic recommendations for decision-makersAimed at boosting investment, supporting entrepreneurship and increasing employment opportunities.
- Worked with officials and business leadersTo ensure the recommendations were applied in practice, driving economic impact across the region.
- Policy frameworks built for sustainable growthTackling the challenges facing SMEs and startups directly.
Who led it.
This programme was led by Saleem Najjar.
Saleem is a co-founder of Umbrella500, and the workshop programme described here is his own engagement with the EU MED Means Business initiative. It sits in this index because it is the same practice — designing and running programmes for institutions — carried out by the same person who leads that work here.
