Report from SIFE National Competition

24 Jun 2009 | Posted By: Maria Markenroth

By Israel Ambe Ayongwa

Day 1
The delegation from SIFE Jonkoping arrived at Electrolux Stockholm, where the event was to take place, at 10:45 am on June 16, after a 3 hour ride from Jonkoping.

Members of the Jonkoping delegation who attended this year’s competition included;
Herik Wei (PR & Communication, School of Education & Communication)
Dick Halvorsen (PR & Communication, School of Education & Communication)
Julia Lukyanchenko (International Management, JIBS)
Magdala Leung (Business & IT Management, JIBS)
Mingming Leung (Bachelor of Business Administration, JIBS)
Jingchen Zheng (Innovation & Business Creation, JIBS)
Yun Xu (International Economics & Policy, JIBS)
Mao Yanwei (Business & IT Management, JIBS)
Johan Truong (Business & IT Management, JIBS)
Israel Ambe Ayongwa (International Logistics & Supply Chain Management, JIBS)
Eric Litton (Bachelor of Business Administration, JIBS) who jetted in from Poland for the event.

Upon arrival at the Electrolux center, SIFE Jonkoping met with the other teams: SIFE Malardalens, who arrived with a massive entourage of at least 30 members, SIFE KTH, represented by 2 participants, SIFE Lund, with 4 members, SIFE Umea, with some 8 students on board, and finally SIFE Uppsala having only 2 participants.

Members from the teams then took the opportunity to walk around and familiarize themselves with the environment and the other opposing teams, grab some breakfast and set up their stands for the City Fair event.

At about 13:00, the different participating teams, panel of judges, sponsors, SIFE executive members and other guests were ushered to the Electrolux auditorium for the introduction and formal kick off of the programme.

The Vice President of SIFE Sweden, Camilla Ljunggren, began by giving a brief introduction about SIFE as an organization, it’s goal and principles, before saying what the competition was all about. She also presented a brief picture slideshow of the 2008 competition and concluded by introducing the judges who will assess each team’s performance.

The presentations of projects by the various teams got underway right after the meeting in the auditorium drew to a close and was carried out in two different rooms with SIFE KTH presenting in one room while SIFE Jonkoping carried out theirs in another room at the same time. The other teams proceeded with their presentations during the afternoon. At the end of each presentation there was a Question and Answer session during which the judges raised areas for clarification and further explanation from those presenting.

For SIFE Jonkoping, the task of trying to impress the judges, who were about 10 in number, rested on the shoulders of Mao Yanwei, Yun Xu, Julia Lukyanchenko and Mingming Jiang.

With all the pressure of presentation over and participants heaving a sigh of relief, the next item on the agenda was a mingle between the Sponsors to showcase some of their products and catalogues to the students. Students had an opportunity to inquire what opportunities these companies could offer them in terms of employment and internships.

This item was followed by the last aspect of the day which was a drink mingle and buffet. Jury members, sponsors, students, advisers and special guests all had an opportunity to share in some small talk over a glass of wine and right after this, participants were ushered to the dining section which was an occasion to feast on the different foods on the table. The dining was interspersed with the Award of some Prizes.

These Prizes included the SIFE Monthly Competition for the months of January to June. SIFE Umea handily swept the prizes in this category but SIFE Jonkoping received the prize for Best City Fair Stand. Recipients were awarded a Diploma of recognition.

The SIFE team

Day 2
Wednesday June 17 was the D-day of the competition with the major highlights being results of the last four teams that had made it to the finals of the competition, the finals itself and the declaration of final results.

Hans Stråberg, Electrolux CEO, introduced the members of jury and judges, and handed out medals to all members of all the participating teams as well as a Diploma of participation. The moment all teams had been waiting for arrived and the announcement of what teams had made it to the finals of the competition was made. Malardalen, Umea, Jonkoping and KTH were the four teams while Lund and Uppsala were eliminated.

The leaders of the four remaining teams were called up onstage and through a draw of numbers, KTH had the unenviable task of presenting first in the auditorium, followed by Jonkoping, Malardalen and finally Umea.

A few minutes were given for the two participants representing KTH to prepare and present. With a small SIFE membership, they had 4 projects to present and unfortunately for them one of their presenters had a cold and this made talking for him very difficult.

When their time was up, the four ladies representing Jonkoping had their turn and they did have a better performance than KTH with the 4 projects they had worked on during the year, their show of diversity, results from this projects and the environmental sustainability of it.

Closely followed was Marladalen who had 14 projects during the year and were presenting 6 of them. Interestingly, they had carried out most of these projects out of Sweden in places like Ghana, Nigeria and Slovenia. They raised the bar of performance even higher.

Last team for the day was Umea, winners of 2008 competition, they presented the projects they had done through the year and also they had projects about clearing landmines they had carried out in Asia. Their performance was good although it was difficult placing them on the same level as Malardalens and their group did not show diversity.

After lunch, during which the judges took time off to compile their results, participants reconvened once more for the prize award ceremony and declaration of results.

-First prize was for Rookie of the Year and this was awarded to SIFE Lund.
-Best Faculty Adviser Award was given to Malardalen’s adviser.
-The recently launched Green Challenge Competition, which was open to all students in Sweden was won by Miljöveckan of Umea university while the runner up position went to Miljocaset of Lund University.
-SIFE Spirit award was won by Uppsala university.
-The SIFE Team Award prize, which would give the winners a place at the SIFE International Competition to be hosted in Berlin, had SIFE Jonkoping in the second position while SIFE Malardalens took the first place. Both teams would represent Sweden in Berlin.

The event officially came to an end with participants taking pictures and heading off to their destinations.

Comments Off

Share this: