Robert Akerboom
From our analyzed subsystem, sustainable entrepreneurship, I have learned that a very important part of this system lays in the literal sustainability of the business, which describes the essence of insuring long term profits. If for example, a business idea has a very noble and sustainable vision to thrive for, this can only be attained if the business is financially stable and therefore ensures a future for itself. This in order to eventually fulfill this noble vision, which in this way will be double sustainable (economically and environmentally).
In my opinion, a similar scenario can be drawn by evaluating our communication over the last 10 weeks that this course has been ongoing. It is not only the great and amazing goal of a sustainable Texel in 2065 that is our goal, but just as important (and maybe even more) is the way it can be established and how important communication is within that. Group work amongst approximately 30 persons is in my opinion a very interesting representation of for example discussing climate laws amongst several political parties. Without a very clear and defined goal and without proper internal meetings, this can easily lead to a time consuming chaos.
I for example had the idea that it has not been very clear what the end goal was for the entire course and it was certainly not on the same level amongst other students. Apart from time being wasted, people got irritated and found it difficult to discuss with each other, since main goals were not the same. It seemed to me that when bottom was reached last Wednesday afternoon, a eureka-moment during one of the (few) well organized group meetings led to a common vision and a very acceptable end result on Friday.
I do believe that a better structure of communication could have increased the quality of our end product, although sometimes it seems best to hit rock bottom before you can reach higher grounds. For me personally, this week has been very educating in many ways. Not only have I gained a lot of pure knowledge, but I have also learned how to work within groups and how to put common goals before individual goals. I take all this with me, and it makes me stronger both in personal and professional way. This week has shown me that there is far more demanded from a future sustainable engineer than just a nice vision, and I’m very keen on getting there.