Watch: A Conversation on Refugee Entrepreneurial Success

Global Entrepreneurship Week celebrates and empowers entrepreneurs in every country and community around the world – especially those individuals who face structural barriers or may have never considered the idea of launching their own startup. Entrepreneurial spirit fuels our nation’s economy. That willingness to be innovative –adapt to changing marketplaces, meet customers’ needs and develop new ways to deliver products and services -- has never been stronger.

Garry
Lyon

To celebrate, please join Administrator Isabella Casillas Guzman, head of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) and the voice for America’s 33 million small businesses in President Biden’s Cabinet, and Hans Van de Weerd, Senior Vice President for Resettlement, Asylum & Integration, of the International Rescue Committee. Together, they will be joined by entrepreneurs from around the world who have overcome incredible odds to seek safety and economic security by starting their own small business. To conclude, hear from subject matter experts within the U.S. Small Business Administration on how you, too, can start your own entrepreneurial journey to small business ownership.

Featured Speakers:

Isabella Casillas Guzman | Administrator | U.S. Small Business Administration

Isabella Casillas Guzman was sworn in as the 27th Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration on March 17, 2021. She serves as the voice for America’s 32.5 million small businesses and innovative startups in President Joe Biden’s Cabinet.

Administrator Guzman has made supporting small businesses her life’s work. From a very young age, working beside her father in his chain of veterinary hospitals in Southern California, she gained a deep appreciation for the small business owners who define Main Streets in neighborhoods across America, deliver our products and services, and innovate to solve global problems.

Hans Van de Weerd | Senior Vice President for Resettlement, Asylum & Integration | International Rescue Committee

Hans Van de Weerd is the Senior Vice President for Resettlement, Asylum & Integration (RAI) at the International Rescue Committee (IRC). With a network of 28 US regional offices and 6 European countries, RAI serves more than 100,000 individuals each year in the US and Europe, among them some 10,000 newly arrived refugees.

Prior to his current role, Hans was Executive Director of the IRC’s office in Northern California. Before joining the IRC in 2012, Hans was a General Director for Medicines Sans Frontiers (MSF)/Doctors without Borders, where his work included leading a campaign for access to essential medicines and directing country programs in India and Iraq.