ISSA School of Applied Management welcomes SERCOTEL and NVIDIA to its classrooms for a conference framework innovation and entrepreneurship

Last Thursday, March 27th, the second and last Sectorial conference of the 2024/2025 academic year were held at ISSA School of Applied Management under the theme "Entrepreneurship and Innovation". This colloquium was led by the speakers Javier Garro, founder of SERCOTEL, and Carlos Rojas, datacenter modeling architect at NDIVIA. Both shared their work experience with the students of the Degree in Applied management through their respective sectors: the hotel industry and the AI and technological future.

The first discussion paper was given by Javier Garro under the name 'Entrepreneurship in the hospitality sector'. He detailed his business career as the founder of a hotel chain, having started at the reception desk of a hotel. "It's also nice to start at the bottom and work your way up," he said. "I was thirty years old when I founded SERCOTEL". It began," he says, "like all companies, as a project, but it went ahead thanks to a lot of work. Garro stressed several times that you have to enjoy your work: "You have to like what you do. Otherwise, you get bitter. Find something that really motivates you," he explains.

Garro started his hotel chain with an original capital stock of 18,000 euros. "I got my first salary six months after starting all this," he says. In addition to working, he said, one has to have experience in the sector and know the risks well so as not to go crazy. "You have to have fuel, gasoline in your reservation, otherwise you can run out of energy," he explains. "And above all, you have to be very clear about your objectives. Hard work , together with good planning and risk assumption, must be linked to a human approach : the world has changed a lot, but companies are still human," he concluded.

The second discussion paper, position by Carlos Rojas, was presented in English and under the frame: 'The AI Advantage: Leveraging Technology in Modern Business Strategy'. Rojas, datacenter modeling architect at NDIVIA, shared his vision about AI. "Now that an average person can perform functions that used to belong to a computer engineer - creating code, for example - it is important to rethink the future of work with AI in mind," he said. He pointed out that, for them in particular, thinking about this was a core topic: "More and more, processes will be delegated to artificial intelligences," he says, "so we have to know how to put them to good use as a tool.

Rojas also warned the students that AI is not the absolute truth: "It makes mistakes and that is exactly why good critical thinking is more necessary than ever, to help us distinguish the best way to make use of this tool that is AI. This world is new for everyone," he concludes, "so it is good that, little by little, we are learning about it for our future.

Isabel Llorens and Arancha Díaz

The first session of these Sectorial conference on Entrepreneurship and Innovation was held on Wednesday, March 12 and hosted Isabel Llorens, founder of RUSTICAE, and Arancha Díaz Lladó, chief sustainability officer at TWINCO CAPITAL. The talks with these two entrepreneurs were attended by almost a hundred students.

Arancha Díaz Lladó began by sharing various tips and tricks to know how to move as a business person: "It is very important to learn how to finance yourself well, but the real crux of the matter is to know how to distinguish when a provider is a good provider or not," she explained. That's why it's a core topic ," he continues, "to check the data very well. With good information, I can better ensure the risks or possible impacts". He explained the changes for the better that generating a positive impact on workers brings about in companies. "This will then generate a good impact on business, and business, in turn, on society".

It was Isabel Llorens who put the final bow to the session with a monologue on the theory of entrepreneurship, motivating and encouraging students to try, to risk. All with passion, of course. An entrepreneur's eyes have to shine with every project ," he says. You have to be highly motivated and go for it. And work hard, of course.