Earlier today I was sitting with my friend Nora over food and argileh when we started to talk about some past experiences, she is an ex-Aramex employee who now works with Jordan River Foundation, I was introduced to her when she started to use Nakhweh as the very first adopter when it was the buggiest website on the internet and she really had the passion for it, that’s why she’s one of my favorite. Nora, when she talked about some funny stories during her days at Aramex, brought this story back to my mind and made me write this well-deserved thank you message to the most supportive team on earth.

Back in 2008, all what I knew about Aramex that it’s owned by someone called Fadi Ghandour who believes in youth (as I heard from people) and might support new initiatives, I had one email in my list for an Aramex team member, Mariam, who I approached for a sponsorship in 2006. I thought that the whole team should have the same email format and it wouldn’t hurt if I try and send Fadi (after googling the right spelling of his name) an email introducing an idea that needs his support.

Email was sent to Fadi after I showed it to many people who made sure it has no mistakes because it’s going to a very important person who might delete it without even reading it, surprisingly (at that point) I get a call from someone called Reem Khouri who had an extremely sexy title, “Special Project Executive – Office of the CEO” at Aramex, asking for a meeting because of that email, I felt so special because someone with such a title is going to meet me. I remember that first meeting at the Hyatt hotel with Reem where I sounded very stupid (at least for myself) when she started to share information about things that Aramex does with Ruwwad and how a business can be built, she asked me to do the thing which I really hate, she asked for a business plan. My experience in writing business plans wasn’t so good, especially when I was a finalist of Queen Rania National Entrepreneurship Competition. I only wanted to see my idea implemented without these complications, I tried at that point to do what Reem asked for but it never happened for many reasons and I disappeared.

Nakhweh went online in August 2009 after I quit my job at Akhtaboot and decided to start my own thing; couple of days later, Fadi Ghandour starts a conversation on Twitter about what we, entrepreneur wannabes, need to make it happen. I sent him an email with my own opinion about it and Reem decides to call and meet again for that. Honestly, if I was in her shoes I would never call someone who disappeared earlier but she thankfully did.

For those who don’t know Reem, she’s the kind of person who takes an idea in 2 words and gives you her opinion in a very professional way that you can’t ignore or even disagree with. I can write books about Reem, but I will sum it up and say: she’s my “Godmother”. Actually some people thought I’m exaggerating about Reem until they got the chance to meet her.

Since that meeting until now; I met a huge number of people from Aramex and Ruwwad. I told Nora, every single person of them is of a priceless help. Let me tell you about Lina Shehadeh, a superwoman (literally) and one of the sweetest persons I’ve ever seen. Lina, the Chief Marketing Officer of Aramex, is someone who gives free ideas and knows the pros and cons of any project that involves communication and many other things, she’s very strict when it comes to work but a friend like no other everywhere else.

When it comes to Fadi, no words to describe! The story above says enough and you can follow him on Twitter to figure it out by yourself

Raji, Nader, Hani, Walid, Diana, Samar, Dima, Tarek, Mariam, Feras, Kefah and all these amazing people who work with the great Fadi Ghandour deserve a huge thank you from someone who they really impacted with their kindness, professionalism and endless support. I’m extremely lucky to officially have two of you on the Nakhweh Advisory Board but you all will always be my advisors.

Thank you Aramex, thank you Ruwwad, thank you Fadi Ghandour.

Today marks the day 364 of a year which I consider the most challenging since I was born (26 years ago). I never had mixed emotions about anything like how I feel about 2010. Successes, failures, courage, disappointment, love, hate… etc; everything took a part in my journey since January 1st until the moment.

Who knows me well would say that 99.9% of my life lately is about work, entrepreneurship, Nakhweh.com and putting myself on the right track. A lot of highlights, some are negative and some are positive, but what made me reconsider the way I think about everything is how I could get rid of an illness that was stick to me for 2 years.

Very long nights, travels, fights, hard times, sleeplessness and other things were all beaten with the positive attitude that helped me in reconsidering the way I think. For me life now has another definition and I started to appreciate it more, positivity made me feel pleased, it attracted additional positive people within my life, it drew a permanent smile on my face, it made me think about a brighter future and forget a lot of bad memories.

2010 was the year of learning for my “entrepreneur wannabe” mission; my best teacher was failure and I know now what it means when some people say failure is a bless. Under delivery, over promises, fights, bad decisions, overwhelming myself with whatever comes to my mind of ideas, bad time management skills, underestimating team building importance and a lot of other mistakes I made and helped in expanding my vision to a point where I figured out that what I’ve done since I established my startup, other than Nakhweh.com, is 80% wrong and made me modify my business path recently.

Nakhweh.com is excluded from the above dilemma to some extent because it’s another experience by itself; a unique initiative that’s driven by passion and the bright side I look at. I can’t say it’s a mistake-free project but I was lucky enough to get the support of those who loved the idea and helped me to avoid a lot of mistakes, they keep giving me advices on how to run such a project.

It might be the first time I say this in public but neither me nor my partner were expecting to see Nakhweh.com where it’s right now, it makes me very proud of the achievement yet very worried about the huge responsibility of maintaining and improving it. I never thought that within a very short time Nakhweh.com will become a well known platform for the technology and the social scene in Jordan and some other countries, an initiative that’s mentored by great people who I consider my role models, a show case in the biggest events, one of the final projects for King Abdullah Award for Youth Innovation & Achievement and most importantly a website that has a real impact on the ground.

The year is concluding tomorrow and a new beginning is in front of everyone. For me; now I know what are my plans and ready to accept more mature failures. Also, I want to take this opportunity to thank a lot of people who have great impact on my life, Nakhweh.com and my entrepreneurial mission:

• My very supportive and loving family members
• My 13 years old friend and partner, Hadi Nasereddin, it’s about time for you to start enjoying the hard times
• I seriously can’t express how thankful I’m for Fadi Ghandour, I envy myself for having you beside me
• Our god mother, Reem Khouri, you know how much we adore you and if you don’t I will let you know
• Valentina Qussisiya, I don’t think it would happen without you
• Habib Haddad, you’re the COOLIOest mentor ever
• Dina Shoman, thank you for supporting Nakhweh.com at a very early stage
• Suleiman Al-Bakhit let’s hope that both of us will ever focus, thanks for the endless flow of tips brother
• Sana Tawileh, thank you my other mama for the continuous feedback and advices
• My supporter since 2006, Mohamad Khawaja
• My social media teacher, Firas Steitiyeh
• The very creative mind who came up with Nakhweh.com’s slogan, Nadine Toukan, I appreciate everything
• Zina Bata, thanks for the off-work supportive conversations
• Mohamad Haj Hasan, although I’m still confused but you were the best teacher ever and you’re probably the best human being on earth
• Abu Lughod brothers, Tareq & Hazem, sorry for the hard times I’m giving you, we still have long way ahead
• Rami Al-Jundi, thanks for believing in my mission and you always make me feel smart
• Amer Al-Saleh, you used to make me feel wise, which is weird
• Natalie Hijazi, your artistic touches on everything are amazing
• Mais Gousous thanks for making me feel very important yet very shallow at the same time

Thank you all and see you in 2011.

ArabNetMe Roadshow

I just got an email from ArabNet announcing their Roadshow event in Jordan. A free training workshop about entrepreneurship in the technology sector. It’s taking place on Dec 8, 2010 at the Friendship Auditorium in PSUT.

This traveling workshop is part of the ArabNet Roadshow, which will span 7 countries including Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, and Egypt.

The workshop will give you the tools and expertise you need to grow your company and gain further exposure by helping you:

• meet with investors and learn about how to secure financing
• meet with experienced entrepreneurs and learn about growing your business, managing talent, and building a corporate culture
• learn more about the latest trends in the web space
• network and meet with skillful employees you can hire if you’ re looking to expand

Organized by the International Business Alliance Group / ArabNet, the workshop will feature a panel of experts from diverse backgrounds, and a roundtable breakout session where you can talk to the speakers in a close setting and get personalized advice.

It is an ideal opportunity for you to network and get expert insights to help you grow your business.

For more details click here to download the workshop flyer. For registration and information about the speakers, venue and more; click here.

Ideation Box

It has been ages since I wrote a blog post; it’s not because there is nothing to write about but it’s my claim of being so busy. Any way, June 6th 2010 marked the first anniversary of my startup Ideation Box and I was planning to write something then but it didn’t work for me so now I’m putting everything here in one chaotic post.

Entrepreneurship, a phrase that I don’t even know how to pronounce it well, has been always attractive for a person like me, I always wanted people to call me an entrepreneur and that’s probably my first reason of why I took my life to another level and started my own business along with my partner Hadi (I bet he’s still shocked for the way it happened).  I didn’t spend more than 5 minutes of my life to take such a decision and start hitting some walls. Finally now I’m being introduced as a business and social entrepreneur, and here we go, I pinpointed it twice.

Now after more than 1 year of trials and a lot of errors, I can only say that last year was a very intensive “experience course” that kept feeding me mixed emotions of glory and disappointment and helped me in growing my vision, ambition, practices and definitely persistence.

I don’t want to go through the details of my first year, I don’t want to show people that I failed in serving some clients, I won’t explain why I regretted working with some friends… etc! The conclusion is that I’m still here serving my dream, hitting more walls, taking care of the clients and our 2 big babies, Nakhweh.com and Tadarrab.com, proceeding with the Ideation process and popping more ideas out of our Box!

“Your creative idea might redefine you one day, bring it to life and take good care of it!” – Kamel Al-Asmar

The year of 2009 held a lot of surprises for me, I can also consider it an extraordinary year of action that made a huge difference in the whole track of my life. Working with Boundless the sister web development company of Akhtaboot and Jawaker, moving to work on the co-finding of my startup venture Ideation Box, popping Nakhweh.com and finally kicking off Ideation Box Labs a couple of days ago. All of that moves I have done were absolutely guided or influenced by my family and friends.

In the last day of 2009 and the last post of the year I would like to thank those who supported and helped me to achieve this point of success:

• My Father and The God Father of Ideation Box, Marwan Al-Asmar; thank you.
• Intisar Samara, thank you for being my mother and for your prayers that helped me to make it for you.
• Khaled, Sarah, Noor and little Mahmoud I love you.
• Hadi Nasereddin, I wouldn’t be able to make it without a great partner like you.
• Firas Steitiyeh; thanks for helping in making my dream of the original Ideation Box comes true with the Ideation Box Labs.
• Amer Al-Saleh; what a creative mind and a good sales man.
• Mohamad Haj Hasan; 2 years of great experience under your mentorship were the key factors. Thank you.
• Mohamad Khawaja; your endless support for us is priceless.
• Fouad Mardini; I will be benefiting from your technical support forever.
• Mais Gousous; you always make me feel that I’m doing the best thing ever.
• Reem Khouri; your ideas tell me how Ideation is done.
• Ayah Nasan; great efforts and more to come.
• Zina Bata; thanks for the mature advices.
• Aya Jazy; Nakhweh loves you, believe me.

The influence of the these Arab entrepreneurs played a big role as well:

• Her Majesty Queen Rania Al-Abdullah.
• Rabee’ Zureikat of Zikra Initiative.
• Rawan Zeine of Ta3leeleh.
• Samar Dudin of Ruwwad.
• Maher Kaddoura of Al-Jude for Scientific Care Programs.
• Fadi Ghandour of Aramex.
• Laith Zraikat of Jeeran.
• Habib Haddad of Yamli.

Finally, I want to wish you all a Happy New Year of 2010 that brings you happiness, joy and real success