Intrapreneurship, this idea that people can behave and act as entrepreneurs while working inside a corporate environment has been perceived by a range of highly successful companies as “the way of doing business” for over two decades now.

Executives, managers, employees have embraced the concept of intrapreneurship as the path towards innovation, creativity, risk-taking and dynamism, all this while having the support of a large company.

As the Junior Enterprise Brazilian Meeting 2011 ended, the attentions of the international JEM focus now on Rio de Janeiro. The reason of great expectation is that after eight years benched, Brazil is finally hosting, in 2012, an edition of the Junior Enterprise World Conference, widely known as JEWC. To ensure the quality and majesty of the event, Minas Gerais and Rio de Janeiro’s Junior Enterprise Federations (FEJEMG and RioJúnior, respectively, in Portuguese) got together to bring this that is going to be the greatest junior entrepreneurs’ meeting of the world. It is expected that 2,000 people are present, and 500 of them, foreigners.

Experience is an invaluable asset in today's business world. Right away, recruiters are asking newly graduated students what sort of work experience they have. Even for internships and exchange programs, they inquire about it. Today, a student must not only be able to acquire strong academic skills during his studies but he must also find a way and the time to gain experience through internships and other activities. An excellent way of getting this valuable experience is by working for a Junior Enterprise. But what exactly are they and how do they help youth acquire the skills necessary to be efficient in today's workplace?

A Junior Enterprise is a fully operating firm but there's one small quirk: everyone working for it is still a student at the host university. Each JE offers different services but they all have the same common goal, which is to prepare their members for the professional workplace. They do this by allowing their members to put their skills to use in the field as well as teach them the soft skills needed to transition from college to a business environment.

The first part of this extremely rich yet challenging experience takes place inside the JE themselves. Learning how a firm works in an economic class is one thing, taking part and voting in a General Assembly is an entirely different experience. As a student, you are usually working alongside students from the same studies with similar ways of thinking. On the other hand, in a JE, members must learn how to work alongside others from different backgrounds, whether they are from law, economics, engineering or other fields of studies to reach their goals. Everyone will have a different perception on how to do things in the business world and team-working skills are brought to a whole new level because of this. As members evolve over time in their JE, they also take on more responsibilities, pass on their knowledge to the newcomers while receiving those of their predecessors, in whatever domain they interest themselves in whether it be project management, accounting, marketing and so on. Strong organizational and communication skills develop as well. However, this 'career' only lasts for a few years, the time of their studies yet it is a very intense learning experience in how to work, organize and behave in a firm.

The French National Confederation of Junior Enterprises (CNJE) has decided to organize a one year discussion about the current educational system in France. Through the organization of three events which aimed at gathering politicians, specialists of the educational world and students, the Junior Entrepreneurs movement hopes to take a role and to raise the question of the place of Youth and education in Europe. Regarding the current financial and economic situation, the European students hope to see a positive involvement of the European Union in favor of a qualitative educational system. In order to propose, to act and to debate about the future of the European schools and universities, the Junior Enterprise movement plans to take a role by raising questions and encourage the involvement of students. This social initiative aims at giving a chance to any students in France and in Europe to have the opportunity to be more directly involved in its environment and to start becoming an actor in this globalized world.

Because they are directly concerned with those issues, because their ideas can benefit from our continent and because students want to prepare the future in this context of uncertainty and instability, these student associations, called Junior Enterprises, which are implanted in a lot of French universities and private schools are motivated to get involved in this problematic. A Junior Entrepreneur is, by definition, a student who is working in a Junior Enterprise. This concept, born in France in 1967, defines these student-run businesses which aim at proposing to students to put directly into practice their learning’s through the realization of market studies, communication plans, marketing analysis, creation of Website, launch of Web applications, or other engineering services for SMEs, multinational companies, and public institutions. Thus acting like young consultants for companies. Following the motto “learning-by-doing”, these students bring the gap between academia and real business world.