Celebrating the Uncelebrated
To celebrate the success of the British-Iranians in becoming the second-highest earners among the UK’s communities, as reported in the January issue of BIBA’s newsletter, we are holding a meeting at the London Hilton on Park Lane, W1 on Thursday 23 March 2006 at 7pm.
BIBA seeks to challenge the Persian student societies (such as King’s College London Persian Society) to transform themselves into Centres of Commerce and Technology. With such high levels of education and so many talented people, itwould be a tragedy not to do so. BIBA hasevery intention of supporting these societies every step of the way.
BIBA is willing and able to put its considerable network of contacts and resources at their disposal. So a large portion of this meeting is dedicated to cultivating links with these societies. Favud Ahmad, Maryam Farmani and Borzo Baradari of King’s College London Persian Society Missed Opportunities – Now is the time to Fulfil Our Potential In our opinion, the Persian societies have been associated solely with Iranian history and art for far too long.
It is about time that these societies started acknowledging and demonstrating not just art and history, but more Commerce and Technology. We do have many success stories within the British professional community. Sadly, these role models have rarely been invited by the Persian societies to share the secrets of their success. This can only be regarded as a series of regrettable missed opportunities.
In May 2002, in order to address this issue, BIBA sponsored and organised a meeting with the Cambridge University Persian Society (CUPS), and introduced to them 20 leading British-Iranian professionals and business-people. Not one has been invited back. This is particularly sad in the context of Cambridge being a world-renowned hub of technology and learning, in the ideal position to set an example. Perhaps this reflects the predicament of our society; the failure to appreciate and learn from our community leaders.
In January, we laid down our vision: To maintain the success of British-Iranians, and to put ourselves even further ahead in the future, we must become better at the skills of teamwork and sharing ideas. If a community shares and co-operates, everyone benefits. If no-one shares and engages in teamwork, everyone is left behind. This duty to share and to learn extends even to the British-Iranian student communities.
Please see the full newsletter here.