When I stood on stage at LXVI CM Porto applying to be the leader of Europe3D, looking at the Council and my friends there, my perspective changed. It was never about just a few events. It’s not just about learning a new skill or exploring a new country. It’s about people. People who couldn’t be more different, yet connected by a single thread, cherishing the same spirit in their hearts. It’s a bit cliche to say that, but you can’t help it when it’s true. You can’t describe ESTIEM in a single sentence without using a metaphor. There’s always something that connects us.

So I embarked on a journey right away, to partake in the ESTIEM Spirit that I had felt when I discovered ESTIEM. I became the Europe3D leader and Lean Six Sigma instructor because I wanted to make a difference, to help ESTIEM reach as many people as possible and offer them the same opportunities that it offered to me and to change their lives for the better. And that will always stay with me as a lifelong personal goal.

My story is not yet done. And I can’t do it alone. So I call for your help and support to do it together. To make ESTIEM a better place every day. In order to truly make an impact on the big scale, you need to be able to support every entity so that they can together move ESTIEM onwards. That’s why I’m proud to apply for the position of the President of the 35th Board of ESTIEM . To lead a team of people that can truly make a positive impact on a European level, inspire others to undertake a similar path and write history.

Looking at the bigger picture, ESTIEM is the unity of three things: Local Groups, Events & ESTIEMers . Interconnected, supported and crucial. Therefore, I’m making them the focus point of my application and my mandate.

Local Groups are the basis of our organisation. ESTIEM needs strong Local Groups, self-sufficient and motivated to share the vision and mission of ESTIEM. To achieve that, ESTIEM needs restructured and more concrete support towards developing LGs, available documentation and obtainable knowledge from multiple sources. While doing so, the Board mustn’t neglect sustainable growth when welcoming new guest groups to ESTIEM.

Events are our main value and what makes us truly unique. At this point, the network needs to ensure stability in the event balance and allow more room for innovation and creativity , while staying in line with the ESTIEM’s mission.

ESTIEMers are the driving force behind the network, its core strength. ESTIEMers need to feel supported and allowed to develop . To feel more connected to each other. For that, we need strong Central entities and quality events to inspire them.

As you can see, my interests lay wide. And being a part of the Board imposes a serious challenge. Therefore, there are certain things that I wish to keep in mind throughout the year:

• Transparency – visibility of the work of the Board
• Innovation – suitable environment for fostering new ideas
• Opportunities – inspire ESTIEMers to embrace the opportunities that ESTIEM offers
• Cooperation – encourage Central entities to work together and support each other
• Infrastructure – assure an IT infrastructure and documentation to support the network 

But most of all, the workload of the President consists of coordinating the Board. Therefore, my utmost priority is to be a good support to the other board members . Strong foundations are key to a lasting house. I wish for the other boardies to say that they’re proud of what they did when I ask them in July 2025 and for the network to be happy with what the 35th achieved. Keeping the Board members cohesive and coordinated, motivated and in good mental health is essential to a successful year.

Each one of the applicants has a story to tell, a desire to make a difference and grow as a person. There’s a lot we wish to say and add our bits to the story of ESTIEM. Hopefully, that story will continue onwards for many years to come. And we all wish to be proud of the direction we’re headed. As you know, it’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey.

We’re all stories in the end. So let’s make it a good one. Let’s write history. Together.

Milutin Miljanić

To aim high together, send your application to this form.

Applications will be shared once they are sent, stay tuned!

Dear ESTIEMers,

Maybe my hand is shaking while writing this, who knows?

Here we go again, after applying for FC one year ago, I’m gladly typing my application letter to convince you that I am the right person for our finances! I honestly cannot be prouder about it, the feeling that ESTIEM gives me daily is truly indescribable. It allowed me to grow, form strong friendships and get countless experiences. I’m really grateful for this, and thus I want to give back to ESTIEM by dedicating the most precious thing that I have, time.

That’s why I’m honoured to announce that I’m applying for the 35th Board of ESTIEM as Vice-President of Finance.

Before going to the funfunfun stuff, let me introduce myself. I’m Adrien, a 21 years-old ESTIEMer coming from two wonderful LGs, Brussels and Ankara-METU. To briefly sum up my ESTIEM journey, I would say that it was rich! From all the CMs since Belgrade ‘22 to Training New Trainers in Budapest, without forgetting the Winter Academy and our lovely Finance Summits & College ‘24, I truly enjoyed all the events I took part in!

This is nice, but it doesn’t make me more relevant to apply for this position right?

Outside of events, I also took several challenges that allowed me to gain a lot of experience and knowledge. Beside being a Financial Controller and former Local Responsible, I’m currently in the Grants Committee as an Opportunity Seeker, the TIMES team as Corporate Relations Responsible and the Circular Economy Course Task Group as an active member. Organising a Europe 3D, a TIMES Semi-Final and a Finance Summit were also very insightful.

I said that I wanted to give back to ESTIEM, but that’s not the only thing, I also want to make ESTIEM even better. To achieve this, I have few goals:

• Make an investment plan that can ensure a quality support to all of our members and make us climb the sunshine mountain again!
• Making ESTIEM income streams more sustainable due to the fact that we are entering a pivotal year as we’re in the last year of our grant’s contract
• Increase the dialogue with LGs to ensure that our offerings are well shaped for them and that would allow us to make ESTIEM an even better place to grow for everyone.
• Redefining the finance and legal sphere by shaping better the responsibilities of everyone and optimising the way we work.
• Implementing data analysis in finance. It’s not only magic, it can be backed up and improved with data analysis. Trends and data can allow us to be more sustainable.

Keep in mind that it is a very short version of my goals, and that I’m fully available to speak further/answer any questions related to them or my application, so feel free to send me a message (adrien.leonard@estiem.org / +32 467 157276) or ask your question(s) in CM Aveiro. I’m genuinely motivated in our finance as you might have seen it this year and on this note, do not forget that :

Finance is fun fun fun!

Your dear finance boy,
Adrien Léonard

Dear ESTIEMers,

I don’t want to claim that I know the definitive answer to this question, however I aim to be part of a network where such discussions are encouraged. In fact, I would say that might even improve ESTIEMers acceptance of the frame in which the things are being done. Apart from informing more people on why they were created, involving ESTIEMers in the rulemaking process creates a sense of ownership and therefore greater adherence.

I envision a future where people will think of PR less as a content police and rather see the efforts made to promote our activities and maintain ESTIEM’s image to shine bright.

TL;DR (Too Long; Didn’t Read):

Personal Background:
Wow Europe, much events, very PR, such motivation

PR sphere
PRC: Training Program for better knowledge transfer
Socials: Use as board tool to spread messages outside of Elium bubble
Podcast: New formats and new promotion ideas
Magazine: Build team back up, Accessible digital platforms, on-demand distribution

Externals
More opportunities for ESTIEMers: Open up partner events and keep EYE out for more
Internetwork events: continue current cooperations + new BESTIEMEC MoWe

General Board Goals
Intercultural learning and sharing into ESTIEM’s DNA
Council Meeting more active & attractive
Transparency Improvements in summer applications

→ Simply Better Communication

I always saw myself more as a citizen of Europe, as I was fortunate to be immersed in the diversity of our continent from a young age, being born and raised in France by German parents. When I started university in Berlin, I was missing the international environment I was brought up in, which led me to join my local group. It wasn’t long before I embarked on my first offline event: Europe3D. There, sharing stories with other ESTIEMers until the early morning hours and singing ESTIEM songs until my voice would break away, I found my passion for the network, a flame that has burned brightly ever since. In the last three years, I’ve participated in 44 events, each one enriching my understanding and appreciation of our community even further. It feels like just yesterday when I attended my first council meeting in Belgrade. It was there where I was elected as Europe3D leader, but also where I first dipped my toes into the world of PR, capturing spirited moments as a photographer. In the framework of both PR and E3D I successfully rallied our external applicant numbers back to pre-COVID levels. Even venturing beyond our ESTIEM borders, I represented our organisation at EESTEC events in Milan and the VWI HGV in Munich. As my journey progressed, I found a new avenue for expression in the ESTIEM magazine, writing articles on topics I hold to heart. More recently, I started to lend my voice to the podcast team, seeking out ESTIEMers’ stories worth sharing. Despite the numerous events and experiences I’ve had with ESTIEM, my journey feels far from over. There’s still so much I aspire to contribute, change, and shape within our network. It is with this passion that I’m proud to apply as the Vice President of Public Relations of the 35th Board of ESTIEM.

So much about my journey in ESTIEM. Now you are probably wondering what are the things I will be aiming to do during my year, so here are some goals I have been mulling over:

In addition to the central goal of involving active ESTIEMers in our PR processes, I have outlined specific objectives for each entity within the PR sphere :

I aim to kickstart a training program within PRC to facilitate a sustainable knowledge transfer and therefore allow a more equitable distribution of workload amongst its members, which might also be transferable to other PR entities.

In social media I want to embrace our channels as tools to contact the network as the board to share our ideas with a larger group of ESTIEMers outside the Elium bubble; possible formats including board vlogs, takeovers, and maybe even live streams.

Considering the podcast, I salute the move away from seasons towards formats and intend to stay open for new content formats and experiment with innovative promotion ideas to increase its visibility.

For our currently most troubled child, the magazine, offering all my support to build a team back up, adapting its format to digital platforms, and exploring options like on-demand distribution through the merch-form could help setting wind back in its sail.

Another topic I hold quite dear to heart is the External Relations :

In a world where a nice amount of externals are joining our events, but not that many ESTIEMers are going to external events, I aim to create more opportunities for ESTIEMers by opening up more partner events and making our promotion even more effective.

I want to continue the work happening on internetwork events like oNGOing and TSS, while introducing additional engaging events like BESTIEMEC MoWe.

All this while of course keeping my EYE out for any other interesting external opportunities, most probably with the help of an increase in ambassadors…

Finally, I want to dedicate some time to my more General board goals as well:

I aim to allow intercultural learning and sharing to officially receive its rightful place within ESTIEM’s DNAwhile maintaining a professional and educational approach.

I intend to enhance transparency where there is room for more, particularly in the committee/coordinator application process. In general communication on all channels can be ameliorated.

Furthermore, I seek to revitalise Council Meetings to be even more active and attractive for all participants, building on the progress made by the 34th board.

I understand that these goals may seem ambitious, but I’m confident that my diverse experiences and abilities will enable me to make significant progress in achieving them. I cannot imagine a better next year than being part of the ESTIEM board, working tirelessly to keep my own passion flame and ESTIEM shining bright across Europe.

Feel free to reach out to me anytime if you have any questions, complaints, or ideas. I’m always available through my contact information below or just approach me in person in Aveiro.

In high ESTIEM,

Robert Zastrow

robert.zastrow@estiem.org | LinkedIn | Telegram

Aiming high. This phrase is marked in my mind.

Like many of you, I joined ESTIEM in my first year of studies to discover new things and have new experiences. I started in Seville and for reasons related to my studies I moved to Cartagena where I founded a Local Group, which is currently the youngest Member of ESTIEM. Creating an association and leading it helped me develop myself more than I could have imagined. I consider myself fortunate to have discovered a passion to work for and to continue learning within ESTIEM. With this motivation and experience, I aim to contribute to the development of the next generation of ESTIEM.

That is the reason why I, Fran Lopez, present my application for Vice-President of Education of the 35th Board of ESTIEM.

During my university years in Seville, I was involved in ESTIEM in a brief but relevant way for my future. Moving to Cartagena in 2021, I established the Local Group Cartagena, the youngest member of ESTIEM, overcoming challenges while leading a dedicated and wonderful team. As Local Responsible and President of my LG for almost 2 years, I organised impactful international and local events such as the Paellas Activity Week and the Lean Six Sigma Green Belt Local Course, fostering leadership skills and expanding my network across Europe. In addition, by joining the Central ESTIEM Members Committee in 2022, I contributed to the growth of new Local Groups, starting as Knowledge Management Responsible and becoming Members Committee Leader , thus expanding ESTIEM’s reach and impact in Europe.

My leadership role at ESTIEM has provided me with valuable insight into the essence of the organisation. Through outreach to new European universities, I have recognised the importance of the academic offerings within ESTIEM and the academic development capacity of our members. In line with ESTIEM’s core values, I have analysed the academic curricula of new universities to see the breadth of IEM education in Europe. 

On the other hand, my belief in the value of university education prompted me to participate in student representation in the international area of my university. Being involved in university projects has given me the opportunity to attend important European student meetings, such as the European Student Convention 46 , and to contribute to initiatives such as the formation of the European University of Technology alliance. These meetings with professors, deans and students from different universities showed me a different perspective on the situation of the next generation of our studies.

All of these experiences resulted in a comprehensive picture of the network for me; seeing the value, knowledge and capabilities for improvement we provide to our students. What unites us in ESTIEM is our university studies and the continuous learning and professional development. This position for me is about the influence and value that our network of IEM students has to improve studies at our universities. Therefore, I would like to work on the following areas as Vice-President of Education:

• Support academic and professional growth by increasing the opportunities of certified local courses , fostering collaboration with professors and companies, with potential for national and international implementation.
• Enhance ESTIEM’s presence in conferences and academic events through strategic social media promotion and leveraging Alumni and University networks for increased participation.
• Forge partnerships with professional stakeholders and explore collaborative opportunities to enhance ESTIEM’s recognition as a reputable institution across Europe.

Feel free to ask  me all your questions, through my email (fran.lopez@estiem.org) or approach me during the Council Meeting Aveiro.

Because it’s all about the people,

In high ESTIEM,

Fran López

Hello, my name is Boris Zabunov, a 24-years-old Industrial Management master studying at Technical University of Sofia and a member of ESTIEM since late 2020.

Have you ever played Minecraft, the block game that took over the world ten years ago ? I am very sure the majority of you have heard about it! Did you know it could change lives ?

Minecraft is a game offering you infinite amount of possibilities to build a world of your own using blocks and resources. It is a very simplified virtual version of freedom.

Now you might be asking yourself – why did I start this introduction talking about Minecraft and what is its connection to ESTIEM ?

So is ESTIEM, but in real life. An interculturally vibrant playground that gives you the resources to explore Europe and improve yourself, as well the people and environment around you. ESTIEM strives to unite the IEM students of Europe and contribute to their development and play a role in shaping IEM Europe by offering a wide portfolio of events..

And events ah..They are reason I fell in love with ESTIEM. Having attended more than 20 offline ones from different types and in many different countries, I started to realize that each event has its own heart, almost like a living creature. And what makes the heart beat are three things: the location, the organizers and the participants.

Since joining ESTIEM in late 2020, over time, I found one of my passions in ESTIEM and that one is trying to expand our network in more countries and universities, thus making more diverse and contribute to its main mission – connect all European IEM studentsh. Since early 2022, I am Approaching Responsible in Members’ Committee, currently leading the Approaching Team made of 7 amazing people who share the same passion as me – growing ESTIEM and spreading it new locations.

All the experience gained from travelling and the knowledge gathered about local groups as Members’ Committee member gradually built up my vision for ESTIEM. And I will sum up that vision using 4 bulletpoints:

• Diversity and inclusivity
• Freedom to create, learn and explore
• Memory-making, legacy and traditions
• Exchange of knowledge in all of its aspects and storytelling.

Using those 4 pillars, with a great sense of excitement and responsibility, I hereby present to you my application for 35th board’s Vice-President of Activities.

If elected, as VP of Activities, I would love to work on those areas:

• Knowledge management is the backbone of any successful organization.
  ESTIEM has a long history and many generations of experienced people who have been putting efforts to pass on their knowledge to the future ones. Making sure every local group has equal and easy access to BPDs on how to organize every single type of event and how to be a good organizer in general can massively boost their motivation and remove needless layers of communication.
• Event application processes
  – both to organize and participate in events. Transitioning to an integrated form-type of applications where both participants and organizers have more freedom with customizable questions and structure will lead to better applications and overall event quality. In addition, making sure rejected people always get a mail by the organizers and reassurance to keep applying in the future will raise our retention rate.
• Event portfolio
  – ESTIEM has a little something for anyone. Making sure we keep a sustainable and diversified set of events, that answers the needs of our members, while still trying to gradually create new offerings is the direction I want to follow. Using the sheer amount of data about events we have, with the help of Analysis Committee, Event Quality Committee and Knowledge Management Committee, I would want to keep using methodical and practical methods when it comes to providing event offerings and strive to offer new and innovative types of Activity Weeks and try out new types of exchanges such as country or region exchanges.
• Online events
  – COVID forced us to digitalize our operations and offers for a period of time. However, it also showed us opportunities we never knew we could use. Online events are a great tool to give opportunity to people to make connections, share ESTIEM, accademic and career knowledge or just enjoy each others’ company, without having to travel. I would like to revise the way we organize online events by forming an “Online Events” task group that will assist me in evaluating which needs (such as short info sessions, meet the board/leaders, etc.) we can satisfy in an online environment

• ESTIEM Spirit
  – our spirit that was born three decades ago and is still uniting us throughout the years. I would like, with the help of LG Yellowstone, make our spirit knowledge is easy to understand by all members and make sure it is easily accessible. Together with that, I would strive for motivating our new generations to keep contributing to it with new songs, games and traditions.

Additionally, together with my boardies, I would love to work on:

• Spending more time on talking to local groups and people outside leaders and central –
  organizing “Meet the Board” online events
  and having chats with local groups individually to help everyone better understand our role, responsibilities and build more mutual trust
• Creating a “societies-based” environment
  where ESTIEMers can freely talk about their hobbies and develop them together, as well as share knowledge about non-ESTIEM-related topics
• Promoting the importance of physical development
  and health by implementing more sports-based activities in our events and trying to create a concept for a sports-based event, where ESTIEMers can compete with each other
• Together with the future VP or Public Relations and Ambassdors increase the amount of cross-NGO events with our partners and increase the number of externals from universities not part of ESTIEM attending our events.
• Taking on the “ESTIEM Encyclopedia” project
  and making sure all the great and crazy stories that happened through the years are accessible in a PDF format, as well as interesting ESTIEM and LG facts.

So without further ado, let’s get to some mining, crafting and brewing to shape our ESTIEM world in the best way possible!

In high ESTIEM,

Boris Zabunov

boris.zabunov@estiem.org

+359 88 479 1061

Dear ESTIEMers,

For me, ESTIEM is all about making new experiences, meeting new people with similar interests, and growing as a person. All of this happens during our events, which are the main activities of ESTIEM. Every single event is a new chance for someone to make lifelong memories and get new experiences.

International events were and still are my main reason to be active in ESTIEM. I spent most of my studies so far being active in different local initiatives in Darmstadt but wanted to meet some people outside of our university. That’s when I first learned about ESTIEM in a chat with a member of LG Darmstadt and was instantly sold.

During the last years, I participated in online and offline events from every department and central. In 2023 I was the Local Responsible of LG Darmstadt and last year I also joined central ESTIEM as the Career Development Department Coordinator. During that time I got deeply involved in ESTIEM and it became a big part of my life. As I became more involved with ESTIEM, I realised several areas of the organisation could be improved upon. After that realisation, I spoke with many ESTIEMers and discussed these areas. These chats reinforced for me that these topics are a problem and I want to work on them. That being said, I am proud to take the next step in my ESTIEM journey and present my application for Vice President of Activities of the 35th Board of ESTIEM.

So what do I want to focus on?

Encouraging innovation in the event portfolio

The current structure of the services doesn’t really focus on developing new event concepts. Services focus on their existing concepts and while Department Coordinators are also responsible for innovation in their departments, they usually don’t focus on it. If LGs or ESTIEMers come up with a new idea, they can start an initiative, but often they get pushed into the mould of existing services. A new innovation system could then also be used in different parts of the network.

Structuring and standardising the feedback process

Feedback is an important part of a functional improvement process. After events happen, ESTIEM already collects quite some feedback from participants, organisers and sometimes the central team. Unfortunately, the processes here differ a lot between services and local groups. Especially the usage of the collected feedback seems to be a big issue. Some services discuss the collected feedback and how the service and the local group can improve with all impacted parties, while others just collect it.

Improving the knowledge management

ESTIEM has many different resources, templates and BPDs for event organisation that have been developed over the years. Not all of them are easy to find and some LGs are not even aware of their existence. Some parts, especially the spirit portal are easily available on the ESTIEM portal but others are hidden in the members drive. Because of this, many ESTIEMers recreate the same documents which wastes our limited resources.

Supporting LGs in their event decision

Some LGs struggle with deciding what events they want to organise. They might want to organise something “more professional” but can’t really decide between our different services. Some ESTIEMers are also not aware of all the services, so it might be hard for LGs to include all of their members in the decision-making. This could also be the reason for some LGs to only organise exchanges or other IDD events they are more familiar with.

As you can see all of the goals start from issues in the activities sphere, but the solutions will have to reach out to many different aspects of ESTIEM. So obviously my future work as a boardie would also not be limited to these topics, but will also extend to the wider needs of the network. 

If you want to learn more about my goals, discuss your own thoughts or maybe share some suggestions don’t hesitate to write me an email at: 
hannes.martin@estiem.org
, on WhatsApp: +49 1575 2411538 or approach me in Aveiro.

In high ESTIEM,

Hannes Martin, LG Darmstadt