Scholarship / It Starts with Small Act toward Bigger Impact (Erasmus Mundus: GLOCAL - Track I) [3]

Hi everyone,

Here's my motivation letter for EMJM GLOCAL Track I: Entreprenership in Global Markets. I would really appreciate any feedback on how to improve this essay so I can improve it. This is my second attempt to the same program and track:

ESSAY DRAFT:

Words count: 1150/1200

Dear GLOCAL Consortium Admission Committee,

My mom once told me that many ways that shape the values we stand for may stem from the smallest moments at home. One such moment came during the COVID-19 pandemic, when I instinctively helped my mother navigate the impact on her micro seafood business by leveraging digital platforms. The business not only survived but also expanded from a B2B-only model to a customer-facing market, which allowed us to create more employment opportunities for our underprivileged neighbours. From here, I started to grow a heart in the interlink between entrepreneurship and digital innovation, as it can move beyond personal commercial gain to foster growth for the surrounding ecosystem.

Having a bachelor's degree in International Relations further solidified my entrepreneurial orientation through a more holistic lens. In courses such as Globalisation and Local Dynamics, I examined SMEs' participation in online marketplace platforms as a case study on how local business practices adapt to competitive pressures from global market integration. At a broader level, my studies on European regionalism also exposed me to how such pressures are handled through coordinated institutional mechanisms, underscoring the sharp contrast to Southeast Asia's more fragmented landscape. Later, these insights culminated in a collaborative publication project with my lecturers for The Conversation on Indonesia's digital economic diplomacy and the role of the Indonesian Trade Promotion Centre in supporting local enterprises during COVID-19. This work became the foundation of my thesis, through which I graduated cum laude with a GPA of 3.68/4.00.

To assume my exploration of global-local interplay, I joined AIESEC at Universitas Brawijaya and served as a committee member and a project vice team leader in the Incoming Global Volunteer department. Over two years, I contributed to multiple SDG-oriented projects and honed my cross-cultural leadership skills by working with both local and international student volunteers from six countries. Together, we managed to impact hundreds of individuals and numerous community partners, for which I was honored with an award for my dedication. Additionally, I undertook a student internship at the Indonesian Ministry of Transportation, where I supported partnership facilitation with public, private, and foreign organisations by providing summaries of policy frameworks from over ten countries. These experiences ignited my curiosity about the mechanisms that enable actors on the ground to translate global agendas into practice, beyond how policy frameworks shape their environments.

The curiosity sharpened with my tenure at Campaign for Good, a social enterprise that channels corporate and philanthropic funding to grassroots civic organisations through digital campaigns. While working closely with these groups, I observed their persistent hesitation to participate, often driven by limited digital capability and unfamiliarity with funding mechanisms. In response, the enterprise addressed these obstacles through its regular educational programmes, which enabled the organisations to understand the system better and convinced them to engage more confidently. As an Outreach Intern, I also contributed by introducing more interactive programme formats, which increased the number of new joiners and marked the point at which my interest in exploring business models that effectively shape digital participation began to emerge.

Stepping into the fintech industry at Midtrans placed my earlier insights on a larger scale. As a Product Marketing Associate, I worked on growth programmes for merchant payment services and saw how rapidly digital payment infrastructure expanded across Indonesia. Yet, I discovered that medium and large merchants in urban centres progressed quickly, while many micro and small enterprises struggled to sustain transaction volume and often reverted to traditional operations. Their obstacle was not only about access alone, but also trust, security concerns, fees, and the absence of on-the-ground support. This gap frustrated me, as micro and small merchants, who represent around 98% of businesses in Indonesia, actually hold significant potential not only to benefit from digital payment but also to uplift ecosystem-wide growth. It led me to question how payment systems, as the driver of the digital economy, can truly scale in ways that bring smaller actors to participate alongside the larger ones consistently.

With the question in mind, I realised that my current understanding of merchant behaviours, market practices, and gaps in nationwide datasets is unable to answer it fully. This situation sets my vision to work in business strategy and to design market strategies and strategic models that enable micro and underserved businesses to rise sustainably by leveraging payment infrastructure, for which pursuing a master's degree becomes the most coherent continuation for this journey. As the fintech ecosystem is expanding cross-border and operates through collaboration among industry players, policymakers, and the communities in the market, I see the GLOCAL Programme, with its interdisciplinary learning method and multicultural research environment, speaks directly to my aspiration. Moreover, studying in Europe, with its mature cross-border payment integration and institutional coordination, offers a critical comparative lens to examine how such systems evolve and what elements can be adapted to emerging markets like Southeast Asia, including Indonesia.

Track I: Entrepreneurship in Global Markets aligns closely with my objectives for its course structure and dissertation model. Some relevant courses, such as 'Global History of Marketing and Mass Consumption' in Göttingen, 'Companies in Emerging Sectors' in Barcelona, and 'Technology Transfer in the Global Economy' in Glasgow, will collectively equip me with multi-layered analytical frameworks to examine how markets are shaped, firm-level strategy, and regulatory environments condition whether payment innovations translate into sustained use among smaller enterprises. Therefore, my dissertation focus will potentially incorporate insights from my industry exposure on human intermediary models, such as Indonesia's branchless banking agent scheme. While this model has proven effective in reaching unbanked individuals, its potential to support merchant adoption of payment systems remains underexplored. I also hope to refine or expand this topic through placements with organisations such as PIMEC, BBVA Microfinance Foundation, or Nesta, whose focus spans across inclusive financial services and social innovations.

On top of that, I am keen to engage with lecturers across Track I mobility, including Dr Jann Logemann, Dr Esther Hormiga, and Prof Jeffrey Fear, whose work closely aligns with my interests in entrepreneurship, innovation, and market strategy. Beyond coursework, I see these engagements as opportunities to bring insights from fintech markets in emerging economies into European research and teaching contexts, contributing to the GLOCAL Programme's comparative perspective. Drawing on my participation and networks from industry-facing events such as the Digital Economy and Financial Festival (FEKDI), Indonesia Fintech Summit & Expo, and National Fintech Month, I would also be interested in facilitating practitioner-oriented exchanges with relevant institutions, including the Indonesian Trade Promotion Centre in Barcelona and Bank Indonesia's Digital Innovation Center, through applied discussions, project initiatives, or guest lectures. These interactions could lay the groundwork for that extends beyond the programme level.

Ultimately, the GLOCAL Programme offers the academic and comparative space I need to translate years of observing digital participation gaps into more grounded and inclusive market strategies. Through its interdisciplinary structure and cross-cultural learning environment, I aim to develop strategic frameworks that enable smaller enterprises to participate meaningfully in the digital economy across emerging markets.

Sincerely,
APN