CATÓLICA-LISBON kicks off 2026 with a new episode of the Negócios com Impacto videocast, a partnership with Rádio Renascença dedicated to amplifying the voices of alumni entrepreneurs and projects that generate positive impact on society. The guest for this episode is João Cotter Salvado, Academic Director of CATÓLICA-LISBON’s Entrepreneurship Center (CLEC), who returns to the program after appearing in the first season to reflect on the evolution of Portugal’s entrepreneurial ecosystem and the structuring role of education in shaping profiles capable of creating sustainable value.
Throughout the conversation, João Cotter Salvador takes stock of CLEC’s growth in recent months, highlighting a clear consolidation of its mission and significant progress across multiple indicators. “We’ve grown substantially across all metrics. We’re seeing a very strong demand both for academic courses and for entrepreneurship initiatives within the school,” he notes, adding that there is now increasing interest among students and alumni in launching companies or, at the very least, in understanding whether entrepreneurship makes sense at a given stage of their professional journey.
One of the clearest signs of this maturation is CLEC’s pre-acceleration program, Forward!, which has established itself as a cornerstone of the strategy to democratize access to entrepreneurship. In its most recent edition, the program expanded its scope to the entire Universidade Católica Portuguesa, bringing together students from fields such as Medicine, Nursing, Psychology, and the Humanities. “Across these two editions, we received around 60 to 70 applications and ended up admitting about 40 teams, which translates into roughly 100 people trained through this pre-acceleration program,” João Cotter Salvador explains.
For CLEC’s academic director, these figures reflect a deliberate commitment to diversity of profiles and skills, grounded in academic evidence. “There is extensive research showing that this mix of profiles is, in fact, what makes innovation happen and flourish,” he emphasizes, reinforcing the belief that heterogeneity is now one of the main drivers of entrepreneurial impact.
The episode also focuses on the profile and core competencies of an entrepreneur. Resilience, adaptability, and tolerance for failure emerge as essential traits in a path defined by experimentation and constant adjustment. In this context, João Cotter Salvador stresses the importance of “falling in love with the problem, not the solution,” advocating a mindset of continuous learning and reinvention throughout the entrepreneurial process.
However, the value of these profiles extends beyond the creation of new ventures. The episode also highlights the benefits of embedding entrepreneurial skills within established organizations, whether family businesses or large corporate groups. Despite the resistance to change that characterizes many organizations, competencies such as cross-functional leadership, agility, and critical thinking prove decisive in ensuring their capacity to adapt and survive over the long term.
The episode is now available to watch and listen on CATÓLICA-LISBON’s Spotify and YouTube channels.
Watch all episodes here.