📍 Haarlem
Mentor Bio
Emily Jacometti, known for her pioneering work in gamification and digital education, is a leading entrepreneur and speaker in the technology world. As co-founder of HackShield Future Cyber Heroes and Hero Center, she has dedicated herself to generating social impact through the power of play and storytelling. HackShield, an innovative game that teaches children how to defend themselves against cybercrime, has received significant recognition since its launch in 2019, including the prestigious Computable Award for ICT Project of the Year.
At the age of 24, right after school and with no experience, Emily started her first company, Flavour, above a car garage in Amsterdam. Flavour developed custom gaming and gamification products. Within ten years, the start-up grew into a multinational with over one hundred employees.
In 2019, she decided to change course: she stopped delivering custom products and focused even more on social issues. This led to the creation of HackShield, which is now active in six countries and has forty employees. Flavour further developed as the umbrella company under which HackShield operates. Additionally, it offers gamification products to other organizations using the building blocks developed for HackShield. Finally, the method used for HackShield, Hero Centered Design, is applied in the development of products for other organizations.
Current role and activities
As co-CEO, Emily is responsible for the development of gamification and storytelling software widely used for educational and transformative purposes. Under her leadership, Flavour has won multiple national and international awards, confirming the effectiveness and innovation of their methods.
In addition to her entrepreneurship, Emily is also active as a board member of the Dutch Games Association, where she specifically focuses on the serious games industry in the Netherlands. She regularly shares her insights and experiences as a woman in technology as a speaker at conferences and seminars, covering topics such as entrepreneurship, gamification, hero-centered design, and diversity.
What you can learn from her
- Business development
- How to be an innovative entrepreneur in applied games
- The power of gamification and how to apply hero centered design
- Pitching, funding and making connections
It’s better to fail and learn then not to try at all.