My team was lucky enough to come in first place. And then after lunch, Daniel Epstein and Teju Ravilochan both co-founders of the institute gave a great welcoming speech. I will share two things that really sticked:
- Treat everyone as if they were the Messiah - with lots of respect, lots of attention, lots of love, lots of will to learn from what they represent.
- And this also made me remember what my great friend R.A.S. told me about making something different to really attract attention from your potential customers. While they told an incredible story about a guy that sent watermelons to get attention of potential investors, they conclude that in order to get the attention of Fortune 500´s CEOs you need to think as an unreasonable fellow. In their specific case of the 2011 Institute, they sent big stuffed penguins with a hand written note to every mentor and capital partner asking them to join the institute. You can be sure that all of them will always remember getting that big box, the penguin, and of course, the written words.
We then had time to talk about our strengths and weaknesses as entrepreneurs and to meet and chat for at least 2 mins with the other 26 entrepreneurs. It was amazing to hear people from around the world sharing the same feelings and to confirm that everybody lives for their venture and for helping people in various ways.
At the end of the day we met our first Capital Partner, Taryn Goodman, who manages the Impact Investing at RSF Social Finance, a nonprofit financial institution offering investing, lending, and giving services that support social and spiritual renewal.
Tomorrow is the opening reception and every entrepreneur would have the opportunity to give a two minutes pitch answering the following quesiton: Who am I to define progress in our time?
I might post my answer as soon as I have it...
