[MUSIC]
By show of hands, who of you likes free food.
Perfect because free pizza changed my life.
>> [LAUGH].
>> It was a cold October evening my freshman year of college and
I was in the main building of my university.
The universal school of economics, finishing up the last day of a five day
marathon called, student union elections campaign.
Now I had dedicated all my time to this, ever since high school, I wanted
to become a policy maker and work in Brussels in the European Union Structures.
So I was dedicated and becoming a member of my university
student union seemed like a natural next step to achieving my professional goal.
Nothing else mattered.
So that October evening as I was packing up my things,
I bumped into my friend, coincidentally at a meat hall as well.
He said I'm hungry let's grab a slice of pizza
that they have in the room upstairs in one of the student club's meetings.
He said it would take only a minute.
Now I was exhausted.
I was exhausted to the point that I think I actually snoozed when he was
telling me this.
But somehow I agreed.
Unfortunately that minute turned into a dreadful hour.
A dreadful presentation that I had to sit through,
the presentation was called consulting, the best job in the world.
>> [LAUGH].
>> I was really angry at him and
as soon as they finished, I just stormed out of the room.
I went back home.
As I got back home, I opened my laptop and there was an email from him saying,
well you left before they started signing people up for projects, so
I signed you up for one.
Now I was not happy or thankful.
But I am happy today, I am happy that I bumped into him.
I am happy that I had this hour-long slice of pizza and
I'm thankful that he signed me up for this project.
Because of this project, I actually joined the consulting club and
the next year I became it's president.
In this club, I first heard the name Procter and Gamble and I fell in love with
marketing, which led to my career in brand management and eventually got me here.
So the slice of pizza that i have no rational reason to go for
at the moment, actually inflicted series of events that changed my life choices.
Now ever since then I've had many more serendipitous events in my life.
And each single one of them left the happiest memories, and
the closest relationships that I cherish and hold deep in my heart.
Now to me this is the true impact of serendipity.
Why am I telling you this?
Because I know that each single one of you
has had at least one serendipitous event in your life.
Even though you might not know what you did to make this opportunity happen.
So, today I want to share with you four suggestions
that help me increase serendipity in my life and hopefully will help you as well.
So number one, just turn up.
When I was working Proctor & Gamble in Geneva, there was a small media digital
agency that reached out to me and asked if I could have an hour meeting with them.
I didn't want to for 3 reasons, I wasn't looking for a digital agency,
I was swamped with work and it was the last week before the,
3 week vacation I had booked a year earlier, but again,
somehow I agreed, we had to call, exchange emails, then not talk for a year.
After a year, I got shipped back to Poland and I was in need of a digital agency.
So, I called them up, I hired them.
We did the project.
It was super successful.
So, I went out for beers with one of the co-founders.
After two or three beers I think, I became a little bit too sincere with them.
>> [LAUGH].
>> Because, because I told him that I'm actually really not happy with my
current position at PNG, and I want to change something in my professional life.
I wasn't looking for advice, but what he said next just hit me like a rock.
He said why don't you get an MBA.
You know what?
He was one of only five GSB grads that lived in Poland at that time.
What are the chances, right?
Now, he helped me with the application, wrote one of the recommendation letters,
and the rest is history.
So, we have often find ourselves being invited to meetings and
at least my default is to decline when I don't see an immediate benefit, but
I challenge you just as I challenge myself who make just turn up a rule.
Number two, put yourself in the right place.
So this happened when I was junior at my college and
I wanted to spend my summer in marketing at a CPG company.
The best in the world, not Pepsi.
PNG, am sorry, sorry.
[LAUGH] Proctor and Gamble, now the tough is that, they had a limited
number of slots and, it was really hard to get a hold of marketing managers.
So what I did is I applied to an IT case study,
of course with no prior IT background.
Somehow I got in.
Now when I walked into the room and everyone started introducing themselves,
I really felt out of place cuz there were 29 CS and engineering majors and
me, marketing and management major.
But, you know what, one of the panelists was a brand manager and
I was the only person interested in marketing.
So I just approached him after the case study, I told him, hey,
can we grab a coffee?
This coffee led to me getting an interview and eventually getting an internship.
So, paraphrasing famous Steve Ballmer's presentation to developers.
Location, location, location.
>> [LAUGH] [APPLAUSE].
>> If you want to find relevant people through your course,
make sure you put yourself right in the middle.
>> [LAUGH].
>> Number 3, use serendipity engines, I started my blog in July 2013,
just before coming to the GSB.
And throughout the last one and a half years, I've had more
people reach out to me, than throughout the previous 28 years of my life.
In fact, one person wrote to me that my book was one of the reasons that
he applied to the GSB.
He got in and he's coming next Fall, so who knows?
Maybe he'll become my future co-founder and fellow billionaire.
>> [LAUGH].
>> But my point is here that there's so many of those engines and
you can name them.
WordPress, Medium, Twitter, Facebook, and
I think it's a sin not to be using them because they're out there 24/7 so
the create this amazing background home for, for opportunity and for serendipity.
And last but not least is, don't require a reason, particularly in business school
I find myself needing a reason for every single thing I do.
And in fact last year I signed up for
a disco class called leadership through flow.
People ask me like why did you do that.
And I told them like, I don't know.
And to be honest with you, I still have no clue why I did that.
>> [LAUGH].
>> [LAUGH] But it was refreshing,
it was fun, and I learned that such seemingly insignificant thing as posture,
can have a major impact on how people perceive your leadership skills.
So, it's okay to say, I don't know why.
It's okay to do things, even if you don't know why,
because the experience and the knowledge that you can get out of them,
can benefit you in the most unexpected of circumstances.
Now there's an obvious danger.
There's an obvious danger with serendipity.
There's an obvious danger in chasing those open-ended opportunities
that might not had, have an immediate benefit in your life.
The danger is that you get distracted from your day-to-day work and
you become frustrated.
But you know what, if you don't open your life for
serendipity, you will get stuck in a rut.
And you will become miserable.
So, [LAUGH] what I think the solution is to find
the Goldilocks zone of not too little, not too much.
Just enough so that the next time your friend tells you there is a free pizza at
an event, take him or her on it, because that free pizza can change your life.
It truly changed mine.
Thank you.
>> [APPLAUSE].
[MUSIC]