Graduation Speech by Guiseppe. Thank you Giuseppe for letting me post the speech on this journal. The whole promotion elected Giuseppe to represent the class and stand up in front of everyone for one last address, based on an outline that he circulated. Giuseppe once told me that he loves organizing shows - and his being the main force behind Cabaret would naturally illustrate one of his many talents. His is a fun-loving outspoken generous creative energetic and charismatic Italian. One of the most appropriate people I can think of to represent our promotion. His speech was one of the most inspirational speeches of the ceremony - which I will comment on in more details in a future post.

"I am very proud to stand up here to receive the Ford Prize"

[laughs]

• [ENERGETIC] Congratulations – you made it!
• Today, I have the great challenge but also the privilege to represent our class, so diverse and talented. Thank you for the opportunity!

FUN, ENERGETIC, FAST PACED
[THE PAST]
• But what is INSEAD to all of us?
• To me, and to many of us, INSEAD means four things…
o Academic excellence
o Unique Lifestyle
o A source of new friendships
o An Ideal Multicultural World to live in

• Academic Excellence: 23.5 courses, more than 600 class hours, an average of 250 cases (or about 3,750 pages, always read just 1 hour before class), we have learned - even "I" have learned something. With 147 world-class faculty, and facilities in 3 different continents, we are lucky to attend such an Institution.
…But INSEAD was much more than just academia…

• Unique Lifestyle: just one number… 1 to 6. No guys, I am not talking about the ratio of women to man (even though by a strange coincidence, it appears to be quite similar)… but the ratio of time asleep versus time awake for a typical student while here at INSEAD. Sleep 4 hours, and live the rest… and how did we live them? To the FULLEST! There was no reason not to: infinite number of dinners in the amazing settings of the châteaux that hosted us; hundreds of parties, 4 formal Balls, 2 Cabarets (where we finally could all show our real skills), skiing in Chamonix, partying in Dubrovnik, sailing in the South of France, dancing in Brazil, countless nights out in the heart of Singapore and many other fascinating places.

• A Spring of New Friendships: but more than anything, this was an amazing social experience where we built incredibly strong new friendships (and more, in some cases); we studied in the same cubicles, shared opinions about how to solve a real-life case and we passionately argued about it; and when the work for the day was over (ah, who am I kidding? When for the day we would just Call it quits!), then we would spend more time with other mates going for dinners and drinks. New friends helped us during the year choosing the right job, or just applying for the right position; negotiating effectively a salary, or (if not that advanced in the job hunting process yet) just choosing the right tie or dress for the job! But we, as friends, went much further… some of us shared the same hotel rooms on vacation, others sacrificed their leased cars to their Sunday-driver friend (and never saw the car again!), others even shaved together (as a true bonding experience)… and LET’S LEAVE IT AT THAT!
… and maybe all these friendships would have never flourished, if it was for the incredibly diverse crowd that surrounds us…

• An Ideal Multicultural World to Live In: in fact, our promotion represents more than 70 nationalities. Throughout the year we learned about most of them through the traditional INSEAD National weeks that we had here in Fontainebleau and in Singapore. We learnt, amongst other things, about Chinese calligraphy, the sensual movements of Arabic belly dancing, how to play a didgeridoo, and the old and traditional Italian art of gesture management. Sipping espresso at the bar in the morning, we got used to hear at least four or five different languages being spoken around us. 90% of us live abroad now: 100% of us now have to deal with French bureaucracy – this is a real cultural challenge! As for our language skills… we CAN speak at least 3 languages… we CAN, ok???? From this multi-cultural environment though is precisely where we learnt the most (more than with the books of Accounting and Finance)… through the exchange of opinions and laughs among each other, so different in backgrounds, education, professional experiences and even principled beliefs… and yet we found common ground. Today, we do not even know which invitation, in which country, to accept for this summer… would it be the French Coast, China, Portugal or Brazil? I don’t know! And we want to go to all those places to still be together, because these 10 months were NOT ENOUGH to be together!!! We wanted to do more!

[THE FUTURE]
• This desire to do more is what makes this place so special. INSEAD bond us together and made us need the others around us. Now, it will be difficult to part from each other, and go our own ways… but we all know we need to. After all, this is why we came here on the first place.
• We came to INSEAD to learn, to change and to do better and greater things once we left. We learned (come on… we did learn!), we certainly changed… now let’s move on and make an impact on the real world.
• Personally, at INSEAD, I decided to live this year with passion and excitement, having a clear impact among our community, and making sure future generations of students would have a tough time doing better than what we did.
• I believe this is how we should approach the life awaiting from now on.
• Let’s be action oriented: waiting for things to mature and develop is quite a boring process… we need to make things happen – NOW! Once you leave this safe environment, be ready to take risks… now is as good a time as any! Get together with some of your buddies and start to make things happen. In our hearts, many of us want to be real entrepreneurs… show some guts… realize your dreams!
• Have a good impact on society: an impact that you can be proud of, in the short and long term. We want to hear about it when we meet again at reunions… we want to read about it in the newspapers, and want to see how you have improved your own community.
• Finally, live with passion more than anything else. INSEAD has been a great example. Life (like INSEAD itself) is too short to be lived less than profoundly and fully… live with the same energy the rest of your life, as if Graduation day was always coming on the 1st of July. Love what you do… and show to all the others that you love it. Because ‘passion’ at the end is the only TRUE MOTIVATOR… REALLY!

[CONCLUSION]
• This year was special for all of us: for most of us it was among the most eventful, inspiring, challenging, and fun years of our lives… for this, I want to make sure we thank our families and partners for their continued support and patience; the faculty, and all the rest of the INSEAD staff, because they *are* indeed world class … and finally, all of you, great INSEAD’ers without whom, well this school would have been quite a lonely place… LITERALLY!
• INSEAD’ers… individually you are great people, but together you are much more...
• It is indeed a cliché, but I truly feel close to many of you today as a brother. And as a brother to you all, I promise today to respect you and to love you in the years to come. But as a good brother, I also promise you that I will always hope you do the best with your life and will be quite blend and sincere if I believe you are not doing so.
• I hope you make the same promise to the colleague next to you, that you will call them when you are about to make a big decision, because no matter how smart or mature that person is, a decision made together, is much better than one made alone – and together, especially the Insead bunch which is so diverse, we will better have a grasp of what is good for our society, and what is not.
• I worked on this speech while in Dubrovnik. It was difficult though, because to summarize in seven minutes what we as a big family went through, how we changed, and where we should all try to head towards, from today on, is an incredible challenge. I wish we don’t let go of each other… I wish we remember this year as vividly as we just remembered it today… I wish we will make an impact in this world, and that when we meet again, in 5, 10, 20 years… we will still be proud of being each others brothers and sisters!
• Today, I represent all of our class before our loved ones… from tomorrow, I hope you will also get the courage or representing all of our class before your communities.

Best of luck in the future Giuseppe, I will be reading about you in People Magazine when I find out that you have taken over the organization of the Cannes Film Festival.