#107: Pitching in Prague
Lessons on Pressure, Teamwork, and the Joy of Doing Hard Things Together
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Hey Friends,
Welcome to the 107th edition of this newsletter.
This is a personal edition of “The Antifragile Leader” newsletter, detailing my trip to Prague for the MBA Entrepreneurship pitch. It might be a long one, so bear with me.
I don’t know where to start; it’s been one week since we pitched our business idea, “Lucid Roasters,” to a group of investors in Prague. I’ll try to be as short as I can.
The Entrepreneurship course is our last MBA course (we have another one this month, but it’s a “closing course” type of thing), but the Entrepreneurship one is the last one that is graded. As with all the other courses, we had a 4-day lecture, followed by an individual project based on an interview with an entrepreneur and a group project, which is the pitch in Prague.
Now, for the other courses, you would spend 20% of your “offline” time on the group project, which is usually a small presentation, and 80% of it on your individual homework, which is usually an analysis, an essay, a consultancy project, or a mix of those. Well, for this course, our teacher, Andreas, warned us that it would be the other way around, as we will spend a lot more time preparing for the group project.
Even before class, we had to form teams and come up with business ideas. Andreas would validate (or more often, invalidate) 2-3 of them, and we had to choose one for our project. And the project meant creating a 6,000-word business case for the idea and a 10-ish slide investment deck that we would present in a “Shark Tank”-like context in Prague.
First of all, from my perspective, we had a very, very strong team. A consultant from Google, a renowned business owner in data analytics and visualization, two former GMs, and the CFO of one of the biggest courier companies in Romania. Oh, and me, so I guess the team was just very strong.
Anyway, we brainstormed and had many meetings to come up with an idea. I had like 2-3 ones in the field of AI; there were some ideas in sustainability, some in outdoor and leisure; I can’t even remember all of them. In the end, our teacher liked most the newly founded business of one of the team members, a coffee roastery, so we went ahead with this.
The unfortunate thing was that we had around 3 weeks for this, and we also had to write the individual paper for our “Leadership” course, which was one of the most challenging ones, and then Easter came, so we had to do most of the work in the last week. And it was a very busy time, as most of us spent all our “free” time on this project, with nonstop WhatsApp messaging, meetings, and calls that would go deep into the night, and submitting the needed documents at the last minute, on Thursday night.
So, Friday morning, around half of the group embarked on a plane to Prague, eager (read as terrified) to pitch their idea to a group of investors.
We got to Prague; I had some meetings at Deloitte, checked in at the hotel, had a quick nap, and around 5 or so, our group met in the hotel restaurant to rehearse our pitch. A few meals and more than a few beers later, we were done and went to bed.
I woke up early and stressed, as I had to present some complicated slides and I hadn’t timed myself yet, so I took a shower and went to the only coffee shop near me that was open at 7:30, which was a Starbucks. It’s funny because Starbucks will eventually be a competitor of our business, but that’s life. So I went there, got a coffee, and spent the next hour and a half going through my slides and my speech, preparing for some possible questions. I even timed myself, and I was a bit off. I had to finish my 3 slides in less than 3 minutes, and I was around 4ish. But I figured out I will make it work.
I got to the University of New York in Prague at 9:30; we took some pictures on the rooftop and started the presentations. We were the second group, and it was good that we were not the first one because we got some really good insights from the feedback they received.
We started our presentation; I was the second in line of the four presenters. And while it seemed like less than a minute for me, it seems I talked well over 5 minutes, which was unfortunate, as our CFO didn’t have enough time to present the full financials. My mistake, coupled with some things we hadn’t thought of, caused the investors to be quite critical in their feedback.
I was very upset. I knew we put in so much work, I knew our idea was good, and our team was brilliant. But somehow we messed up. Or at least that’s how it felt in the moment. The other three groups presented their ideas, and I thought they were so good! I was thinking to myself, “How did I manage to mess it up?” “I should have prepared more,” and things like this. Which is something I usually do, as I’m being quite harsh on myself.
The presentations were over, and the “jury” was out for deliberation. When they came back to give us feedback, they were very positive and said they were impressed by the level of our preparation and performance, and it was the first time they didn’t have any flops. They congratulated one of the teams for their great presentations, but, surprisingly, they said that if they were to invest in one of the businesses, it would either be one business that sells mixes for baking cookies at home or ours. And they would invest in our company not because we had a good pitch, but because they felt our team was very knowledgeable and solid enough to create a successful business.
Well, I’ll choose to remember this part!
Finishing the presentations, we had almost two whole days to spend in Prague, and we had a great time. We walked around, ate good local food (we also went to a nice Ukrainian place), drank beers, sat in the sun, listened to live music, ate more food, drank more beers, and overall enjoyed what seems to be our last trip together.
We came back Monday morning, and I had a strange feeling. Of course, I was very happy to see Miki and Zeno, whom I’ve missed deeply, but I also had this feeling like camp was over, you know :) And the nauseating thought of starting work on my thesis. I had the first call with my supervisor this week, and I’ll have to work a lot for this in the next three months.
What did I learn from this experience?
Working Under Pressure: High-performance individuals will always prevail under pressure. As they say, “pressure makes diamonds.” Could we have started work on the project sooner? Sure.
Could we have planned things better? Of course?
Would we have had better results? Hard to say.
On the other hand, Parkinson’s law says that “work expands to fill the time available for completion.” It’s also impressive to see motivated individuals fixing things at the last minute.
Team Strength Over Individual Mistakes: Even when mistakes happen, a strong team can still carry you forward. Trusting your teammates' expertise and support is invaluable.
Self-Compassion Matters: Being harsh on yourself doesn’t change outcomes—it only clouds your judgment. Reflect, learn, and forgive yourself.
Preparation vs. Reality: Reality often differs from rehearsal. Embrace adaptability; it's an essential leadership skill. Always prepare for the unexpected.
You always learn. Look, I have never pitched in my life. Odds are, I will pitch again. Next time, I will be better at it. And so on. You need to try things in life.
Was it uncomfortable? It was.
Did I learn? Did I grow? Of course.
And this is what it’s all about, putting yourself out there.
But the most important thing, by far, is this:
Have fun!
Working in corporate. Doing an MBA. Working on a project.
Building a company.
Raising funds for your startup.
Always do it with people you enjoy spending time with.
With people from whom you can learn.
With people who also want to be better.
Just a little bit better every day.
And this is why this was one of the best experiences in my life.
Recommendations:
Black Mirror Season 7: Finally got to see this and it doesn’t disappoint.
This Substack post about structuring your day as a high-performer
Found this YouTube channel, Drumeo, where accomplished drummers hear one song for the first time and try to play it. It’s very fulfilling and impressive. I probably spent a couple of hours on it this week when I came across it.
Thanks for reading.
Hope this helps you finish something small (but significant) this week!
— Leo
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