Returning to college after 10 years

I was asked to speak to the economics and law students at the University of Sannio in Benevento, to share teachings and secrets related to professional success.

I decided to open my speech by talking about Iceberg and how this extraordinary phenomenon of nature is the perfect synthesis of the life of each of us. Often people only know the tip of the iceberg, what we show of ourselves: the successes, the confidence, the best essence of what we are. In truth, people often forget that the entire iceberg floats thanks to the enormous block of ice that is under the water and that no one sees, in that block of ice there are disappointments, failures, lessons learned (at a high price), the falls from which we got up and all our experience, the same one that has shaped us forever.

We look at people's success thinking that there are greater forces such as "luck", "chance", "the right person at the right time" and many, many others. Instead, it would be enough to talk 5 more minutes with these people to discover that luck does not exist, that in life no one will ever give you anything for free and that if you want to be successful you have to roll up your sleeves and commit yourself, in any field, discipline or context you want to do it.

Yesterday's was an exciting session, a way to introduce the kids to the right mindset that can support them in challenges outside of university.

In particular, I shared with them 7 lessons that, going back to the desks of the first days of university, would have helped me to face these last 10 years in a different way:

Lesson number 1: Passion is the greatest form of motivation

“Did you choose to study law because you want to be a lawyer?” How many times have we heard this phrase, as if the very fact of having started a path immediately imposes a label on us, the stamp of what will be the goal to reach. The thought alone already makes us anxious about having to understand, years before, if it is really what we want or not. It is not like that, always choose what makes you happy , choose what makes you feel good, what makes you feel passionate and you will see that beyond the goal you will reach (even if different from the one you had imagined), your path will always be accompanied by a very strong determination. Don't ask yourself if what you are doing today will lead you tomorrow to do what you want, in life often things never go as you think, ask yourself instead if what you are doing today makes you happy.

Lesson number 2: Humility

Be humble, accept challenges, go door-to-door selling, serve in a restaurant or try to be a rider for a food delivery company, work ennobles man and has the great peculiarity of making you gain experience, the greatest form of learning and growth. Often people never start, they remain in search of the perfect job, of what the movies have taught us or what we hear around, in the meantime the years pass and it becomes increasingly difficult to start. Don't waste time, start with what you find, with humility and you will see that step by step you will get much more.

Lesson number 3: Skills are needed

I would never stop learning new things, challenge yourself to read a new book or take a new course. Don't stop, Socrates said that " wise is he who knows he doesn't know ", and don't say you don't have time, you just need to give up a TV series on Netflix to grow your knowledge. Thanks to digital you can access any type of information at any time, take advantage of it!!

Lesson Number 5: We are all afraid

Learn to live with your fears, don’t listen to those who tell you that you have to be “brave”, that you have to “fight fear”. The truth is that everyone is afraid and that the people you see as self-confident have done nothing but learn to live with fear, to ride it, to draw positive energy from it. Try to look at fear from a different perspective and you will discover that it can be your greatest source of motivation.

Lesson number 6: We are in a global market

Thinking of studying, making a career or starting a new business thinking about the local market is a failure from the start. In an increasingly global world we can only think in WWW mode. Learn English, take advantage of university studies, opportunities such as Erasmus, foreign colleagues, to learn and practice your English, it will be the skill that will be most useful to you in your future.

Lesson number 7: The job interview and personal branding

The era of the CV is over, you can't think that a good CV is enough to find a job. Today companies select people more and more on soft skills, on the ability to solve problems and work in a team. Take care of your personal branding, if you haven't done so yet open your profile on Linkedin, 2.0 companies hire mainly using Linkedin and the sooner you start creating your own digital identity on this social network too, the greater your chances of making a good impression during your next job interview.

I must say that I never imagined I would find myself in a similar situation, it was truly exciting to receive compliments from students, professors and collaborators of the University , returning to the benches after almost 10 years was the strongest demonstration of how, by applying the 7 rules just described, it is easy to obtain unimaginable results.

A special thanks to Prof. Francesco Rota, an extraordinary person with an uncommon vision, I was lucky enough to meet him on this occasion and I am sure that we will collaborate together again, I leave you with a backstage video, funny, irreverent and that closes this post with the most important advice that I wanted to pass on to the guys: study and work while having fun!!!!

John