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Executive Summary

Elevator Pitch – the Empowering MBA Experience

April 7, 2010

in GWU School of Business,MBA experience

Continued from Executive Summary – Brewing Disaster.

What started and promised to stay as just another lackluster group assignment, turned into probably one of the most empowering experinces in my MBA endevour so far (Ok, getting an A in Microeconomics comes as second close :-)  ).


When I showed up for class a bit earlier than usually, I met with the rest of the team and asked what we were going to do as a group. It was literally 10-15 minutes before class. Surprisingly, two people from the group found my idea quite interesting. They, turned out, also had reservations about the original one, even if for different reasons. The guy with original idea graciously conceded and agreed to go along with my proposal. Another guy just hopped on the new bandwagon. 

We had to decide on the Elevator Pitch presentation then. Of course, I was the natural choice to do the Pitch, since I obviously had the best idea of the business start up, and I could not expect people to turn on a dime and do a presentation of something they just learned a few minutes ago. I had to confess here, I was still working on my public speaking skills, which was true. So, I asked if someone else felt confident enough to present the Pitch based on the Executive Summary they’d just read. One person stepped forward and  said she could do it. It was a huge relief for me.  Our team was the seventh to do presentation. This was all the time she had to prepare – while other six teams were doing their Pitch. We also had to evaluate other teams’ presentations in the meanwhile.

So, the rest of the “preparation” took place in class, before it was our turn to do presentation. While the teammate who volunteered to do the Elevator Pitch was preparing, she asked me to do a short intro and mission statement. In intro she wanted me to explain how I had come up with the business idea. I had shared with my team briefly before class that the whole idea was inspired by my 11-year old daughter, who is very entrepreneurial. I thought that natural entrepreneurial spirit of the kids in upper-elementary and middle school was usually stifled by the time they could do something meaningful as grown ups. And that was really how I got on the whole path of thinking about it and doing some preliminary research.

Of course, I had no choice, but to agree to do the mission statement part of presentation, given all the implications of putting my team on a spot at the very last moment. Another team member offered to pick up the part on the financial model and revenue generating model in the Pitch. In my Executive Summary I was fuzzy on that aspect, as I did not have time to think it through in details. So he suggested to talk about corporate sponsorship model. At that moment the only natural reaction to this proposal could be: “Of course, whatever! Just do it!”

When our turn to do the Elevator Pitch eventually came, we had three presenters. The whole thing was prettey much pulled out on improvization based on a half-baked Executive Summary, which was born just a few hours prior. 

After a 3-minutes presentation we were answering questions from the classmates on different aspect of the enterprise. All three of us pitched in to answering those questions. As a group we were giving quite coherent response.

I was really amazed by what we managed to accomplish as a team under the circumstances.

The highest mark for me was that the guy who had done presentation in the class of his real functioning non-profit, found the idea very plausible and shared some advice with me. So did the professor in his comments after the presentation. That was just unbelievable.

 I just have to confirm again what I said in the beginning of the post: the making of the Elevator Pitch was probably one of the most empowering experiences for me personally in my MBA tenure at GWSB so far. The most amazing part of it was how my teammates were able to step in at the last moment and just do it.

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Executive Summary – the Brewing Disaster

April 6, 2010

in GWU School of Business,MBA experience

On the first day of classes our professor in Entrepreneurship prompted us to form study teams to work on a few group assignments throughout the course. Namely, we were expected to work in groups on the Executive Summary and Elevator Pitch for some business start up. I joined a group of classmates I knew from my previous classes, but we have not worked together on group projects before. After the first class we convened for a few minutes to discuss our course of actions, select the business idea to develop into the Summary and the Pitch.

Turned out, one of my team mates was involved in helping an actual start up with their business plan and funding solicitation. He shared a general idea of the start up and the service they were going to provide. He offered to use the executive summary of the start up he had been working with for our group assignment. He also volunteered to present this in the form of an Elevator Pitch, which was sort of natural, given his close involvment with that start up.

We all thought it was a good idea, especially because it was a real thing, not just something we would make up in our minds just for the sake of presenting in class. So we agreed to take that start up for our group assignments. Of course, we all pledged to pitch in to the project on “as needed” basis.


In the following weeks, overwhelmed with other assignments and for various other reason, we just let it slip. We were talking in general terms about it on our breaks during the class, but that was it. I actually did not even get the Executive Summary of our start up in writing untill the night before the class when it was due, along with the Elevator Pitch presentation.

I volunteered to type out and format the Executive Summary into the form suitable for presentation. And this is where the exciting part began. I only got to reading the Summary for the first time around noon on the day of presentation/submission it in class. To tell you the truth, when I first heard the idea of the start up, I had some reservations about the nature of the service and viability of the business model. But it seemed like an easy way to deal with the assignment, and I thought I could go along with it.

When I actually read the Summary while working on formatting it, I realized that I personally would not be able to sign my name under that business. I formatted it to give to the group, as I promised. But I had to do something else in the remaining 4-5 hours to present for myself, as missing the points in the course because of non-submitted assignment was not an option.

That was a gruelling exercise. I had to come up with a business idea and turn it into something credible in this extremely short time. Mind you, other groups had spent at least a couple of weeks working on that assignment. For the first two hours I was just relentlessly brainstorming, all by myself,  all possibilities which could at least remotely pass for a credible business start up. At times my brain was freezing because of the time pressure.

Eventually I came up with a business idea which was connected to something I had been thinking about in general terms and had done some preliminary online research in the last week or so. The business start up idea was based on the premises of scarce resources available for entrepreneurial training at elementary and middle school level. Once I figured that out, I put together an Executive Summary in the remaining time. At that moment I could not even think about the Elevator pitch part of the assignment. I was just happy to have something on paper to turn in at class.

Now was the time to break the news about my “defection” to the group. I sent them an email with explanation that I could not support and undersign the original business idea. I attached both Executive Summaries, for the original business and for the one I had cooked in the previous few hours. I offered my business idea as our group paper, if they agreed, and said that I would have to go solo if they stuck on the original one. That way the group would not suffer from my withdrawl, and I would have to deal with the rest on my own.

Continued: Elevator Pitch-Empowering MBA Experince.

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