Lorenzo Lugli, Executive MBA XV
7 January 2021For Lorenzo, the BBS Community is a world of shared opportunities that broadens your mind, opens up new horizons and helps you nurture your passions.
Also, thanks to people like him, who has chosen to share his thoughts with us, we can say that our Community is today larger, stronger, and more alive than ever. We’re proud we’ve created an environment in which you have “the awareness of not being alone”.
A degree in Computer Engineering and a short period as programmer were the experiences that enabled me to transfer projects and dreams into a small enterprise specializing in design, building, and the maintenance of large industrial plants. Here, my ambition and desire to do things immediately found a place where to settle and, in my capacity as Junior Engineer, I started working on increasingly important projects. Over the years, we worked in the main sectors of heavy industry, from iron and steel to Oil & Gas through Power Generation, to the automotive, shipbuilding and railway sectors.
During this long journey I went from construction yards to product development, from strategy to sales management. The time to leave the nest, so to say, came after going to the Commission in Brussels with my colleagues, for a project recognized as innovative, that was awarded a grant and that enabled us to project our vision onto more and more ambitious goals.
I’d just completed the EMBA and this certainly prepared me for the jump I was about to take, it helped me spread my wings and start over from scratch. My second professional life actually started in a company whose core business was far from my technical expertise, with the aim of bringing a change management project to a consolidated company, organized around traditional business lines. For a personality like mine, this leap into the void wouldn’t have been as straightforward without the EMBA I’d attended at BBS and without the experiences developed, also thanks to the relationships with the other participants.
The EMBA and what followed it was for me the trigger of a journey of personal and professional growth which I believe is still at the beginning.
What enriched me being part of the BBS Community was the opportunity to break stereotyped models, in order to acquire a sharper and more realistic view of the business context, but also of the way with which to relate to collaborators, co-workers, and, more in general, with the different stakeholders.
The awareness of not being alone is what has remained with me ever since I started my path at Bologna Business School.
Recently, I needed to collect some information for a new project and the first people I turned to were precisely my colleagues at BBS, because I knew they’d give me a professional and honest point of view. Even though, in many cases, we’re all very busy, we always manage to find time for the Community, in the attempt of giving back a portion of what we’ve received.
Thanks to one of my EMBA fellow students, Franco Valentini, who wanted me to join the organizing team, I had the opportunity to participate in the creation of A4A – Alumni for Alumni, an association headed by Franco and born out of the contribution of some EMBA XV, that immediately opened up to the other MBA’s participants.
The aim was to share the valuable contributions brought by the participants in the various BBS Master’s courses who, along their paths, devoted time to being learners, in addition to having the human and professional qualities and talents to be teachers.
Then I took part in the “Boosting Sales Management” study group, this too launched by our indestructible Franco Valentini, together with a team of experts. Covid didn’t help, because many of us were challenged within our respective organizations, but the fire burns under the ashes and the proof is that on November 30th the study group will start again.
There are several things from my time at BBS that stay with me. The first few that come to my mind are the desire to challenge the status quo before deciding whether to embrace it or not, the overarching view I developed, lateral thinking, being disruptive and the desire to face things from different angles. Then there’s undoubtedly the wealth of experiences I’ve come into contact with, thanks to the relationships with my fellow students, with the faculty and the collaborators of the Executive MBA, and also with the BBS Community, which I was able to get to know better, expanding my network of contacts during the various networking events in which I took part.
I’d suggest to anyone who is at BBS to make the most of the Community because the eyes of those who shared a need don’t lie.
Those who found at BBS a powerful tool to start filling up an empty space, may find in the Community the nourishment to keep on feeding their passions and their relationships: it’s a kind of magic!
Take good care of yourselves!
So long,
Lorenzo Lugli
