Back to EDHEC Rendez-Vous in London
Discover or re-discover the testimony of Dylan, a scholarship student, at the London EDHEC Rendez-vous
"Good evening everyone,
Bonjour à tous,
First, I would like to apologize to keep you waiting for the champagne and celebration. Then, I would like to thank EDHEC Business School for inviting me to this event as well as letting me speak - particular gratitude goes to Bruno Mayeur for his support. So let's get started! I'm not really here to talk about me. Not either to talk about the past, but I’ll focus on the future. Especially: How we can make this world better, isn't that what we all want? You may wonder why I'm here to speak in front of all of you: the excellence ambassador, the EDHEC Director, the Charitable Trust, the Alumni Director, as well as all of you, alumni.
I'm here to tell you a story. A story about a little boy who came from nowhere. His dad left when he was nine. Therefore, this little boy had to take care of his family, and especially his mum. You guessed that it is not easy to be a mom alone with four kids, is it? They didn't have enough to eat, and they lived in the place you don't even want to know. Trust me on that. They lived in a neighbourhood plagued with drug sales and burning cars. So this little boy didn’t understand: Why was this world so unfair? Why did he need to take care of his family when he was only 9? Finally, why they didn't have enough to eat? However, this little boy wanted so much to get out of there. He wanted to see the world, to believe that life was amazing. He managed to get to an engineering preparation class in Strasbourg. However, he didn't even know that it was a possibility. Indeed, nobody had any degrees in his family, even in his neighbourhood. After that, this little boy was 20, so he wasn’t that little anymore. However, he was still troubled by this hard childhood. However, it became a strength. Indeed, he was a fighter Never giving up Always working harder than others to get what he wanted Eventually, he didn't want to go to an engineering school and chose to go to EDHEC business school. Because he loved sales, business, and languages.
After one year at EDHEC, he managed to get an exchange to New York City, mainly thanks to all the scholarships that he got from EDHEC. The best months of his life. He knew that he was not like the other ones. As his finance teacher in New York told him, two kinds of people succeed:
1. Blue Blood people: Rich family, everyone went to Harvard etc
2. PhD, not the ones who write a thesis but the poor hungry and driven people.
He was probably part of the latter category. After that, he realised that he wanted to work in finance. Not for the money but because he just loved Finance. How challenging and diverse it was. He was passionate about it. He got a gap year at Credit Agricole CIB in sales on the Forex market, then moved to London to work in equity sales at Exane BNP Paribas. Surprisingly, he got accepted to a dual degree at London school of economics. Also, if I said “surprisingly”, it’s because it's hard to believe in yourself when nobody does, isn’t it? However, he understood after all these struggles that if you don't believe in yourself, nobody will. It's been a tough year at the LSE for him, trying to find a way to pays fees and get the degree. Finally, he managed to negotiate an arrangement with the LSE to pay them back as soon as he got a job in equity sales.
I guess that you understood who this little boy was. It’s me But, I'm here to tell you that I'm not the only one. There are thousands of them, out there. I still have a lot to learn, and I didn't achieve much. However, we can change people’s lives for better by hearing the story of this little boy. Maybe we will understand why they need you. Why all these little boys, who are smart but weren’t that lucky, need your help. It may not be much for you, however, it means a lot to them, for us. Getting this support from EDHEC made me feel less alone and reinforced my commitment to giving back by helping others in turn. That is why, once more, I would like to thank EDHEC Business School for enabling me to become the person I am today. Thank you for your attention".
