How an internationally minded MBA led to a bold move

Everything started in the countryside outside Bordeaux, where I was raised by a single mom in a working-class home. My mom used to tell me that, as a kid, I wanted either to be the master of the world or an inventor. I was always challenging things, trying to understand why do things work this way? This kind of thinking followed me throughout my life.

After a bachelors degree in entrepreneurship at the University of Bordeaux and a few years of working at Carrefour, the supermarket group, I followed my wife — who is a cancer researcher — to Singapore. It was a struggle. Back then, being queer in Singapore was challenging because it wasn’t always easy to be fully accepted or live openly. I moved to the other side of the world on a tourist visa — not only did I have to find a job, but I had to find an employer that would sponsor my [work] visa.

But I believe in the importance of meetings between people, and there were a lot of interesting people in Singapore. Finally, I met this crazy Australian guy who was building a chain of beautiful grocery stores called Little Farms, and I started helping him out.

He became my mentor, and he was the one who first told me: “If you are thinking of moving to the US, you should do an MBA — it will really help you.” Because my wife is a scientist, moving to the US was always part of the long-term plan.

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So, when my wife returned to France to finish her PhD, it was the perfect opportunity for me to do an MBA. I chose Kedge Business School, partly as it has a campus in Bordeaux, where I’m based when I’m in France. It also has great electives — anything from public speaking to negotiations — and the best part was you could do as many as you wanted. It was great for me — not only did I learn a lot, but also I met a lot of people.

The team at Kedge was super responsive and supportive. Doing an MBA was the most expensive thing I had ever done in my life at the time — if you put it all together, it was almost €60,000 — so, when you’re doing something like that, it’s important to have a supportive team.

With an MBA, you really touch on everything. I had an operational background, international experience and an entrepreneurial mindset. But, with the MBA I was getting visibility of things that were new to me, such as horizontal marketing.

My favourite parts of the course were the international seminars. I chose to go to the US twice, once to Florida and the second time to Portland, where we studied together with students from other cities.

There were about 60 students in my class and I would say about a third of them were international. When I moved to Singapore, I learnt about other mindsets in life but also in work, and I really wanted more of that experience.

I was 28 when I started the course, which was pretty young. A lot of the people I was learning with were 40 plus and had different experiences. One time I remember working on a project with a professional dancer, a boat skipper and a top executive from a car manufacturing company. The experience was so enriching — otherwise, I would never have met or worked with these people.

Two weeks after I handed in my final MBA coursework, I landed in New York, where I had never been before and didn’t know anyone. With the experience of Singapore at the back of my mind, I started by trying to meet new people.

To make it easier, I started with the French community. Soon, I met the team that was trying to set up a corporate catering business called Fraîche. They needed help and I believed in the project, so I joined them. Very soon, I was hustling in New York.

I would say the main thing that the MBA gave me was the sense of youthful confidence, which is often lost as you develop as an adult. In the MBA, I studied and worked together with top executives in their 50s and realised that, often, they were not necessarily smarter than me and — importantly — I realised they had the same fears as me.

It really put things into perspective. That boost of confidence is still in me.