From MIP MBA student to successful entrepreneur: the story of Lily Wang

Young, brilliant, audacious and very talented: meet Lily Wang, a former MIP MBA student from Taiwan with a burning passion for the world of fashion and luxury.

What makes her so special? Her excellent results? Her important roles in big companies? Her extraordinary skills set?

All of that and more.
If we were to tell you that despite her young age, Lily has already set up a start-up company and has the foundations in place for her next business idea, would you be interested in hearing her story for a bit of inspiration?

We imagine you would: quite simply, Lily is a great example of enterprise and courage for any young people wishing to throw off the shackles of the stagnant work market and plough their own furrow.

So, let’s rewind the tape and start from the beginning.

Lily began her career in the world of tourism, a sector experiencing exponential growth in the East. It proved to be the start of a brilliant future career in management.

Lily’s strength of will, desire to grow and dedication to her work were so overpowering that she was left wanting more, dreaming big.

And so Lily’s journey through the world of entrepreneurship began, as she decided to found an art start-up connecting artists, auction houses and galleries in order to create a complete, functional service.

Yet running a business is a complex thing, full of challenges and difficulties. The first? To shake off the employee mindset of being bogged down in a specific role, take a step back and acquire a more panoramic vision of the bigger picture.

Lily herself tells us that “in order to successfully manage a company (…) a general understanding of the processes within and around your business is a great asset�.

So how can you achieve such an understanding? By studying for an MBA, for a start.

Indeed, developing business-leader skills is the core mission of an MBA, making it an effective and prestigious way to transform yourself into the complete manager.

Having sold her shares in her successful start-up, which was already turning a profit in its first year of operation, Lily picked MIP in Milan, “an epic city of art and luxury�, from the many universities around the world. It was a strategic decision aimed at enabling her to broaden her knowledge of the sectors she was most interested in and gain invaluable on-the-ground experience, something that would become a precious competitive asset.

Lily’s experience at MIP, where she studied on the MBA Full Time Programme, allowed her to realise that as well as the need to perfect her theoretical understanding, the world of business is first and foremost built on relationships.

As Lily puts it, no matter how brilliant you are, “you can never be a one-man show�.

The challenges of growing your business, finding the best partners and establishing privileged access channels to the wider business world are easier to tackle if you can create a network of relationships, contacts and solid, enduring friendships.

To put it simply, in order to be a real business leader you must be able to network.

This elusive quality is truly crucial if you are going to be successful in business, and it is a skill nurtured by participation in an MBA programme and by the daily contact with “classmates, professors and alumni� that “could all be very important assets and useful connectors�.

And now? With her MBA done and dusted, Lily is already working hard on launching her brand-new business idea: a company in the fashion and luxury sector aimed at simplifying links between Europe and Asia, facilitating international trade and boosting growth.

Read the full interview with Growing Leader Lily Wang here and get inspired today.