In March 2003, I started working for the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), one of the world's big three consulting firms.
I don't believe in luck, because I believe that behind every success there is a lot of work, resignation, a lot of diligence and perseverance, but I felt really lucky there.
I travelled, worked with great colleagues and clients on big international projects.
It was a lot of work, but I enjoyed it. After all, what else is there to do in your twenties for a young enthusiastic economist.
I had a dream career, yet I was always thinking about starting my own start-up, I wanted to create my own company.
I already worked out 20 IT start-ups in my mind, when one evening my BCG colleagues pointed out to me that instead of starting a company from scratch in an unknown industry, I should join the family business, as tourism and gastronomy is a sector that will grow explosively in the 2000s and has a lot of potential.
Moreover, my parents were running a very successful restaurant for 20 years at that time, they knew the sector and I could develop it with my strategic thinking and knowledge background in economics.
Briefly, they advised me to look at the family business as if it were a start-up.
I don't remember the specific moment when I made the decision, but my parents were very shocked.
My mother was not at all supportive of me working in hospitality because, as she always said, why should I work as much as they do, that's not why I was educated in American universities and besides, I already have a very strong corporate experience, I should stay in that line.
Of course, if you think about it, I also worked 16 hours a day at BCG...
I thought over what my friends said and it felt like the perfectly logical step.
In 2006 I took a year off to study for an MBA in Hotel Management at Cornell University in the USA. My parents' friend János Kiss, whom I consider my mentor, helped me get an internship in Miami at the then opening boutique hotel of Hyatt - so I took part in a very serious management training programme there.
After returning home from a year of studying in the US, I left BCG and joined the family business sixteen years ago, in the autumn of 2006...
This week, under one of my "40 years, 40 stories" posts, a former BCG colleague commented that he told me I would not return to BCG when I left for America and how right I was that I did not.
And how right he is
With friendship,
Roy