How to Win a B-School Competition

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Students at the Rice Business Plan Competition, housed at Rice University's Jones Graduate School of Management, have a chance to get several rounds of feedback from the judges during the three-day contest, said competition director Philana Diaz. Incorporating this feedback can be what makes the difference between getting to the next round or staying on the sidelines, she said. Students who advance to the finals will sometimes spend a few days holed up in their hotel room, retooling their business plans to incorporate judges' suggestions. "Those that advance and do well are the ones that take the feedback from Thursday and incorporate it into the present even if the turnaround time is short," Diaz said.

GET MENTORS. Compile a team with supportive advisers and mentors in your field. This is one of the most important things students can do in a business-plan competition, according to students and judges. These people can lend more eyes and ears, providing valuable feedback. Just ask Nevan Hanumara, an MIT doctoral student in mechanical engineering and a member of the Robopsy team, which took first place at the MIT $100K competition this spring. He spent several hours at Massachusetts General Hospital watching radiologist Dr. Rajiv Gupta perform needle biopsies on lung cancer patients.

Hanumara's team eventually designed a remotely controlled biopsy needle that doctors can operate while a patient is inside a CT machine. The insight the team received from Gupta and another MIT professor was "critical" in the development of the team's business plan, said Hanumara.

"The hospital was willing to try things out and let us come in," Hanumara said. "They weren't, like, ‘Oh God, here are students with gizmos.'"

Dwork, the GreenWare designer, spent several hours talking to restaurateur Danny Meyers, owner of the Union Square Hospitality Group, and Steve Michaelson, president of FreshDirect, while researching his business plan. "There are a lot of people out there you can safely talk to who can tell you if the idea makes sense," Dwork said.

However use advisers carefully. Students should be wary of listing advisers on their business plans unless they have spent a significant amount of time with them discussing the plan, said Joseph Hadzima, a senior lecturer at MIT's Sloan School and one of the founding judges of the MIT $100K. "What stands out is when they list a bunch of advisers, and it's clear that their advisers haven't done much advising," Hadzima said. "If it's a bunch of window-dressing, that comes through easily."

PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE.

The old adage "practice makes perfect" is one that business-plan competitors should keep in mind before appearing in front of judges. But there's a fine line between practicing too much and sounding like you're reading from a script during a presentation, said Draper, the Columbia judge. Walk into the competition polished, but also try to be spontaneous during the presentation, he advises. "We can tell if it's a memorized speech," Draper said. "I like them to know their stuff so well that it seems off the cuff, like it's part of their being."

Members of the MIT team that won the Columbia competition said they approached their presentation as if they were telling a story. The three-person team designed an antibacterial coating called SteriCoat that will be used to reduce the risk of infection in patients using catheters. They practiced their pitch on everyone from a spouses to MIT professors, said David Lucchino, one of the team members. "I think presenting to a cross-section of people gave us a real benefit," said Lucchino. "What happens a lot of the time is that you are so close to this that you lose perspective on who you are presenting to."

BE PASSIONATE. Teams that make it to the top at these competitions often walk in knowing that they are committed to their business plan for the long term, even if they don't manage to win the competition.