How to Receive Curly Fries for Life

What I learned from university students pursuing their dreams

A fifth-grade teacher asks their students to write a business letter. In this assignment, they need to make an ask of any person or company in the world. Students should dream big, ask for anything, and most importantly do it in the form of a business letter. 25 blissfully naive students must send off their most audacious, polite, and ridiculous requests. 

This assignment is pure genius. We’re encouraging our next generation to reach for the stars, be bold, be creative, think outside the box, and just go for it. The students aren’t jaded by the realities of the corporate world. Their requests aren’t timed to coincide with the fiscal year or latest venture raise. They are not qualifying their leads and identifying financial champions using BANT, or aligned with a formal RFP. Most of the requests were written with #2 pencil on recycled white lined paper. Some students had the wild ambition to type and print their requests, rather than handwriting them.  (Anyone remember when using a #2 pencil with yellow paper was for drafts, and teachers hoarded the white paper, to be used with pen, for the final versions?)  

Believe it or not, the outcome of the assignment is straight from a Hallmark Channel inspirational-movie-of-the-week. Most of the students get exactly what they asked for. 

Kate, one of the fifth graders, asks for curly fries for life from Arby's. 

The venerable culinary institution was so moved that they created a certificate for A Lifetime of Curly Fries from their local location, and mailed it to the student. This is both brilliant customer service and great way to engage with your customers! It was 2002—pre-social media as we know it today—but the groundwork was laid for #NuggsForCarter.

Now, did the lifetime certificate have a ton of restrictions? Sure, but we don’t have to get lost in the details. The lesson here is that a student made a bold ask—and her curly fry dreams came true. 

If the student didn’t ask, it never would have happened.  

“And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”  In The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho, was clearly alluding to a Lifetime of Curly Fries.

This fifth-grade assignment teaches so many life lessons I decided to incorporate it into my own university teaching. 

Over the past three years, I've asked over a hundred students at Stanford University, University of Michigan, and Carnegie Mellon University to make an ask of any person, mentor, or company, in a similar manner to the fifth-graders’ letters. Students are asked to consider things that would benefit their future careers or the collective careers of others in our class. Aside from that guidance, there are no rules. Most students make their request by email; others use direct messages on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram, using whatever platform is most appropriate for them.

Over the years, 70% of my students achieved their asks within only one or two follow ups. (We’ll explore the 30% who did not fully achieve their asks in a follow-up article.)  

As a result of those 70% successes the students’ career trajectories were vastly changed. Students met folks such as Chance the Rapper’s manager, Apple’s Audio R&D team, and the editor of Inc Magazine. They received accelerated internship offers from Google, Bose, and Amazon. They now have insider connections and one-on-one relationships with leadership from YouTube, Spotify, and Pandora | SiriusXM.

Students always initially start out doubtful when this task is set for them. “I was certainly skeptical and nervous about reaching out to someone to ask for something, but I quickly realized that the worst thing that could happen is they say no.” said Michael, a senior at the University of Michigan.  

Alexis, a Michigan graduate student added, “I think as students we often are hesitant to reach out to professionals because we are afraid of being ignored or rejected. However, I think because we are students, we should try to leverage our student status more frequently and be more shameless to reach out and get the things that we want.”  

Yes! Students, especially college students, must try to leverage their student status more frequently. 

Dream big. 

Ask for help from a given industry. 

If you’re embracing a lifetime of student loan debt, at least take advantage of this limited-time status as a student. I’m not sure why, but it seems that industry folks are much more inclined to help out active university students than a recent unemployed and struggling recent grads. 

What surprises my students the most about this process?  The most frequent answer: “That this actually works.”   

Curly fries, anyone?