Virgin Entrepreneur

Virgin Entrepreneur
Richard Branson started his
first businesses as a youth.
Decades later, he’s still
excited by the next
new idea, the
next challenge.
by Mary Vinnedge
and
Jesse Nash

Joanna Vestey/Corbis

©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved

©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved Success  July 2009  45
 Virgin Entrepreneur

t he 20-something Richard Branson racked up a

résumé that would impress no one: high-school dropout with
poor reading and math skills. Failed get-rich-quick schemes.
Long-haired, barefooted hippie. Struggling business that led to
two arrests and a night in jail on suspicion of tax evasion.
But as he turns 59 in July, Branson’s life seems as golden as his locks. Worth about $4.4 billion, he ranked as the 236th
richest person in 2008, according to Forbes. Branson has put his Virgin brand on independent businesses in the airline,
hospitality, space travel and financial industries, to name a few. He has made headlines as a humanitarian, environmentalist
and adventurer. In 2000, he was knighted for his services to entrepreneurship.
Perseverance, imagination and courage sustained his transformation. His family nurtured his independence and entre-
preneurial spirit; however, many of his strengths were born out of struggles. Dyslexia, for instance, made reading and
understanding some concepts painfully difficult. Even today, he says he doesn’t trust numbers. “I don’t complicate my life
with financial reports,” he says, laughing. But he compensated for what he lacked by exceeding in other areas, developing
extraordinary people skills and learning to trust his instincts.
“I do a lot by gut feeling and a lot by personal experience,” Branson says. “I mean, if I relied on accountants to make deci-
sions, I most certainly would have never gone into the airline business. I most certainly would not have gone into the space
business, and I certainly wouldn’t have gone into most of the businesses that I’m in. So, in hindsight, it seems to have worked
pretty well to my advantage.”
As entrepreneurs struggle in today’s economy to throw off the negativity and rekindle the bold spirit that fueled their
passion in the first place, Branson has this advice: “Obstacles and challenges are healthy for everyone, not just entrepreneurs.
They force you to think outside the box, so to speak—to be creative.
“The challenge is to follow through on a great idea. I think if [you’ve] got a great idea, you need to just give it a try,” he
tells SUCCESS. “And if you fall flat on your face, pick yourself up and try again. Learn from your mistakes. And, remember,
you’ve got to go make a real difference in people’s lives if you’re going to be successful.”

Breaking the Rules Read more about

the young
Branson’s own challenges did not stop with his dyslexia. Though famous for his business risks and daredevil
Richard Branson
adventures, like record-setting attempts by balloon and boat, he’s also seen his share of calamities. Branson
took lessons from those experiences, but was never unnerved. In many cases, his failures led to innovation and
greater success. success.com
In his early years, his Virgin records shop continually experienced cash-flow problems, even despite its brisk
sales. To pay off an overdraft, 20-year-old Branson pretended to buy records for export to escape an excise tax on

46 Success July 2009 ©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved

 sales within Britain. He was arrested and jailed for a night, released only after his mother
secured his bail by pledging her home as collateral. Branson’s plea bargain called for him

Colin Davey/Express/Getty Images

to pay £60,000 or face rearrest, trial and a criminal record.
He had previously been arrested after founding his Student magazine for violating laws
dating from 1889 and 1917 that banned publishing advice about remedies for veneral
disease. But he was able to avert imprisonment with help from a good lawyer and was
fined just £7. He emerged emboldened and vindicated.
But with charges of tax evasion, the law was clearly not on his side. “Avoiding prison
was the most persuasive incentive I’ve ever had,” and the next two years were a crash
course in money management.
After that incident, Branson realized there were some rules he would heed in the
future. “I vowed to myself that I would never again do anything that would cause me to
be imprisoned or, indeed, do any kind of business deal that would embarrass me,” he
writes in Losing My Virginity. “My parents had always drummed into me that all you have
in life is your reputation: You may be very rich, but if you lose your good name, then
you’ll never be happy.”
He paid the fine and, looking back, realizes that failure to do so would have ruined his
life. “It is unlikely, not to say impossible, that someone with a criminal record would have
been allowed to set up an airline.”

Taking Flight
Indeed, the airline business was fraught with plenty of other challenges. Branson was
aware of some of the obstacles related to starting Virgin Atlantic Airways, which was
the clear underdog in the British Airways-dominated transatlantic market. He thought

“The Challenge is to follow through

on a great idea,” says Branson,
shown with a model of the Virgin
Galactic craft that will take tourists
into space. Above, a younger
Branson in a 1986 publicity shot.
Toby Melville/Reuters/Corbis

©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved

 Virgin Entrepreneur

“Obstacles and challenges 

not just entrepreneurs. 
outside the box, so to 
Paul Buck/epa/Corbis

the big airlines weren’t in touch with customers’ needs and believed
he could be successful by offering a more affordable and enjoyable
flying experience. To minimize financial risk, Virgin Atlantic started
out in 1984 with a jumbo jet leased for a year.
But during the government certification flight, the unexpected
happened: Birds flew into an uninsured engine, which exploded.
Insurance on the plane was dependent on the certification, and
certification was dependent on a fully functional plane. A new
engine cost £600,000 (more than $1 million). Virgin’s bank balked
at the tab, so Branson pulled cash from overseas record subsidiaries
to ease the crunch. Then Branson brought in financial specialists to
restructure the company and find new banking backers.
Despite the setbacks, Virgin Atlantic was ready for takeoff a
couple days after the engine failure, just in time for an inaugural
flight filled with journalists.
Virgin Atlantic’s competition with British Airways was perpetu-
ally difficult and financially draining. Branson even waged a
lengthy court battle claiming British Airways had played dirty
tricks to steal Virgin Atlantic’s passengers. Branson agreed to a
settlement in 1993 calling for a £500,000 payment to him and
£100,000 to Virgin.
But amidst the competition, rising fuel prices and global
economic woes in the early 1990s, the price to keep Virgin Atlantic
flying was too great. To appease impatient bankers, Branson faced
one of his most difficult decisions ever. Against the advice of his
wife, Joan, he sold Virgin Music Group in 1992 to Thorn EMI.
Ironically, Virgin had just contracted to record the Rolling Stones,
a lifelong dream Branson would never realize.
Yet, the influx of cash from the sale—almost $1 billion—allowed
him to pay off loans on Virgin Atlantic and own it outright. The sale
of the beloved music company also gave him new incentive to avoid
the crippling indebtedness that put him at lenders’ mercy.
Adventures in Business
Richard Branson’s Success Strategies
 Have fun. “Any proposal I like must sound fun.”

Take pride in your work. “What really matters is what you create.
Does it work or not? Does it make you proud?”
 Stay open to ideas. “Some of the best ideas come out of the blue,
and you have to keep an open mind to see their virtue.” For instance,
Virgin Atlantic’s in-flight massages and manicures began after a tip
from his wife’s manicurist.
 Empower and Respect. “Inspire people to think like
entrepreneurs, and whatever you do, treat them like adults. The
hardest taskmaster of all is a person’s own conscience, so the more
responsibility you give people, the better they will work for you.”
 Pass the torch. “All young people… need someone who can
show them a future. They need to be able to work out what they can
do with their lives, how they can enjoy their lives, how they can pay
for it and how they can take responsibility for their actions. I think
it’s a shame that we teach children everything about the world, but
we don’t teach them how to take part in the world, how to realize an
idea, how to measure the consequences of their actions, how to take
a knock, or how to share their success.”
Sources: Business Stripped Bare and Losing My Virginity, both by Richard Branson

A New Approach
Out of what had been a chaotic and heartbreaking experience came
a new business strategy: “branded venture capitalism,” as Branson
calls it, which gives him control over a large number of companies
with minimal financial risk. Today, the Virgin Group is an eclectic Branson believes in empowering talent to flourish, providing
empire of more than 200 diverse companies that run independently freedom and minimizing bureaucracy to foster creativity.
with different shareholders and boards, yet share the brand, as well “Every business… operates according to its own rules. There are
as the resources and collective knowledge and experience of others many ways to run a successful company. What works once may
at Virgin. never work again,” Branson writes in Business Stripped Bare. “There

48 Success July 2009 ©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved

are healthy for everyone,
They force you to think
speak—to be creative.”

tourism beginning in 2011 or 2012

(flights are $200,000 per ticket,
and the group has already secured
almost $40 million in bookings).
Interested passengers include
designer Philippe Starck, actress
Sigourney Weaver, astrophysicist
Stephen Hawking and, of course,
Branson and his family.
In a new venture to encourage
ent r epr eneu r sh ip, Br a n s on
launched PitchTV in March as part
of Virgin Atlantic’s 25th anniver-
sary celebrations. The show will
air the video pitches of wannabe
entrepreneurs onboard and online.
Virgin Atlantic’s business travelers,
many of them executives, will see
the pitches, and each year Branson
will select a favorite with a yet-
undisclosed prize for the winner.
Branson remains mindful of his
own entrepreneurial beginnings,
as well as the fact that great ideas
from up-and-comers help fuel
the Virgin Group today. He tells
SUCCESS that one key to entre-
preneurial success is to “get a great
group of people around you who
believe in your idea.” Just as he
had his family’s support from his
Chip East/Reuters/Corbis

childhood to his earliest business

ventures to his space flights today,
Branson aims to provide encour-
agement and inspiration for other
entrepreneurs. But, he says, the
ultimate reward for an entrepre-
neur is individual and personal.
are no rules. You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn “Entrepreneurship is business’s beating heart. Entrepreneurship
by doing.” isn’t about capital; it’s about ideas. Entrepreneurship is also about
In addition to Virgin Atlantic, Branson’s airlines include Virgin excellence. Not excellence measured in awards or other people’s
Blue and V Australia in Australia, and Virgin America. He expects approval, but the sort that one achieves for oneself by exploring
to fly even higher with Virgin Galactic, which plans to offer space what the world has to offer.” S

©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved Success  July 2009  49

Chairmanofthe

Tony Hawk’s wild ride into business

Shred or Die

©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

 by Arden Moore
©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved
Photos by Chris Barr
 ChairmanoftheBOARD

As a hyperactive child
growing up in San Diego, Calif., Tony Hawk reveled in being uncon-
For Tony Hawk, the glory days of buying homes, traveling the
world and spending like a lottery winner vanished. Unprepared for
this financial free-fall, Hawk scrambled to pay bills by refinancing
ventional, pushing his physical limits, and sometimes the patience his homes and placing himself on a $5-a-day meal allowance.
of his parents and teachers. He was equally tough on himself, too. Even at this low point, he saw an opportunity to start a skate
From an early age, he hated to fail and demanded nothing but the company. He knew it was a risky move, but skating had gone
best from himself. through ups and downs before. “I felt like if I could start a
When he was 6, he decided to swim the length of an Olympic- company when skating was at one of its deadest states,” he says,
sized pool without taking a breath—“and then he was so frustrated “then if it takes off again, we’ve set ourselves up in a position of
when he didn’t do it,” his mother, Nancy, remembers. After striking prominence, and we’d just ride that wave. For someone to come
out in a Little League game, young Tony became so distraught that in once the sport takes off, it’s just going to take way too much
he hid in a ravine and had to be coaxed out by his father. A school
psychologist explained to Tony’s parents that the youngest of their
four children was no ordinary kid. “You have a gifted child who
struggles because he has the mind of a 12-year-old trapped inside an
8-year-old’s body,” the psychologist told them. “Ride through the good times,
Things started to sync the day his older brother, Steve, handed
9-year-old Tony a blue fiberglass banana skateboard. Tony quickly ride through the bad times,
abandoned his baseball bat and discovered he was destined for more
than maintaining his balance or picking up speed and making turns
see bumps in the road as a
on this low-riding board on wheels. He tapped his unconventional, challenge and embrace
push-it-to-the-limits nature to create skateboard tricks and stunts no
one had ever done. the challenge.”
Skateboarding proved to be the perfect confidence builder for
Tony. His personality improved as he continued working on getting
better and better at skateboarding. He stopped fretting and mentally
beating himself up. He smiled more, became more likeable and
more generous.
Then he embarked on a one-boy mission: to be the best skate-
boarder on the planet.
Timing, talent and pure passion soared Hawk to the top of
the skateboard world. He turned pro by 14 and bought his first
home before he earned his high school diploma. By 16, Tony was
considered the best competition skateboarder in the world. In the
next 17 years, Hawk won 73 out of 103 pro contests and placed
second in 19. He achieved his childhood quest: to be the best in this
once-considered maverick sport.
He also obtained skateboarding immortality by being the first to
master the impossible: the 900 (2½ revolutions) inside a half-pipe.
After working on it for years, even cracking a rib in the effort, he did
it live before a televised audience at the 1999 X Games.

The Fall of the Hawk

But when he was in his 20s, the skateboarding world unex-
pectedly collapsed. Public interest waned. The late 1980s and
early 1990s marked the birth of sports marketing, and blue
chip companies focused on making household names out of
professional athletes from traditional sports like baseball and
football, rather than pouring dollars into a grassroots sport of
“renegades”—like skateboarding.

36 Success November 2008 ©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

capital and way too much marketing money to get in a position to
be recognized.”
Much like the mythical phoenix, this Hawk stayed in the sport
and reinvented himself—and helped make skateboarding more
popular than ever. “I focused all my energy on it because I loved
it so much and I felt like, you know, I want to make this happen,”
he says. Hawk sharpened his focus and reclaimed his decision-
making authority. He started scrutinizing the true intentions of
people pitching him opportunities.
“Early in my skating career, I made mistakes because I was less
methodical and tended to grab deals as they came,” Hawk says.
©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved
“I learned the hard way not to hand everyone the keys to all your
opportunities. I gave them the power to have the final say in projects
and deals, and it cost me.”
He realized he needed to grow as a brand and not be limited to
just being a guy who does amazing stunts on a skateboard. Much
like a master chess player, Hawk strategically plotted his come-
back. He mentally sized up those pitching him opportunities. He
began aligning himself with those who shared his work ethic and
his passion for this sport. “If you get involved with someone who
clearly does not share your same passion, then you risk ruining your
chances and opportunities,” he says. (Continued on page 39)
 ChairmanoftheBOARD

Tony Hawk Inc.

Meeting with his company execs, above;
left; clowning with miniature skateboards

Flying High
Hawk’s Tips he was ready to break out on his own. Six months later, he
came to me with a business plan and some investors. He is
On fame: “The idea of being now the head chef at the Market Del Mar. I am happy to invest
famous for being famous is ridiculous. in him. Years ago, I started an exclusive clothing line, but it was
You have to have something to offer.” limited to surfing and skate shops. Now, I mass-market bikes
On coping with fame: “It and skateboards that are affordable, but offer upgraded bearing
is important to stay grounded. In this decks more true to professional models.”
day and age, some people get a taste of On growing personally and
success and blow it out of proportion. professionally: “If I had any advice on how to reinvent
They get inflated self-images—a train yourself, it is to not get stuck in a rut. Just because you made a
wreck just waiting to happen.” good product doesn’t mean it will last. You need to see change
On staying successful: coming down the road and prepare for it.”
“These days, I’m more about spotting voids in business and figuring out On the power of teens: “Kids are so savvy now, so much more
how to fill those voids and to reach more people.” technologically advanced. You can’t feed them a line and expect them to buy it.
On passion and persistence: “Your heart has to be into They know when you’re being authentic.”
it. It has to be something that you genuinely love to do or that genuinely On managing time: “Never allow open-ended conversations. Keep
interests you, because [otherwise] if you go through any sort of shaky your comments to the specific topic. Otherwise, you risk being there longer than
times, you’re just going to throw it away. And maybe you need to hold onto you want to as the person starts a new subject.”
it through those shaky times to propel yourself even further…. I think that On being a father: “Being emotionally supportive to my children is
the best thing you can do is to ride through the good times, ride through most important. It is not just the time together, but the way we spend that time.”
the bad times, see bumps in the road as a challenge and to embrace the On pursuing a skateboarder career: “Only do it because
challenge.” you truly enjoy it, and do not underestimate the power of an education—even
On spotting talent: “My wife Lhotse and I met a chef at a if you make it to the pro ranks. Always continue to challenge yourself, mentally
Marriott. This guy, Carl Schroeder, is the best. I told him to call me when and physically.”

38 Success November 2008 ©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

“Kids are savvy… You can’t feed them a
line and expect them to buY it.”
(Continued from page 37)
Most important, he recognized he was
the face of this fast-growing sport. He used
Hawk’s Ascent
this power base to broker deals that gave
■ 1968: Born May 12 in San Diego, the youngest of four, to parents
him the ultimate say. It was a risk, but in
Frank and Nancy Hawk.
true Tony Hawk style, a calculated risk.

Back on Top
At 40, with flecks of gray in his sandy
brown hair, Hawk is hailed as the father of
■ Age 9: Older brother Steve gave Tony a blue fiberglass banana
board as an outlet for Tony’s hyper behavior.
■ Age 12: Sponsored by Dogtown Skateboards.

Courtesy of Tony Hawk

skateboarding, still dominant in a youth-
oriented marketplace. But he is much
■ Age 14: Turned pro in skateboarding.
more. He is a savvy visionary directing
a wide range of ventures, a let’s-get-it-
■ Age 16: Ranked the No. 1 skateboarder in the world.
done-right head of a charitable foundation
designing quality skateboard parks and,
■ Age 17: Bought his first home in Del Mar, Calif., and a second
most of all, a devoted dad to three sons and
one in Fallbrook two years later.
a newborn daughter.
Since taking over the wheel of his life, Tony
■ 1991: The popularity of skateboarding takes a nosedive. in the 7th grade
Hawk has achieved success inside the half-
pipe and beyond. His series of Tony Hawk
■ 1992: Refinanced his home to start a skateboard company
PlayStation games have sold more than 40
called Birdhouse Projects.
million copies. His autobiography, HAWK:
Occupation: Skateboarder, landed 13th on the
■ 1996: Skateboard interest begins to grow again.
New York Times Best-Seller
List. His name is stitched
1998: Creates a children’s clothing company called Hawk Clothing.
■ 
alDisc
™
on a line of clothing and
On Du
he offers a video arsenal an
Listen toe 1999: Teams up with Activision to create Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater
■ 
of trick tip DVDs. And, exclusiv with
w video game for PlayStation, the first of many popular video games. Starts
yes, he even has a roller- inervie k.
w
Tony Ha a TV production company called 900 Films.
coaster ride named in his
honor: Tony Hawk’s Big
■ 1999: First skateboarder to master the 900 (2½ revolutions in a
Spin at amusement parks in St. Louis and
half-pipe) during the televised X Games.
San Antonio. His name merits not one, but
three Wikipedia entries.
■ 2000: Writes the New York Times Best-Seller, HAWK:
D id we ment ion he dueled Rosie
Occupation: skateboarder.
O’Donnell in the premier show of Million
Dollar Password earlier this year—or that
■ 2002: Starts the popular Boom Boom HuckJam tour
he raised $175,000 for his Tony Hawk
across America.
Foundation on Are You Smarter Than a Fifth
Grader? quiz show?
■ 2002: Forms the Tony Hawk Foundation to create
“OK, so I wasn’t smarter than a fifth-
well-designed skateboard parks.
grader and won a million dollars, but
I knew when to stop and collect the
■ 2007: Six Flags Fiesta Texas unveils its newest roller coaster,
prize money for the foundation,” he says.
Tony Hawk’s Big Spin.
“Knowing your limits is a good thing.”
Not bad for a 40-year-old guy who
■ 2008: Partners with T-Mobile USA to introduce a limited-edition Tony Hawk
still can’t get enough of skateboarding.
Sidekick LX.
He  maintains his childlike wonder and
spunk and willingness to take on any chal-
lenge. Even if it means donning a designer

©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved Success  November 2008  39

ChairmanoftheBOARD

Half-Pipe Dreams
Hawk’s corporate headquarters
includes his own customized half-pipe.

©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

 gray suit and performing a few tricks inside the customized half-
pipe at his corporate headquarters in Vista, Calif., during a recent
photo shoot.
“Tony, Tony, can you look right at the camera when you get to the
top of the rim?” pleaded the frantic photographer, perched precari-
ously on scaffolding. “Not without knee pads,” replied Hawk with
a sly smile.
Seconds later, Hawk masters the move and shoots a grin directly
into the camera without a single stutter step. Hawk delivers.
As usual.
The Legend Continues
In competitive skateboarding, Hawk was the guy you feared—
and admired. He wasn’t satisfied to stick to a list of mastered tricks.
He was so driven that he compiled a to-do list of seemingly impos-
sible tricks to learn, and one by one he did. He won numerous titles,
invented more than 80 tricks before skating for a cause. The deal
in skateboarding is that if you create a new trick, you get the honor
of naming it. Hawk’s laundry list includes the McHawk, Madonna
and Stalefish.
Now “retired” from competition, Hawk’s fame continues to soar.
He created the Tony Hawk’s Boom Boom HuckJam series in 2002.
Today, this annual tour spotlights top skateboarders and BMX and
Freestyle MotoX riders performing tricks choreographed to music
by top bands to bring awareness to these sports.
His Tony Hawk Foundation, a nonprofit group, has raised
more than $2 million in grants and assistance to create about 400
well-designed skateboard parks in urban and rural communities
throughout the United States.
“I want skateboard parks to be available all over the country
in big and little cities,” he says. “I remember visiting one park
opening in a wealthy suburb of Chicago where the city officials
were congratulating themselves, but the kids using the park said
it was terrible. The officials told the kids, ‘Wait until Tony Hawk
comes. He knows.’ Well, after testing out the park, I told them
the truth—it was awful. That’s why we are committed to building
quality parks.”
He envisions a day when the skateboard parks outnumber Little
League diamonds. “Skateboard parks are used twice as much as any
baseball field or basketball court. Skateboarding is constant partici-
pation and fast paced,” he says. “This is a fast-paced generation who
knows what they want and they want instant gratification. They
don’t have the patience to tolerate baseball with its ‘strike 1, shake
it off, strike 2’ when they can be on a skateboard or bike and—
snap—enjoying the speed.”
Hawk knows—and respects—his youthful audience. That’s why
he pushed to have some of his signature clothing, skateboards and
bikes available at major retail discount stores at affordable prices—
without sacrificing quality. After all, the stuff bears his name.
“Kids these days know when they’re being force-fed and they
know when it’s bull…. You can’t fool them. They know when
©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved
you are being insincere and when you’re truly being authentic,”
he says.
Family Man
He also embraces his ever-evolving role as father to three sons—
Riley, Spencer and Keegan—plus a newborn daughter, Kadence
Clover, whom he and his wife Lhotse welcomed on June 30.
Hawk credits the support provided by his late father, Frank,
and his mom, Nancy, for recognizing the importance of family. He
wants to carry on the Hawk tradition of honoring promises made
to children.
He shares the time when he was about 9 and his father prom-
ised him a specific skateboard. Together, they traveled from one
surf shop to another until they found the brand at a shop 40 miles
north of their home. “My dad made me a promise and I have always
appreciated that he made that extra effort,” Hawk says.
Tony knows how fortunate he was to grow up with a dad like
Frank Hawk. And Frank Hawk knew his precocious youngest
needed him. He willingly drove Tony to skateboarding contests
up and down the California coast. He constructed countless skate
ramps and stepped up to become founder of the California Amateur
Skateboard League that served to boost the sport’s popularity in the
early 1980s.
Eldest son, Riley, 15, has forged a name for himself in skate-
boarding and has sponsors earned on his own merit—much to
the pride of Tony. “At this point, I’m happy to be his chauffeur and
do what it takes to facilitate what he’s doing,” Hawk says. “Being
emotionally supportive to my children is most important to me.
It’s not just the time together, but the way we spend that time.
Sometimes, I have to say no to a good project because I value my
time with my family very much.”
A new—and pleasant—challenge awaits Hawk: being a dad to a
daughter for the first time. “With three sons, I know what they like
and how to make them laugh. It’s a bit scary and exciting to have a
daughter,” he reveals. “I’m actually looking forward to hosting a tea
party with her. Hey, I like tea, so it shouldn’t be hard, right?”
We’re betting that Hawk will learn to master tea parties
and more. S
Success  November 2008  41
 Apple founder Steve Jobs birthed the personal computer,
was banished from his empire and then saved it from ruin.
Along the way, he changed the way we work, play and
communicate. And he’s not done yet.

by John H. Ostdick
Paul Sakuma/Associated Press

©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved

©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved Success JUNE 2010  43
 On a foggy, The company’s iPod and iTunes store “changed the way we
discover, play and purchase music,” Jobs says. In February,
cool day in January, the company announced that its iTunes store recorded its 10
billionth song download (Johnny Cash’s “Guess Things Happen

Steve Jobs and Apple are That Way,” purchased by a Woodstock, Ga., customer).
Those are staggering numbers for a company started by two

bidding to change the smart, scruffy Northern California kids in their 20s who lacked
any business training or college degrees—particularly since the

world again.
Jobs sits comfortably in a leather chair in front of a rapt San
Francisco auditorium crowd, a large video screen tracking his
hand movements on a thin, slate-looking object resting comfort-
ably in his hands. Dressed in his trademark blue jeans, dark
turtleneck and New Balance shoes, the wire-framed Apple
co-founder and culture-shaper peppers his speech with “remark-
able, awesome” and “amazing” references to his company’s
latest new wave—a notebook device called the iPad. This “truly
magical and revolutionary product” fills a category need between
his company’s successful laptop and iPhone and iPod business
lines, Jobs says.
company in its best years has captured about 10 percent or less
of the personal-computer market (although it has historically
dominated the high end).
➲ Pursuit of Perfection
The American business success collective has volumes of
examples of visionaries who have met pressing societal needs or
created rich new markets. Among those pages, Jobs is a tutelary,
a rough-about-the-edges company founder who has rattled the
world, was banished from the kingdom he built during tumul-
tuous times, and then returned to rescue and take Apple to
loftier heights. During the past 34 years, he has overcome ambi-
tious missteps, competitive obstacles and recent health issues to
change the way people work, communicate and entertain them-

➲ Sterling Performance
Jobs has established a rock-star-like persona around colossal,
innovative successes that dwarf a couple of high-profile fail-
ures. The 55-year-old is personal, smooth. He exudes, well, a
cool vibe.
Before his product announcement, he ticked off some
heady numbers:
In January, Apple sold its 250 millionth iPod; Jobs’ self-
proclaimed “mobile-devices” company now has 284 retail stores
that attracted 50 million visitors in the fourth quarter of 2009
alone; its “apps” store offers more than 140,000 software applica-
tions for its mobile products (more than 3 billion downloaded
in the store’s first 18 months of operation); and Apple revenue
makes it a more than $50 billion company.
Steve Jobs’ Journey
1970s Jobs meets future business
partner Steve Wozniak in
selves. Since rejoining Apple in 1997 after a 12-year exile, he has
rescued it from near collapse, introduced meteoric products such
as the iPod and iPhone, and cemented his role as the oracle of
consumer tech gadgetry.
“Apple and Jobs are uniquely capable of defining the ‘whole
package’ as they approach a new technology,” Gadi Amit tells
SUCCESS. Amit is founder and principal designer of the San
Francisco-based NewDealDesign LLC, a strategic industrial
design agency that includes Dell, Fujitsu and Nokia among its
clients. “They are building a whole experience and culture around
that technology. As such, there is no distinction in their thinking
between marketing, sales, branding or product development. It’s
a coherent offering that has multifaceted value to many.”
In naming Jobs “CEO of the Decade” in November 2009,
Fortune magazine said history will remember him as “an indi-
vidual who relentlessly pursued new opportunities,” chasing
“new possibilities without being deterred by whatever obstacles
Jobs and Wozniak form

1955 1971; works during the

Apple and introduce
the rudimentary Apple I
SSPL/Getty Images

summer at Hewlett-Packard
Born Feb. 24 in San computer.
with Wozniak. Graduates
Francisco, Steven Paul
Jobs is adopted by
high school in 1972; drops 1976
out of Reed College in
Paul and Clara Jobs.
Oregon after one semester.

44  Success JUNE 2010 ©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
 setbacks that have plagued Jobs since a
2003 cancer diagnosis.

Moshe Brakha/Liaison/Getty Images

➲ Moving the
World Forward
Associated Press

On the same day Jobs announced the

details of the iPad, his Apple co-founder,
Tom Munnecke/Getty Images Steve Wozniak, addressed a smaller, less
formal group at the Laxson Auditorium
in Chico, Calif. The brilliant engineer
spoke about the late 1970s and early
’80s, when he embodied a new way of
thinking, far removed from the world of
mainframes and minicomputers, when
he and Jobs helped birth the personal-
computer industry.
“I was turned on that little guys were
going to do something of more value than
the big corporations,” recalls Wozniak,

Paul Sakuma/Associated Press

who retired from Apple in 1985. “My
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

friend Steve Jobs… was always interested

in doing things that would change the
world. He was a move-the-world-forward
kind of guy.”
Jobs has always adapted, moved
forward. While he dropped out of Reed
College in Portland, Ore., because he
he encountered.” Although he has assembled and trained a formi- found the curriculum a poor fit for him, he cites a calligraphy course
dable management team, his innovative will is deemed tantamount he audited after dropping out as being instrumental in his career.
to Apple’s success. In 2007, Barron’s proclaimed him the most valu- “I learned about serif and san-serif typefaces, about varying the
able chief executive in the world when it estimated that Jobs’ depar- amount of space between different letter combinations, about what
ture from Apple would wipe out about $20 billion of the company’s makes great typography great,” Jobs told Stanford University gradu-
market cap. ates during their 2005 commencement. “None of this had even a
His fierce determination and pursuit of product perfection is hope of any practical application in my life. But 10 years later, when
etched in the company’s DNA. “We’re on the face of the Earth we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to
to make great products,” Apple chief operating officer Tim Cook me, and we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer
said during a 2009 earnings conference call. Cook, a successor in with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single
waiting, ran the company while Jobs was on leave recovering from course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces
a liver transplant in early 2009, the latest in a series of medical or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the

Apple releases
1977
SSPL/Getty Images

Macintosh, the
Apple introduces first affordable 1985
Tom Munnecke/Getty Images
Apic/Getty Images

Apple II, one of the home computer A power struggle with

Apic/Getty Images

first successful personal with graphical user then-CEO John Sculley

computers. interface. results in Jobs’ departure

1984 from Apple.

©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved Success JUNE 2010  45


1986
Jobs founds NeXT computer
hardware and software company.
He buys Pixar from Lucasfilm for
less than $10 million; Pixar later
creates such hits as Toy Story and
Finding Nemo. Getty Images
Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had
never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this callig-
raphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful
typography that they do. Of course, it was impossible to connect the
dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear
looking backward 10 years later.”
➲ Apple Seeds
To fully understand the impact of Apple and Jobs, a bit of time
travel is required. Jobs and Wozniak met in 1970; Wozniak was 21
and Jobs 16. Northern California’s Santa Clara Valley (pre-Silicon
Valley), where Jobs and Wozniak grew up, was a churning place
for engineers and their ilk, fueled by Lockheed’s booming defense
business. Computing power was confined to gigantic, expensive
machinery outside the realm of most businesses. The most basic of
today’s processes—like spreadsheets, inventory control and sales
projections, and the basic mathematics used to run all businesses—
were time-consuming, paper-and-brain operations.
Wozniak worked for Hewlett-Packard and Jobs for Atari as they
scrambled with their groundbreaking work. He and Wozniak met
regularly at informal Homebrew Computer Club meetings where
locals compared notes and ideas in the bubbling information tech-
nology pool, as well as design and production techniques for the
nascent computer industry. But they didn’t impress the other engi-
neers and hobbyists, who didn’t think much of Wozniak’s initial
“cigar box” circuitry that would morph into the Apple I, Michael
Moritz explains in his 2009 book Return to the Little Kingdom: Steve
Jobs. Not even Wozniak could comprehend where the seeds of his
work might lead.
On April Fools’ Day in 1976, Wozniak, Jobs and Jobs’ former
Atari colleague Ron Wayne signed papers forming Apple Computer
(the name plucked in part from the fruit in the valley’s remaining
orchards). Wayne resigned 12 days later because he decided the
financial risk was too great. While many other players and backers
had a hand in Apple’s rise as a player in the technology sector, it
was Wozniak’s brilliance and Jobs’ dogged determination that were
the engines. Jobs scavenged for parts and hounded “Woz” to finish
the Apple I and then the Apple II, which Wozniak single-handedly
designed. It ignited the personal-computer revolution in 1977.
➲ Impact and Timing
“We were in the right place at the time,” Wozniak said in his Chico
speech. While the Apple II was a leap forward and introduced color
46  Success JUNE 2010
Courtesy of Apple Corp. via Getty Images
Apple releases the
1990s iPod, then capable of
Apple buys NeXT, putting “1,000 songs
and Jobs returns to in your pocket.”
the helm at Apple.
2001
and pixels to the computer, Wozniak says Visicalc, which he calls
the first “killer app,” increased demand for the Apple II. Visicalc, a
third-party program developed on a loaned Apple II, for the first time
enabled users to do budgeting and projections on a computer.
Fortunate timing helped, but it was Jobs’ vision that moved Apple
into the vortex of an emerging industry. “What Steve’s done is quite
phenomenal,” Microsoft founder Bill Gates said during a rare joint
appearance with Jobs at a D5 industry conference in 2007. “If you
look back to 1977, that Apple II computer, the idea that it would
be a mass-market machine, the bet that was made there by Apple
uniquely—there were other people with products, but the idea
that this could be an incredible empowering phenomenon, Apple
pursued that dream.”
The company’s highs—and some lows—are the stuff of Apple
legend. “At the time, we certainly had no idea that a personal
computer would someday have enough memory to hold a song or a
movie,” Wozniak says today. The company went public in 1980. It
reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the introduction
of the Macintosh.
Jobs’ deftness for impact and timing was never so keen than in his
now well-cited pitch in wooing Pepsi executive John Sculley to join
Apple as president and chief executive officer in 1983: “Do you want
to sell sugared water the rest of your life or do you want a chance to
change the world?” Apple’s stark, groundbreaking “1984” big brother
ad at Super Bowl XVIII, although hated by board members when
they previewed it, became the standard for high-dollar impact adver-
tising at the annual sports event.
➲ A Devastating Fallout
In 1985, tensions between Sculley and Jobs about the direction of
the company culminated in Jobs trying to oust Sculley in a palace
coup. It failed, and Sculley stripped the founder of all his operational
responsibilities. By September, Jobs was gone. Litigation ensued
when Jobs tried to take some employees with him. Jobs sold all but
one share of his Apple stock. Bloodied but not beaten, Jobs recovered
from the very high-profile exit.
“I was lucky—I found what I loved to do early in life,” Jobs said
during the Stanford commencement address, which is hailed as one
of his best and certainly most personal speeches. “Woz and I started
Apple in my parents’ garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in
10 years, Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a
$2 billion company with over 4,000 employees. We had just released
our finest creation—the Macintosh—a year earlier, and I had just
turned 30. And then I got fired.
©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
 2005
Courtesy of Apple Corp.
The video-capable iPod
and compact iPod shuffle
are released.
“How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as
Apple grew, we hired someone who I thought was very talented to
run the company with me, and for the first year or so, things went
well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge, and eventu-
ally we had a falling out. When we did, our board of directors sided
with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been
the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.”
Certainly, founders losing control of their creation is a common
and painful endgame in American business. Jobs talked about how
he thought about fleeing the valley because of his very public failure,
but he slowly realized he still loved what he did. He decided to
start over.
➲ A New Day
“I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple
was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heavi-
ness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a
beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one
of the most creative periods of my life.”
Jobs started NeXT Computer Inc., which failed in its attempt
to sell elegant, expensive black computers to the business market,
and by 1993, shifted its focus to the sale and development of its
Nextstep operating system (which would evolve into Mac OS X).
In 1986, however, Jobs stepped deeply into the entertainment world
when he purchased the Pixar computer animation studios from
George Lucas for less than $10 million, and then immersed himself
in this new work.
In 1991, Pixar and Disney agreed to form a filmmaking
partnership under which Pixar made the movies and Disney
distributed them.
The same year, Jobs married Laurene Powell, whom he met when
he spoke at a class at Stanford business school, where she was
getting her MBA. They now live in Palo Alto with three children and
Jobs’ daughter from a previous relationship.
Meantime, Jobs’ work got faster and more furious. In 1993, Sculley
resigned from a beleaguered, battered Apple. Disney released Pixar’s
first movie, Toy Story, in 1995, which was an astounding success
and leap forward in animation quality. In December 1996, Apple
bought NeXT for $430 million in a move full of intrigue, bringing
Jobs back into the fold. In July 1997, former National Semiconductor
chairman Gil Amelio, brought in to right a sinking Apple ship,
resigned after a rocky 500 days on the job. In September, Jobs
became iCEO (interim), and returned the company to profitability
by January 1998.
©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
Disney buys Pixar,
making Jobs Disney’s
2006
Courtesy of Apple Corp.
largest shareholder.
“Apple was in very serious trouble,” Jobs has said about the period
when he returned. “Apple had to remember who Apple was because
they’d forgotten who Apple was.”
➲ The Comeback
Part of that remembering included clearing out some of the
storied past. One of the first things Jobs did upon his return was
to pack up the internal Apple museum—all the company’s papers
and old machines—and send the materials to Stanford University
for archiving.
“[We] cleared out the cobwebs and said, ‘Let’s stop looking back-
ward here,’ ” Jobs explained at the 2007 conference. “It’s all about
what happens tomorrow. Because you can’t look back and say, ‘Well,
gosh, you know, I wish I hadn’t gotten fired, I wish I was there, I
wish this, I wish that.’ It doesn’t matter. Let’s go invent tomorrow
rather than worrying about what happened yesterday.”
When Apple launched its first iMac in 1998, its personal-
computer market share had dwindled to 2 percent (the company
began using “i” before its product in 1998 to represent its visionary
shift to the Internet and personal devices, the individual). In 2001,
Apple introduced the landscape-changing iPod, iTunes and its OS X
10.0 operating system, signifying its return as a champion innovator.
Apple, once again, proved that reports of its demise were greatly
exaggerated. In a strategy shift, Apple also opened its first retail
stores in McLean, Va.
“Steve gave a speech once, which is one of my favorites, where
he talked about, in a certain sense, ‘We [Apple] build the products
that we want to use ourselves,’ ” Microsoft’s Gates said in 2007. “He’s
really pursued that with incredible taste and elegance that has had a
huge impact on the industry. And his ability to always come around
and figure out where that next bet should be has been phenomenal.
Apple literally was failing when Steve went back and re-infused the
innovation and risk-taking that have been phenomenal.”
Jobs returned to the top of the business world, but life held another
challenge for him. His diagnosis, treatment and recovery from
pancreatic cancer in 2004 reinforced his will to be, in co-founder
Wozniak’s words, a “move-the-world forward” visionary.
➲ ‘Follow Your Heart’
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life,”
Jobs recounted in the Stanford address in 2005. “Don’t be trapped by
dogma—which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.
Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner
Success JUNE 2010  47

 From the Lion’s Mouth
Whether he’s being called an innovator, a game-changer or a genius,
Steve Jobs is a modern-day business guru. Here, some of his words of wisdom.
“You’ve got to find what you love [to
Stanford University graduates, 2005]. Stay
hungry. Stay foolish.”
“A lot of companies have chosen to
downsize, and maybe that was the right
thing for them. We chose a different path.
Our belief was that if we kept putting great
products in front of customers, they would
continue to open their wallets.”
“My job is to not be easy on people. My
job is to make them better. My job is to pull
things together from different parts of the
company and clear the ways and get the
resources for the key projects. And to take
these great people we have and to push
them and make them even better, coming
up with more aggressive visions of how it
could be.”
“I mean, some people say, ‘Oh, God, if
[Jobs] got run over by a bus, Apple would
be in trouble.’ And, you know, I think it
wouldn’t be a party, but there are really
capable people at Apple. My job is to
make the whole executive team good
enough to be successors, so that’s what I
try to do.”
“When I hire somebody really senior,
competence is the ante. They have to be
really smart. But the real issue for me is,
‘Are they going to fall in love with Apple?’
Because if they fall in love with Apple,
everything else will take care of itself.”
“Our DNA is as a consumer company—for
that individual customer who’s voting
thumbs up or thumbs down. That’s who we
think about. And we think that our job is
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
to take responsibility for the complete user
experience. And if it’s not up to par, it’s our
fault, plain and simple.”
“Be a yardstick of quality. Some people
aren’t used to an environment where
excellence is expected.”
“Innovation distinguishes between a leader
and a follower.”
“Sometimes when you innovate, you make
mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly,
and get on with improving your other
innovations.”
“You can’t just ask customers what they
want and then try to give that to them.
By the time you get it built, they’ll want
something new.”
©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
 2007
Courtesy of Apple Corp.
Apple unveils the iPhone, an
st
Internet- and multimedia-
a rn b e enabled smartphone.
Le tion
presentafrom The iPod Touch
tactics obs
Steve J music player
comes out.
m
success.co
voice. And, most important, have the courage to
follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already
know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
Since his return to Apple, Jobs has enforced more company infor-
mation control and limited his interviews (Apple did not participate
in this story). “There used to be a saying at Apple, ‘Isn’t it funny, a ship
that leaks from the top,’ ” he has said. “That was what they used to say
about me when I was in my 20s.”
In 2005, Apple introduced the iPod Nano, the Video iPod and the
iPod Shuffle. In January 2006, Jobs sold the award-winning Pixar
group to the Walt Disney Company for about $7.4 billion in Disney
stock, making him its largest shareholder and earning him a spot on
its board. In 2007, Apple launched the iPhone, followed by its Apps
store in 2008. Those products vaulted Apple from turmoil into one of
the world’s largest and most respected companies. For the third year
in a row, Apple topped Fortune’s 2010 “Most Admired Companies”
list, based on annual businesspeople surveys.
“Steve Jobs is a singular persona in our culture,” says NewDeal-
Design’s Amit, who writes an industrial design-focused blog. “He,
more than anyone else, made utilitarian digital technology merge into
a rich cultural experience. Without him, most of the tech world would
have relegated culture to a decorative role, rather than a substantive
element of product and service innovation. His impact is so profound
on our culture, our way of thinking and our approach to smart tech-
nology, that I would consider him one of the most influential cultural
creators of the past century.”
➲ Redrawing Boundaries
Entrepreneur and author Guy Kawasaki, whose latest venture is
the Internet aggregator Alltop, had two stints with Apple (1983-87,
1995-1997) as a company “evangelist” or product super-advocate.
Though no longer connected to the company, he remains a product
loyalist and observer. Kawasaki maintains it is Jobs’ extraordinary
vision that allows Apple to keep redrawing industry—and modern
culture’s—boundaries.
“He sees what should be before others,” Kawasaki tells SUCCESS.
“And now, he has such a track record that even if he sees wrong, he’ll
be right. It’s an upward spiral.”
In presentations, Jobs is skilled at helping the audience see the
world his way. He sets out what’s wrong with the status quo before
introducing his solution.
“Jobs is a magnetic pitchman who sells his ideas with a flair that
turns prospects into customers and customers into evangelists,”
writes Carmine Gallo, a communication skills coach who wrote The
©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
Apple releases the
iPhone 3GS, the
newest, fastest and
most powerful iPhone 2010
Courtesy of Apple Corp.
Apple launches
to date.
the iPad tablet
2009 computer.
Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs—How to be Insanely Great in Front of
Any Audience, published this year by McGraw Hill.
“Over and over again, he has turned his eye and his energy—and
at times, it has seemed, his entire being—to what might be gained
by creating a new offering or taking an unorthodox strategic path,”
Harvard Business School professor and author Nancy F. Koehn wrote
in Fortune in 2009. “That puts him in the company of other great
entrepreneurs of the past two centuries, men and women such as
Josiah Wedgwood, John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Henry
Ford and Estée Lauder.”
➲ A Large Dose of Cool
The art of the deal seems as important to Jobs as the product itself.
“Design is the fundamental soul of a human-made creation that ends
up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service,”
he has said in differentiating his approach to product design. In other
words, he seeks a large dose of cool to accompany ease of use.
“We’ve always tried to be at the intersection of technology and
liberal arts,” Jobs said during the iPad announcement. He credited this
combination for Apple’s ability to create intuitive and magical prod-
ucts. When Apple can find partners who do what it’s seeking to incor-
porate into its products—think map search engines—the company
joins forces with them. If it sees a need that no one can fill better than
Apple, then the company develops that business itself.
“If you look at the reason that the iPod exists, and Apple’s in the
marketplace, it’s because these really great Japanese consumer elec-
tronics companies who kind of own the portable music market…
couldn’t do the appropriate software, couldn’t conceive of and imple-
ment the appropriate software,” Jobs has said. “Because an iPod’s
really just software. It’s software in the iPod itself, it’s software on
the PC or the Mac, and it’s software in the cloud for the store. It’s in a
beautiful box, but it’s software.”
Whether the iPad will provide another big splash or be just a ripple
in Apple’s pool of innovation is almost irrelevant at this point. You can
be sure that Jobs and Apple are already working on the next thing. It’s
hot-wired into their genetics.
“When Bill and I first met each other and worked together in the
early days, generally, we were both the youngest guys in the room,”
he said during that 2007 joint appearance with Gates. “And now, I’m
the oldest guy in the room most of the time. And that’s why I love
being here.”
Three years later, Jobs hasn’t gotten any younger, but arguably
the biggest innovator of his generation clearly plans to keep stirring
the pot. S
Success JUNE 2010  49
touch The Secret Behind a Successful
Sports-to-Business Transition

Magic Johnson was in the seventh year of his Hall of

Fame career when thoughts of his basketball afterlife
led him to the office of uber-executive Michael Ovitz,
co-founder of Creative Artists Agency, Hollywood’s
most powerful agency. Johnson had watched many
former athletes attempt entry into the world of business
only to fail, and he was hoping for advice that would
allow him to chart a different course.
by Don Yaeger
©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
Dennis Kleiman/Retna

©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved Success AUGUST 2010  47

 
“Michael dropped the newspaper in front
of me,” Johnson tells SUCCESS. “He asked,
‘When the paper arrives, what do you read
first?’ I told him I opened the sports section.
He looked at me and said, ‘Wrong answer.
From here on, if you want to be involved
in business, you have to read business.’
I walked in his office 6-foot-9 and proud.
I left feeling 5-foot-tall and stunned.”
And thus began the business career of
a man who, just 22 years later, in 2009,
was hailed by Ebony magazine as one of
the most influential black business leaders
in America. Built over the past 23 years,
Beverly Hills, Calif.-based Magic Johnson
Enterprises now owns or operates gyms,
Starbucks franchises, Burger Kings, movie
theaters and other businesses in 85 cities
across 21 states.
“I learned a couple of great lessons there
with Michael Ovitz,” Johnson says. “The
first is that if you want to be successful,
you have to be willing to use every connec-
tion you’ve got. It is a funny story how
that meeting came about. During a Lakers
game the season before, I was standing on
the sidelines getting ready to pass the ball
inbounds. There were two businessmen
I respect—[studio executive] Peter Guber
and [recording industry executive] Joe
Smith—who were sitting there courtside
and were huge fans. I looked over and
asked, ‘How do I get into business?’ It
probably wasn’t the best place to ask, but
they could tell I was honestly looking for
help, so later they arranged for me to meet
Michael Ovitz.
‘Be Ready to Listen’
“The second thing I learned is that if
you want someone to be your mentor, you
better be ready to listen and be humbled,”
Johnson says. “Michael wasn’t sure about
working with me because so many athletes
think they can move right into business
and never take anyone’s advice. I had
to prove to him I was serious and that I
would listen.”
That meant changing his reading habits,
Johnson says, and he immediately started
48  Success AUGUST 2010
grabbing business magazines, newspapers
and books to take with him on the road.
But reading was just the beginning of
Magic’s business education. His next big
lesson was “listening.”
Johnson says his first foray into the world
of business taught him what happens to
entrepreneurs who aren’t listening to their
customers. In 1990, he decided to begin a
chain of retail sporting goods stores called
Magic 32 that he intended to take nation-
wide. To get the business off the ground, he
decided to attend a major sporting goods
convention and negotiate for products he’d
sell at the stores.
“I didn’t ask a single customer what
they’d be interested in,” Johnson says.
“I went there looking for products I’d be
interested in buying. I had to learn that
I was not my customer. Actually, I was
taught that lesson by what happened after
we opened.”
Among the line of products Johnson
chose to carry was a series of $1,500 leather
jackets. They fit Johnson’s taste, but not
the taste of his customers, as evidenced
by the fact they were still hanging on the
racks when the initial store closed just a
year later.
“I’m sure I’ve made bigger business
mistakes,” Johnson says, breaking into his
trademark grin, “but I can’t think of one.”
Early Lessons
Johnson’s earliest entrepreneurial influ-
ences came from his parents in his home-
town of Lansing, Mich. “I grew up in the
kind of black family that people today
worry is disappearing. Even though there
were nine of us, we had what we needed—
two great parents, food on the table and
time for the whole family to be together,” he
writes in his 1993 memoir, My Life.
Both parents worked hard; his dad on
the night shift at a GM factory as well as
second jobs that included pumping gas and
running his own trash-hauling business,
and his mother in janitorial and cafeteria
work. “My parents believed in work—not
only for themselves, but for their children,
too,” Johnson writes. The kids had assigned
chores around the house and had to earn
their spending money. “By the time I was
10, I had my own little neighborhood busi-
ness. I raked leaves, cleaned yards and
shoveled snow. With the money I earned,
I could go to the movies and buy an occa-
sional record.”
Johnson’s dad, Ear v in Johnson Sr.,
provided other life lessons, too. Through
one-on-one basketball games, his father
played tough and not always fair. “But that
was the point. Dad was teaching me that I
wouldn’t always get the calls, that I had to
play above the contact,” Johnson writes.
“He taught me to win against the odds, and
never to quit.”
Johnson’s basketball career included a
national championship at Michigan State,
five NBA championships with the Los
Angeles Lakers and a gold medal with
the “Dream Team” at the 1992 Olympics.
He played alongside and against some of
the NBA’s best players, including Michael
Jordan, Larry Bird, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
and John Stockton.
His new teammates are business part-
ners who include Sodexo, T.G.I. Friday’s,
Aetna, AMC Theatres, 24 Hour Fitness
and Starbucks. He has carved out a niche,
becoming the go-to player for companies
hoping to expand into the urban market-
place, using the power of his brand in that
space to increase the credibility of busi-
nesses desiring a part of the pie in what
Johnson calls “underserved and ethnically
diverse urban communities.”
Something to Prove
The Magic 32 retail store failure also
taught Johnson another important business
lesson: Have a vision for your company, or
prepare for failure.
“A lot of athletes go out and want to
start sports bars or restaurants, and they
do it without vision of what they’re going
to add to their customers,” Johnson says.
“I can say that because I did it. But now
I know what my vision is, and everything
we consider has to fit that vision. Lots of
©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
 opportunities come our way, and we ask
ourselves as we look at every one whether

Magic’s it will bring something of value to the

communities we serve.

Top Assists “And as we make our way around those

communities, my team now is always
asking, ‘What’s missing?’ We learned that
In Magic Johnson’s newest book, African-Americans are the No. 1 group
32 Ways to Be a Champion in of moviegoers in America, yet we didn’t
Business, the legendary point guard have theaters in our neighborhoods. That’s
and serial entrepreneur offers a when we started building Magic Johnson
number of tips from his transition Theatres. If your vision is strong enough,
into the world of business. focus isn’t as much of a challenge. Things
Among them: make sense or they don’t.”
Johnson’s company’s estimated net worth

Neal Preston/Corbis
Have a Mission. Too often, an is in excess of $700 million, according
entrepreneur’s “mission” is to to Forbes magazine, making him among
make money. To be successful, the most successful former professional
your mission must take you and athletes ever to have transitioned into the
world of business.
your customers to someplace
“It is interesting to me that so few athletes
special. “Developing businesses in urban neighborhoods for the benefit of underserved
make a successful move into business,”
communities—our communities—is a mission with deep meaning for me and the more than Johnson says. “There are so many things
20,000 people who work for me,” Johnson writes. about being an athlete that should prepare
you for this world. Discipline, practice, out-
Have a Pre-Game Plan. Johnson said he worked hard to understand the customers who
working your opponent… all of that is just
would be served through his mission so he could find “something that had value to the as important to me today as it was in the
community, something that had been lost.” That led to the opening of his first multiscreen NBA. I think the problem is that for some
theater in the heart of urban Los Angeles, just blocks from some of the nation’s most athletes, our ego has been fed our whole life
famous riots. and we’re not used to people treating us as
peers. Michael Ovitz treated me like a man
Just Do It. To Johnson, it is much more than a slogan for a shoe company. “Too many who had something to prove, and by that
people of all ages talk about getting into the game but never get off the bench,” he writes. stage of my career, not many people treated
me like that. I think I handled it right, and
Use Every Angle to Find a Mentor. All of your relationships should be tapped as you look it made a great difference.”
for someone who has information and advice to offer you. And Johnson points out that most
entrepreneurs don’t ask for mentorship because they don’t think others will help. “That’s just Seeking Mentors
not true,” he says of the belief that successful business leaders won’t make time to share. The truth, Johnson says, is that many
“Mentors are not a luxury; they are a necessity.” entrepreneurs are successful at something,
and that gives them the confidence to
Be Humble. When you ask for advice, heed it. “If you already know it all, don’t take strike out in new directions. Most, like the
someone’s time,” he says. “But if you do ask, make sure to listen!” athletes who have failed at business, aren’t
ready to take instruction from others on
Handle Your Weaknesses. But don’t believe that you have to work so hard you make them what to do next.
strengths. “Greatness is achieved by building on strengths and managing your weaknesses “Sports got me in the door—I know
so they do not matter,” he writes. that,” Johnson says. “But that door doesn’t
stay open forever. You have to do some-
Understand Success. “Success is not some goal that lies at the end of the road,” Johnson thing with that access. In this world, just
writes. “Success isn’t being ahead at the final buzzer. Success is being in the game.” like in sports, nothing is handed to you.
I had to learn that. Lucky for me, I started

©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved Success AUGUST 2010  49

 

learning from my mentors while I was

playing so that I could get a jump on life
after basketball.” Johnson says his passion
to prepare for life as an entrepreneur
changed even the way he traveled when
his Lakers team was on the road. While
in cities like Atlanta, he met with execu-
tives from Coke. “I looked everywhere for
mentors and used every opportunity to
ask questions,” he says. “One thing I tell
people who ask me for advice is that you
don’t have to be a star to find a mentor, but
you do have to show enthusiasm. I always
showed enthusiasm.”
Johnson says there are many parts of life
as an athlete that he can relate to his post-
basketball career. The most important link,
he says, is in the power of research. “While
playing, I always studied my opponents,
I studied their tendencies so that I could
predict where they’d go when they came
down the court,” he says. “That is just as
true now. I want to know my customers,
want to know their tendencies. And I don’t
just read reports. I get out and ask them.”

Disproving the Naysayers

Compiling and sharing that information
has contributed to Johnson’s success. The
greatest example might be his partner-
ship with Starbucks, which hadn’t previ-
ously established partnerships with other
Jeff Lewis/Icon SMI/Corbis

companies. While traveling, Johnson often

noticed that the premium coffee company
didn’t have stores in the communities
where other Magic Johnson Enterprises
partners were growing. Visiting Starbucks
stores near these communities, Johnson
talked to customers and found that many

50  Success AUGUST 2010 ©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved
 John Lamparski/WireImage/Getty Images
Noah Graham/NBAE via Getty Images

were from more urban communities and

had driven several miles to spend their
money at Starbucks.
Armed with that anecdotal informa-
tion as well as statistics about the demo-
graphic he believed he could open for
Starbucks, Johnson requested a meeting
Bettmann/Corbis

with Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz. He

showed Schultz that the minority popula-
tion in America is growing at a rate seven
times as fast as the majority population and
that African-Americans now spend almost
$1 trillion annually. Latinos, America’s
largest minority at 15.1 percent of the
population, have a spending power in
excess of $980 million.
“I asked him if he wanted to leave all that
on the table or if he wanted to reach those
Bettmann/Corbis

populations with a partner who under-

stood them,” Johnson recalls. “He went to
his board and we joined forces.”
Now Johnson’s company ow ns 125
Starbucks franchises, “and our per capita
spending at our stores is outstanding.
We proved ever yone who s a id t h at
minorities wouldn’t spend $3 for a cup of
coffee wrong.”
But h i s re s e a rch d id n’t stop w it h
opening the door. “Once we opened,
Bettmann/Corbis

we started looking at ways to tweak the

Starbucks model to meet our customers.
We were going to bring them what they
Bill Nation/Sygma/Corbis

wanted,” Johnson says. “The results speak

From Hardwoods to
Boardroom for themselves.” S
Johnson, who played for
Michigan State, the 1985 Don Yaeger is a nationally recognized inspira-
Championship Lakers and
the U.S. Olympic team, tional speaker, four-time New York Times best-
has gone on to score big selling author and longtime associate editor at
in business. Sports Illustrated.

©  2010 Success Media All rights reserved Success AUGUST 2010  51

Race of a Lifetim
by Don Yaeger
e
Photography by Joe Patronite

©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved

 Lance Armstrong was directionless, without passion. He called it a
classic case of “Now what?” He had a job and a life, but then he got
sick with cancer in 1996 and everything turned upside-down. When
Armstrong beat cancer a year later and tried to return to his life as
a successful professional cyclist, he was confused and disoriented.
Nothing was the same and he couldn’t handle it.

Joe Patronite

©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved Success  JUNE 2009  45

“Unless we act on a global level, cancer will be
the leading cause of death by 2010.”
Worse yet, he suddenly hated his job.
Armstrong knew surviving cancer involved more than the
gradual healing of his body. He knew his mind and soul needed to
recover, too. Had he actually understood more about survivorship—
in his case, learning to live a more balanced life while also racing his
bike—he would have recognized his quick comeback attempt and
return to his bike were fraught with psychological challenges.
At that moment in 1998, all Armstrong knew was that he had
been given a second chance. He publicly declared he was deter-
mined to take advantage of it, to escape the single-mindedness of his
old life in which the ground simply passed underneath his wheels.
His life would have new meaning, he said.
But privately, Lance turned into your average Joe. He played golf
every day. He water-skied. He drank beer and ate burritos with
tomato sauce. He lounged on his sofa, pointed the remote at his
big-screen television and channel-surfed. He said his life would
mean more, but Armstrong acted as if he never intended to deprive
himself again.
All was… not-so-good.
Giving Up
Although he’d started training and planned to compete again,
the truth was that as each day passed, Armstrong felt increasingly
ashamed that he had allowed his once finely tuned body to get out
of condition. That led to self-doubt and, ultimately, the most embar-
rassing moment of his professional life weeks earlier. During the
second pro race of his comeback from cancer, Armstrong—known
for his stubbornness and toughness, a Texas hombre who never
liked to be cornered—did the unthinkable. He quit.
In mid-race, as a torrential rain pounded him and a wicked
crosswind made it seem colder than the frigid 35-degree tempera-
ture, Armstrong lifted his hands to the top of the handlebars,
straightened up in his seat, coasted to the curb and ripped off his
race number. Lance Armstrong was done and he didn’t care what
anybody thought.
His decision to quit during that eight-day race in France had
nothing to do with how he felt physically, he said. He told everyone
he felt strong. He just didn’t know if cycling through the pain and
the cold was what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. He hated
his bike. He hated the conditions. He hated the racing. He figured
he had nothing else to prove to racing and, quite frankly, to the
cancer community.
Armstrong wanted off his bike, permanently.
Eleven years later, when he reflects on that day, he understands
his feelings were an important step in his recovery. It wasn’t about
his bike, the sport or the conditions. The issue was buried deep
inside of Armstrong’s soul, a place that cancer could not touch.
Armstrong had to go there and find himself again. “Healing wasn’t
just getting my body in shape,” he says. “Real healing meant getting
46 Success JUNE 2009
See the
LIVESTRONG
Challenge video
my mind in shape; it meant getting my
confidence and priorities in shape, too.”
success.com
‘Fight Like Hell’
It was during this phase of his recovery when
he began to feel he had a larger purpose. Armstrong
told himself his battle with cancer could provide not just an oppor-
tunity, but a responsibility. He started to see cancer as something he
was “given” for the good of others, and he wanted people to “fight like
hell, just like I did.”
Armstrong, of course, did exactly that and in the process has
evolved into the most public of figures: a world-famous athlete, a
seven-time Tour de France winner who is an inspiration for the
healthy as well as anyone who has ever battled the odds. Quit?
Armstrong has never entertained the thought again in any endeavor
he has undertaken.
After winning the 2005 Tour de France, Armstrong didn’t quit—
but he did retire to focus on his foundation and other interests. And
three and a half years later, Armstrong, 37, was on his bike again
with designs on an eighth Tour de France win in July. But his return
was more than an injection of star power into professional cycling.
Armstrong was riding to spread the word that cancer can only be
conquered if the world works together. He continues to prove cancer
is the race he’s committed to winning.
“Unless we act on a global level, cancer will be the leading cause of
death by 2010,” Armstrong says. “Our goal is to be the catalyst that
brings everyone together to fight cancer—from survivors, like me, to
world leaders and policymakers who must commit completely to the
effort to avoid a public health catastrophe.”
World Tour
Armstrong’s triumph over testicular cancer—which had spread
to his lungs, abdomen and brain—has become central to his day
job and his life’s work. In September 2008, when he announced
news of his comeback, he detailed a plan to link his riding to the
LIVESTRONG Global Cancer Campaign. “Racing the bicycle all over
the world,” he says, “is the best way to get the word out.” With Lance
Armstrong as spokesman, the word is out.
Although he has emphasized his return had more do with fighting
cancer than cycling triumphs, it’s no secret the ultra-competitive
Armstrong would love nothing more than to win his eighth Tour de
France. But to the question of whether he could be more effective
raising money to fight cancer in a suit than in cycling spandex, he
says, “It is undeniable an athlete in his prime or near his prime can
have more of an impact than a retired athlete. I don’t think we would
go somewhere [to race] if they weren’t actively engaged in trying to
make a difference in their country with regard to this disease.”
Between stages in January’s Tour Down Under, his first officially
sanctioned race as part of this comeback, Armstrong took time to
©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved

Scott Morgan/Getty Images
meet Australia’s Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. The meeting resulted
in more funding for cancer research from Rudd’s government. Then,
after finishing seventh in California’s Tour of Cali in February,
Armstrong announced he and his foundation would host the
LIVESTRONG Global Cancer Summit in Dublin, Ireland, in August
following the five-day Tour of Ireland.
Coming Back to Win
It was a second-place finish in the 2008 Leadville Trail 100—a
grueling mountain bike race in Colorado—that encouraged him to
believe he could compete again as an elite road racer. Prior to the
Leadville, Armstrong had not raced on roads since 2005.
At 37, there are no guarantees that Armstrong can get back to
where he was. Only one rider older than 34 has won the Tour de
France—a three-week, 2,000-mile-plus endurance test—and that
was 36-year-old Firmin Lambot in 1922.
“I don’t know if I can perform that well,” Armstrong said during
a New York news conference in which he announced details of
his comeback to cycling. But no one who knows him believes he
questions his ability to compete. George Hincapie, a close friend
of Armstrong’s who rode with him during his Tour de France
©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved
Leading the Pack
Armstrong gives the
opening remarks at the
LIVESTRONG Presidential
Cancer Forum, a debate
on cancer research and
healthcare.
victories, was thrilled by Armstrong’s decision. “He’s done more
than anybody’s ever done for cycling, especially here in America,”
Hincapie says. “He’s not coming back for show. He’s coming back
to win.”
Armstrong returned to Europe in March 2009, riding in Italy’s
Milan-San Remo Cycle Race, where he finished a disappointing
125th. Two days later, he suffered a major setback when he crashed
during the first day of the five-stage Vuelta a Castilla y León in
Spain. Rushed from the crash scene in an ambulance, Armstrong
had broken his collarbone, a common injury for cyclists that he’d
somehow avoided during his 17-year career. He hoped to be back on
his bike in about eight weeks with the Tour de France still circled on
his calendar.
A Long, Hard Climb
Armstrong’s return to racing was rooted in another comeback a
decade earlier. After the 1998 French race that he quit, Armstrong
told those close to him he was leaving the sport. But during a trip a
few weeks later to the hills of North Carolina, he took stock of his
life. He had been physically blessed with an extraordinarily large
heart that allowed him to do things others couldn’t. He had a mental
Success  JUNE 2009  47
“Real healing meant getting my mind in shape; it meant getting
my confidence and priorities in shape, too.”
discipline that matched his heart and gave him an edge over lesser-
willed competitors.
But he had to pull all that together again if he was going to succeed.
Armstrong said he felt as if he was on a stationary bike, pedaling furi-
ously but not going anywhere. What shape was his life supposed to
take? He had learned to courageously endure immense suffering as
he fought the disease, but now that the battle was won, how was he
supposed to enjoy the victory? How was Armstrong supposed to
survive cancer once doctors told him he was cured? Nobody gave
him advice about this part of the healing process.
It was during a training retreat with his longtime coach Chris
Carmichael when Armstrong says he discovered those answers.
Detailed in his autobiography It’s Not About the Bike: My Journey Back
to Life with Sally Jenkins, Armstrong says he finally began to see
his life as a whole. It was as if he had traveled full circle. He saw the
“pattern and the privilege of it, and the purpose of it, too.” Armstrong
says the message he was given was simple: His entire life was “meant
for a long, hard climb.”
For the first time in his life, Armstrong rode with a passion for
that climb because he knew it was the climb he was built to make.
And that love affair led him back to France with a renewed sense of
48 Success JUNE 2009
purpose and an improved body. And there began one of the most
legendary streaks in sports.
Dominating the Competition
As Armstrong puts it, there was one unforeseen benefit of
contracting cancer. The disease had completely reshaped his 6-foot
body, leaving his upper body smaller and leaner, which made him
better suited for riding up mountains. In old pictures, Armstrong
was sturdily built at 185 pounds with a thick neck and upper body,
which he said contributed to his bullishness on the bike. It was also
difficult to haul that weight uphill. Thanks, in a strange way to cancer,
Armstrong says he was leaner in body at 160 pounds and eventually
more balanced in spirit. He also has modified his diet, recording his
daily caloric intake, and incorporated weight training into his routine
to help retain his strength.
Before his cancer treatment, Armstrong had won two Tour de
France stages, one each in 1993 and 1995. He was forced to drop
out of the 1996 Tour on the seventh stage after becoming ill, a few
months before his cancer diagnosis.
In 1999, less than three years removed from his final chemo treat-
ment and a year after he had quit that other French race, Armstrong
Gaining
Momentum
Armstrong in his
2004 bid for
a sixth Tour de
France win.
Joe Patronite
©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved
  Changing the Face of Cancer
The Lance Armstrong Foundation
When Lance Armstrong was diagnosed
with cancer he made a decision to live. He
armed himself with information and the best
treatment protocol to beat his cancer. With his
Carla Van Wagoner/PR Photos
belief that everyone has the power to make
their own lives better, he started The Lance
Armstrong Foundation. Armstrong turned his
belief into the foundation’s motto—unity is
strength, knowledge is power and attitude
is everything.
Since its inception in 1997, the foundation has
raised more than $250 million. For every dollar
donated, 80 cents supports cancer survivorship programs, with a specific
goal of providing the most current information and resources to cancer
patients and survivors to prevent suffering and death.
The foundation focuses on prevention, access to screening and care,
Lynn Johnson/Sports Illustrated/Getty Images
improvement of the quality of life for cancer survivors and investment in
research. The LAF has contributed money to more than
550 organizations for various cancer programs.
In 2003, LAF created LiveStrong.org, an online resource
of lifestyle health and fitness information for cancer
prevention that also operates as a community of support
for people fighting cancer and for survivors. By 2005,
LAF sold more than 55 million yellow LIVESTRONG
wristbands in a widely publicized fundraising campaign.
won the Tour de France for the first time and
became the first American to win it since Greg
LeMond in 1990. Armstrong’s win was downplayed
by the cycling community because established stars Jan Ullrich and
Marco Pantani weren’t in the race that year. Their return the next
year didn’t slow Armstrong, who won one Tour after the next until
he demolished long-sacred records in the sport. In addition to seven
Tour de France wins, Armstrong won 22 individual stages, 11 time
trials, and his team won the team time trial three times. All of those
add up to physical and mental dominance over his competitors.
Living Strong
Following his final win in 2005, Armstrong delivered on his plan
to spend more time with his three children and on his campaign
against cancer. He also had opportunities to pursue other interests.
He was the pace car driver for the 2006 Indianapolis 500. He ran
the New York City Marathon twice and the Boston Marathon. In
2006, Armstrong, with fellow athletes Muhammad Ali, Andre
Agassi, Jeff Gordon, Mia Hamm, Cal Ripken Jr., Andrea Jaeger,
Warrick Dunn, Mario Lemieux, Jackie Joyner-Kersee and Alonzo
Mourning, founded Athletes for Hope, a charity that encourages
professional athletes to get involved in philanthropic causes and
inspires non-athletes to volunteer and support the community.
Armstrong’s yellow wristband, used as a fundraising tool for
the Lance Armstrong Foundation’s LIVESTRONG campaign, has
©  2009 Success Media All rights reserved
LIVESTRONG also helps cancer patients by matching them with clinical
trial options based on their diagnosis and treatment history. LIVESTRONG
has profiler tools, providing cancer patients personalized lists of treatment
options and possible side effects, reports of the pros and cons of each type of
treatment and suggested questions to ask doctors.
The LIVESTRONG Survivorship Center of Excellence Network, consisting
of eight centers and 21 community affiliates, is a collaborative effort of
the LAF and prominent cancer centers to increase survivorship through
the development of new interventions and sharing of best practices.
LIVESTRONG also is opening cancer research centers around the world.
Among research made possible by LAF is a national study resulting from
a five-year initiative conducted with the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention to address cancer survivorship in medically underserved
populations. The goal of the study is to improve the quality of life for
survivors. The foundation also worked with the National Cancer Institute on
a 2006 report focused on research and care given to adolescents and young
adults with cancer.
The LAF hosts a national LIVESTRONG Day when 100
advocates from every state go to Washington, D.C. to
urge Congress to fund research for cancer. More than
1,000 local events will take place around the world on
LIVESTRONG Day to raise awareness of cancer globally.
—Sandra Bienkowski
gained immense popularity, with more than 70
million sold worldwide. The foundation’s Web
site (LiveStrong.org) features inspirational stories,
news, and advice and spreads a message that includes “Unity is
strength. Knowledge is power. Attitude is everything.” The founda-
tion, with 70 employees and estimated annual revenues last year
of $39 million, also reminds visitors to the Web that more than
12 million people worldwide will be diagnosed with cancer and 8
million will die from the disease each year. In fact, as Armstrong
often notes, the World Health Organization announced in 2008
that cancer is projected to overtake heart disease as the largest
cause of death globally in 2010.
At every opportunity, Armstrong makes sure to amplify his high-
profile role as a cancer survivor. It’s on his bike, however, where
Armstrong believes he speaks the loudest against cancer with his
awareness-raising initiative: Hope rides again.
As he begins a new chapter of his life, Armstrong says he is finally
content. His girlfriend, Anna Hansen, is due to give birth to the
couple’s first child in June. Armstrong, who lives in Austin, repeat-
edly has floated the notion of running one day for statewide public
office in Texas. And when he races, he’s driven more than ever.
Lance Armstrong’s not going to quit. Never again. S
Don Yaeger is a four-time New York Times best-selling author, longtime
Sports Illustrated writer and recognized motivational speaker.
Success  JUNE 2009  49
©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved
 Fortune
Through
Focus
by Mike Seemuth

©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

 Trump says. “I also look for the hidden talents in people—never
Donald J. Trump—billionaire label someone by his or her job title. People very often have abilities
beyond their positions, and a good leader will recognize that and give
real estate developer, television them a chance. It serves everyone well.”

celebrity, author and icon—may Mogul in the

be the best-known businessman Making
As a young boy, Donald
in America. He built his powerful John Trump showed early
signs of real estate mogul
personal brand in real estate in the making. “When
I was a child I liked to
and successfully exported it to build skyscrapers with my
building blocks. I  think
a broad range of products and Courtesy of Trump Organization
that was prescient,” Trump
says. “I also loved accom-
services. The Trump name is pa ny i ng my f at her to
construction sites. I found
used to market everything from it very exciting.”
In his teenage years,
hotels, casinos and condos to Trump began to grasp the
importance of focusing
clothing and furniture. Bright Future on the needs of others,
Donald Trump, above, and, opposite, with the first lesson of negotia-
Less obvious is Trump’s knack for finding a happy balance his father Fred C. Trump tion. When he was 13 and
between working hard and enjoying life with his family. How does a bit of a troublemaker,
he balance the demands of his professional life, especially when his parents sent him to a military academy, hoping the experience
big challenges loom, so they don’t compromise his family life? In a would direct his energies more productively. It did. “The military
word, focus. academy was terrific for me,” Trump says. “I had my first lessons in
“I’ve learned to balance it by focusing on what I’m doing at that negotiating because of a very tough drill sergeant. I had to get around
moment. When I’m with my family, they have quality time with me. him, because I knew I couldn’t beat him…. I had to think about what
When I’m working, I’m working,” Trump says in a wide-ranging, would be good for him, what would make him look good, which is a
question-and-answer exchange with SUCCESS magazine. “I also good approach in negotiating. You have to know where the other side
love what I’m doing, so I’m an easy person to be around. People is coming from to be effective.”
who aren’t doing what they love can be unhappy or depressed. After Trump graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, his
That is a problem I don’t have to worry about. I consider myself father Fred C. Trump taught him about the real estate business and
very fortunate.” much more. His father also exemplified how to persevere in the face
Focus is a poorly appreciated quality yet ranks among the most of formidable distractions. “My father was a great example. He had
critical factors in professional success and personal satisfaction, endured a lot himself, and his fortitude was something I probably
Trump says. He prides himself on his own powers of concentration inherited,” Trump says. “He was always confident in my abilities, and
and insists that anyone he hires show evidence of the same. “I work that was a great feeling. It was also something to live up to.”
efficiently, and so must they, which requires focus,” he says. “Many
people underestimate the importance of focus, but it’s something I The Big Apple and Beyond
observe, and I can tell who has it and who doesn’t.” After a five-year apprenticeship in his father’s real estate busi-
Trump says the essence of leadership is setting an example, and ness in Brooklyn, New York, he went on to reshape the Manhattan
in a business setting, the best way for leaders to ensure a positive skyline and expand far beyond the Big Apple. Today, as chairman
response is recruiting like-minded employees. “Your people should and president of The Trump Organization, he oversees a portfolio of
be a reflection of aspects of yourself. I work fast, I’m disciplined, I’m residential and commercial properties in Chicago, Las Vegas and Los
a positive person and I expect those around me to be that way, too,” Angeles, among other U.S. markets, and in foreign markets such as

60 Success AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2008 ©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved


Keeping the
Momentum
The Trump Routine
Rising early, reading voraciously and avoiding staff meetings are some
of the habits that Donald Trump has adopted to minimize downtime and
maximize his productivity.
“I get up around 5:30 a.m., read a variety of papers and watch the
news,” Trump says. “Lack of information can be a disaster, and there’s no
excuse for it, considering the many options we have today of accessing
that information…. You have to learn every day.”
Trump says he conducts a lot of meetings in a typical workday—one-
on-one discussions with staffers and large group get-togethers:
“I don’t have time-consuming ‘staff meetings’ because I deal with
everyone myself.”
Long lunches away from his office are another no-no: “I have lunch at
my desk, which takes from 5 to 10 minutes. I dislike going out because it
interrupts the momentum…. I keep my momentum going.”
Trump relies on a large circle of advisers to guide his decision-making,
but he relies even more on his own instincts and information.
“Asking is a way to find out, and an easy one. I listen, but I also do my
own research,” he says. “Secondhand information is OK but shouldn’t be
relied on…. I listen to my advisers, but the decision is always mine. So is
the responsibility. That’s part of being an entrepreneur.”
©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved
Courtesy of Trump Organization
Toronto, Seoul and Panama City. The Trump Organization has more
than 30 real estate projects in development worldwide.
Trump and his co-investors own a slew of landmarks in New
York City that bear his name. One of the best known is The Trump
Building at 40 Wall St., a 1.3 million square-foot office building that
stands 72 stories tall, directly across the street from the New York
Stock Exchange. His portfolio of residential high-rises in New York
includes the 90-story Trump World Tower—one of the tallest apart-
ment buildings in the world—adjacent to the headquarters of the
United Nations. His redevelopment success stories in New York City
include renovating the former Mayfair Regent Hotel, now a luxury
condo apartment building called 610 Park Avenue, and turning the
old Hotel Delmonico into a condo called Trump Park Avenue.
Trump is also a major investor in gaming. He is chairman of the
board of Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc., which owns and oper-
ates three casino-hotels in Atlantic City, New Jersey: the Trump Taj
Mahal, Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino and Trump Marina Hotel
and Casino.
Trump is most proud of what he calls “the Trump legacy. My father
started a business, and I’ve brought it forward in a way he probably
couldn’t have imagined, but I think he’d be proud.”
Success  AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2008  61
 Unscripted Success
Television exposure has helped Trump achieve national and inter-
national recognition. While his success in real estate has made him
a wealthy man, Trump’s hit TV show The Apprentice made him an
icon of corporate culture. Contestants in the unscripted NBC game
show compete for a full-time job working for Trump, based on how
well they perform tasks he assigns them. Trump trims the number
of contestants by telling each unlucky one, with a dismissive wave
of his hand, “You’re fired.” The punch line in the ritual termination
scene, which has resonated with millions of viewers, began as an
ad-lib. “That was spontaneous, it wasn’t scripted,” Trump says. “I was
surprised that it caught on like it did. I would suppose because it is
a powerful and final sentence. What’s the comeback? There really
isn’t one.”
Critics wrongly predicted that The Apprentice would be canceled
shortly after the show made its debut on the NBC television network
Continued on page 65

Family Business Avenue in addition to her work at The Trump Organization,” he says. “She
loves jewels, she knows a lot about them, and she’s been very successful.”
The Trump Legacy Don, Ivanka and Eric say they admire their father’s business acumen,
drive and focus. “Hard work is undoubtedly one of the primary attributes
that has led to my father’s astonishing success,” Eric says. Don Jr. says
Donald Trump’s professional life and family life intersect at the company he also looks up to his father for “his ability to see and create value where
that manages many of his business interests. The Trump Organization others do not, and the fact that he always speaks his mind without catering
employs his three adult to populist sentiment.”
children, Donald Jr., Unlike the sons and daughters of wealthy families who take their money
Ivanka and  Eric. and privilege for granted, Trump says his children have proven themselves
“I wanted my children as enterprising employees. “They are hard workers, they do well, and the
to do what they wanted rest follows,” he says. “Easy success can be hollow. That will never be the
to do—whether it had case with them.”
anything to do with Trump says he and his first wife, Ivana, were both strict with their three
my interests or not. children, but not unduly so. Don Jr. and Eric say they’re grateful for
It would be pointless their upbringing.
to coerce them, and I “My parents raised us with a work ethic and an understanding of the
didn’t,” Trump says. “I’m value of a dollar by making us work for it,” Don says. “Learning how hard
pleased they made their it is to earn at a young age creates a great sense of satisfaction later in life
choice to work with me, when you are successful. That in turn creates more desire, and continued
but I wasn’t counting success usually follows.”
NBC: Virginia Sherwood

on it.” Eric says his father was extremely careful “never to hand us anything,
Don Jr., Ivanka and other than our educations, on the proverbial silver platter. There is no
Eric say they’ve learned question that these values have carried over into both our personal and
a lot from their father, professional lives.”
but possibly the most Ivanka, 26, says her father encouraged her and her brothers to take
important lesson is risks, explore and to learn by doing, which helped them all gain self-
Real-Life Apprentices that loving their work is confidence and independence.
Donald J. Trump Jr., from left, Donald essential for success. Trump agrees that his children have had the advantage of great
Trump, and Ivanka Trump Regardless of family educations and travel, but says they were anything but spoiled. “They knew
ties, if they were not what the expectations were, and they’ve done exceedingly well. Navigating
passionate about what they were doing, “we would be weeded out very the business world and society today isn’t easy. I’m very proud.”
quickly,” says Don Jr., 30. His two youngest children are a big source of pride as well. His wife
“There is no question that all of us share my father’s passion for the Melania Trump gave birth to their son, Barron, in 2006; and he has a
business,” stresses Eric, 24. “Hard work and the love of real estate is simply teenage daughter, Tiffany, from his second marriage to Marla Maples.
part of the Trump genetic code.” Trump is also a grandfather to 1-year-old Kai Madison, daughter of
The senior Trump continues to urge his kids to pursue their passions, Don Jr. and wife Vanessa. As important as work is for Don, especially at this
and over time, their business interests may broaden, just as his have. “For stage of life, “I do try to be an active force in her life,” he says, admitting he’s
example, Ivanka has her own jewelry collection and shop on Madison still working on balance. “I just sleep a lot less to come up with the time.”

62 Success AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2008 ©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

 “I work
fast, I’m
disciplined,
I’m a positive
person and I
expect those
around me
to be that
way, too.”
Courtesy of Trump Organization

©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved Success  AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2008  63

 Building Blocks
to Achievement
Trump’s
Strategies
Management style: “Leadership is about
setting an example,” Donald Trump says.
“Your people should be a reflection of aspects
of yourself.”
Keeping a creative edge: “I’m interested in
many things and that keeps me engaged.”
Perspective: “Life is fragile. Success is great
but that doesn’t change the deal. We’re here for
awhile—that’s all.”
Learning from experience: “I’m honest
with myself. You learn the most when you
can scrutinize your mistakes, as well as
your successes.”
Keeping pace: “You have to learn every day.
The world moves at an incredibly fast pace these
days, and if you want to succeed, you will have
to keep up. I always ask questions. I don’t know
everything; no one does. Asking is one way to
find out, and an easy one.”
Staying positive: “Sometimes you’re fighting
a lonely battle,” he writes in Trump: Never Give
Up. “Keeping yourself company with positive
reinforcement and faith in yourself can be the
invisible power that separates the winners from
the losers. Losers give up.”
Building the brand: “My buildings often sell
out before they are built. My tower on Waikiki
sold out in 5 hours, which is a record,” he says.
“Building a brand takes a long time and I was
aware of the importance of that long ago. It has
Courtesy of Trump Organization

paid off to be so demanding, because when

people see the name Trump, they know the
standard will be very high.”

Sky High
Trump International Hotel and Tower in Las Vegas
and, opposite, in New York

©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

Continued from page 62

in 2004. Trump initially found few advisers who believed his invest- Over the years, he has also published 14 books. His first book, the
ment in the show would pay off. “I took a risk when I decided to do seminal best seller Trump: The Art of the Deal, was published in 1987.
The Apprentice. Almost everyone advised me not to do it,” he says. “I Other best sellers include Surviving at the Top, The Art of the Comeback
hadn’t planned on doing a television show, but I was open to it. When and Why We Want You to be Rich: Two Men, One Message, co-authored
it was a big hit, everyone said it with Robert Kiyosaki.
would be a one-season wonder.
We’re going into our eighth season.”
The latest incarnation of the show,
Crash and
titled The Celebrity Apprentice, pits Comeback
TV stars, recording artists and Not ever y t h i ng h a s gone
other famous contestants against his way, of course. In the early
each other. 1990s, for ex ample, Tr ump
struggled to stay in business
Following His dur ing a deep slump in the
commercial real estate market.
Instincts Unable to make payments on
Trump’s successful decision to $9.2 billion in debt, he writes
launch The Apprentice despite all in Trump: How to Get Rich that a
the initial doubt is a rich reminder low point came when he passed
of the potential rewards for daring a beggar on the street and real-
to stand apart from the herd. Even if ized the beggar “was worth $9.2
it means making mistakes, staying billion more than I was.”
true to one’s conviction is impor- Trump says he recovered by
tant because “you… learn the concentrating on how to revive
most when you can scrutinize your his business, and not panicking
mistakes as well as your successes,” over its problems. “I focused on
Trump says. the solution, not the problems.
Embracing ideas contrary to I was steadfast in my positive
common wisdom is the essence of approach. Sure, I had a lot of
Trump’s entrepreneurial mindset. big problems, but I regained my
“The first thing to realize is that focus and just kept working at it,
being an entrepreneur is not a knowing it would work out,” he
group effort—you must become says. “I kept my equilibrium by
your own support team,” he says. being positive and circumspect
“You also have to be very deter- at the same time, so I could be
Courtesy of Trump Organization

mined, and above all, tenacious.” objective. It’s hard to function

Tr ump tenaciously pursues when you are worked up.”
a packed schedule. Somehow, Maintaining an even dispo-
between taping episodes of The sition may be easier said than
Apprentice and tending to his done, especially for people who
real estate development business, face withering volatility in their
Trump also makes time for his professional or personal lives.
many other professional pursuits. But while a positive outlook can
Among other items on his to-do list are tending to his casino busi- be helpful, Trump says neither unbounded pessimism nor blind
ness, writing books and exploring new product endorsement oppor- optimism is a suitable substitute for careful consideration.
tunities. His fame as host of The Apprentice has helped Trump win “I often ask myself, ‘What am I pretending not to see?’ It’s a good
endorsement deals for a shelf-full of products: the Donald J. Trump way to troubleshoot and to discover possible blind spots,” he says.
Signature Collection of men’s business attire, Trump Home furnish- “Positive thinking must be tempered with that, but without posi-
ings, Trump Ice bottled water, home-delivered Trump Steaks and tive thinking, a lot of great things would not have been achieved.
Trump Vodka, to name a few. Striking a balance is a pragmatic and effective way to go.” S

©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved Success  AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2008  65

 TrumpTimeline June 14, 1946
Born in Queens, New York.
Future Plans
• Trump SoHo Hotel
Condominium in
New York
• Trump Towers in Atlanta
1959   Enters New York Military Academy at 13. • Trump International
his interest in the Plaza and other assets.
He loses control of some of his real estate
Hotel & Tower in
1964 Graduates with honors. While working during the New Orleans
to creditor banks and is forced to trade
part of his empire to restructure debts.
summer with his father, purchases the Swifton • Trump International
His net worth plummets.
Village Apartments in Cincinnati for less than Hotel & Tower in Palm
$6 million—and sells for $12 million in a year and Jumeirah, Dubai
a half. • Trump Ocean Club, 1994-1997 Starts regaining control of many
International Hotel & properties. Sale of his share of Grand Hyatt
1968   Graduates from the Wharton School of Finance Tower, Panama City to Hotel in 1996 allows him to extinguish
at the University of Pennsylvania with bachelor’s open 2010 remainder of his personal debt.
degree in economics; moves to New York to work —Brandy Jules
for his father. 1995 Trump casino business goes public.
1974 B ecomes president of Trump Organization. Acquires
option on Penn Central’s Commodore Hotel adja- 1997 P ublishes The Art of the Comeback.
cent to Grand Central Station; partnering with Hyatt Reported net worth of $2 billion. Trump
Hotel Corp., renovates and opens as 1,400-room International Hotel & Tower opens.
Grand Hyatt Hotel in 1980.
1998 S tarts $5 billion Trump Place at former
1979 Leases a site on Fifth Avenue to build $200 million Penn Central railroad yards, with 5,700
apartment-retail complex, Trump Tower, finished residential units, more than 5 million
in 1982. square feet of commercial space.

1980s F ocuses on Atlantic City gaming opportunities, 1999 T rump begins developing golf courses.
developing properties that later would become
Trump Plaza, Trump Marina Hotel Casino and the 2001 C ompletes Trump World Tower, a 90-story
Trump Taj Majal. luxury residential building.

1987   Publishes best seller, The Art of the Deal. 2004 L aunches the NBC reality show, The
Apprentice and becomes executive
1988 Buys the Plaza hotel on Central Park for a record producer and host. Trump’s radio program
$407 million. on Clear Channel Radio premieres.

1989 Purchases Eastern Airlines Shuttle for $365 million, 2006 Trump Vodka is launched.
renaming it Trump Shuttle.
2007 Trump honored with a star on the Hollywood
1990 With recession, Trump faces bankruptcy when Walk of Fame.
unable to make massive loan payments; bailout
pact allows Trump to defer some debt, but forces 2008 Trump International Hotel & Tower opens
him to give up ownership of Trump Shuttle, most of in Chicago. Trump International Hotel &
Tower set to open in Las Vegas.
p an d
See Trumiyosaki
Ro b e rt K
e Want
“Why W e Rich”

@
You to b

m/
succepsKsiy.cooVideo
Tr u m

66 Success AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2008 ©  2008 Success Media All rights reserved

I study SUCCESS
and keep every
magazine
to use as
teaching tools
or restudy
myself.
-Lisa G., Maryland

Get the competitive advantage in business and life.

Each issue of SUCCESS is packed with insights, ideas and strategies from
today’s top CEOs, revolutionary entrepreneurs and other renowned leaders.

SUCCESS will help you:

Special Bonus! • Discover new ways to excel in your marketplace
FREE SUCCESS CD • Build a plan to increase your financial success
in every issue.
• The latest techniques for revitalizing your mind and body
$60 value
• Find proven methods that will energize your relationships

Subscribe Today
12 Issues for ONLY $34.95
www.success.com
800.570.6414