People who study, they have an opportunity.
— Lirio Parisotto #BillionDollarGoldNuggets
But it’s not the school knowledge that is decisive. There is a great difference between schooling and education. Many billionaires may not have schooling, but they excel in education.
As Cai Dongqing put it:
School knowledge is not the decisive factor. I dropped out of school early, and I was not good at learning from the textbook. In the commercial world, I feel that more important factors are the desire and capability in absorbing new knowledge and the personality and behavior such as integrity and the sense of responsibility.
One of Cai’s principles is to always learn and improve. Learn from your business and improve with every step. When I asked him what advice would he give his 20-year-old self, he answered: “Learn more!”
School knowledge is not the decisive factor. More important factors are the desire and capability in absorbing new knowledge.
— Cai Dongqing #BillionDollarGoldNuggets
Cho Tak Wong (Cao Dewang), whom I described in chapter 1, is one of the wisest people I have ever met despite his having had only five years of schooling. He resembles a Chinese philosopher and could pass as a Buddhist monk. I didn’t know him before, but it seems that with increasing age and experience he got this wisdom of an old man who has seen it all, drew conclusions from it, and now teaches his well-thought-out and well-formulated ideas about life and business.
He never graduated from any school. He never attended any university. His poor family couldn’t even afford an elementary education for him. Everything he learned in his life, he learned by himself. He has absolutely no formal education. In spite of all that, he is now among the most respected and wealthiest people in China, a self-made billionaire and the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2009. I asked him about wealth advice for young people. His answer will surprise you:
My advice for young people is, they should start to build up wisdom, not just making money but wisdom.
Use Every Opportunity to Learn
Use every opportunity to learn. You never know what it’s going to be good for. So learn whenever and wherever possible.
Lirio Parisotto learned a lot during seemingly accidental weekend courses. The skills he learned there proved extremely helpful in his later career and paid for his college education.
After he was expelled from the seminary, he worked two years for a small salary as janitor in his uncle’s college in Brasilia.
At the end of the week, they rented the rooms for weekend courses. These were small courses with some special scientific methodology. I remember technical design, tax declaration. There were many small courses of this kind. And I remember one I did was legislation for workers in unions, good for work in the HR department in some companies. Most of the time, I went there. I took these courses for free. I just spent my weekends there. And it made my head more clear.
When I went back to Rio Grande do Sul, I found a job in a small meat processing plant with 23 employees. At the end of the month, I did the bills of the employees.
Also, in January, February, March, I did the special service for income tax. Because in Brasilia I learned what is possible to do in order to optimize it, especially for the drivers of the trucks. Because at that time they had a 3% discount on the income tax. They thought that what they had paid was the final tax. I realized this was only the anticipated tax. At the end of the year, you need to do the balance. Most of them could receive money back. But they didn’t do anything. They didn’t know, because they thought this was the final tax. And I went, “We need to do the figures, maybe you will get something back.” “No! The government! Do you think you will receive money back from the government? Forget it!” The first year was, “OK. I don’t charge you anything. Only when you receive the money back, you pay me 20%.” The deadline was the end of March.
In September, October, the money started to come. They received their money, and so I became a saint in our city, the only guy capable of getting money back from the government. The money I made from the commission was about the price of a VW Beetle.
With this money and the money I had, I was able to study.
Learn more!
— Cai Dongqing #BillionDollarGoldNuggets
Tony Tan Caktiong learns from everybody and at every opportunity.
I think one best way to learn is to keep an open mind and listen and ask the right questions. And I think everybody is a teacher. Every moment is a learning opportunity. Even simply talking to your customers and talking to your employees. So if you keep an open mind, that’s where you learn and people will give you good feedback.
Everybody is a teacher. Every moment is a learning opportunity.
— Tony Tan Caktiong #BillionDollarGoldNuggets
Learn How the World Works
One of the main differences between millionaires and billionaires is their knowledge. Billionaires learn how the world works and understand it on an entirely different level. How do you build a skyscraper? How do you finance a factory? How do you negotiate with a government about the purchase of a mine? Those are the questions billionaires learn and know the answers to.
Let me give you an example: I asked Ron Sim about the acquisition of Brookstone, which was a big financial effort for his company, and how he dealt with it.
Because I had to deal with a lot of bankers, I forced myself to understand every aspect of finance and accounting. You need to understand all the financial derivatives and all the implications. You need to understand the profit and loss statement, balance sheet, cash flow. You need to understand how the market works from both the operational and financial standpoint.
You need to be mindful of a broader spectrum of things. There’s so much to explore in finance. Corporate bankers, investment bankers, private bankers—there are all different bankers. They are each a specialty in itself. And if you do not know how to deal with it, your leverage power weakens. And when it weakens, you make a wrong deal. You pay the price.
Three Steps to Learn to Do Business
You can’t learn to do business at school or from theory books. It’s like learning to swim by reading a manual. No, you need to get wet by jumping into the water and trying to swim. But before you do that, it’s advisable to prepare a little, so you won’t drown immediately.
1. Prepare
In order to do business, you need to understand as much as possible about its fundamentals. Also, learn as much as possible about your industry.
You can do it by working for somebody else, like Hüsnü Özyegin suggests.
I advise our students at Özyegin University to first work in a corporate entity when they graduate and not jump straight into starting a new business or become a new entrepreneur unless they have an idea like Facebook or Twitter. [laughs] They have to work in a corporate entity first and see how a corporate entity operates, and also meet people and learn, build up a network, become exposed to different industries.
So first learn your trade, start at the bottom, and work your way up in order to understand your business from the bottom up.
This is exactly the approach that Frank Hasenfratz advocates:
I only know one job that you start at the top and you’re successful: when you dig a hole. There, you have to start on top. [chuckles] The rest of it, it’s much better to come from the bottom up.
Narayana Murthy became the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2003. But his first business failed. He then decided to first learn the nuts and bolts of his industry as an employee.
I started a company called Softronics in Pune, in 1976, and it failed because there was no market for software in India and computers were very expensive. The banks did not give any loans, and most corporations did not trust small enterprises.
I failed in my first business. And it was good because I learned a very important lesson, and that is the market must be ready for your entrepreneurial idea. If the market is not ready, no idea will take off.
So, I realized my mistake in less than a year, understood that I had to focus on the export market, closed Softronics, decided to learn the tricks of export and the lessons of running mid-size enterprises, and became the head of software at PCS in Mumbai.
And I knew that sooner or later I would return to entrepreneurship. I had a team of about 200 software engineers, and I traveled abroad a lot to meet clients. So, I learned a lot about opportunities in the software export market, and how to promote a company in the export market, and how to organize an export-oriented company. I am very grateful to PCS for such a wonderful opportunity.
I only know one job that you start at the top and you’re successful: when you dig a hole.
— Frank Hasenfratz #BillionDollarGoldNuggets
Read books and magazines, and instead of traveling for shopping, go to conferences or industry fairs, as Lirio Parisotto advises.
If you want to understand one business, any kind of business, you have books, magazines, Google. And instead of traveling just for fun, why don’t people go to conferences, congresses, industry fairs? If someone wants, he will find a way to understand each specific area, if he is interested.
Open your mind and see what happens. Travel. I think one important thing is travel. But people travel most of the time just for shopping. And they do nothing, nothing, nothing.
You will read later in this chapter how Lirio’s travel to New York inseminated in his mind a winning business idea.
2. Learn from Other People
Take advice from the people you admire and trust.
The first address is always the family. Are your grandparents or your parents entrepreneurs? If yes, take advice from them.
The next address are the great people in your industry. Sometimes they are your competitors. Seek contact with them and learn from them.
Hüsnü Özyegin, now the wealthiest self-made man in Turkey, confessed to me he was mentored by the legendary Turkish entrepreneur and philanthropist Vehbi Koc:
When I was the general manager of Yapi Kredi, I lived in the same apartment building as Vehbi Koc. He was famously modest. I was 40 years younger than him, and whenever I visited him, he would listen very carefully to what I had to say. Now I wish that I had made him talk more and listened. He was one of the greatest visionaries of our time, and many count him as being the founder of modern philanthropy in Turkey. He established important institutions such as the Turkish Education Foundation, Koc University, as well as museums and schools.
Frank Hasenfratz was exceptionally active in this area, always trying to learn something from the proficient people in his industry whom he admired:
I started a group, 10 people in manufacturing. It was a general manufacturing group, not just in the car industry. The deal was, “Each one of you has to do a presentation, what you think you did good, something that others can learn from. And brag a little bit.” There’s nothing wrong with bragging. But you can’t have many people. Ten is the best. And usually six or seven showed up.
You can learn, like Petter Stordalen, from those with more experience:
If you’re open-minded, you can learn from a lot of people. I’ve learned a lot from people working on different levels in the companies. But particularly in the beginning of my career, I was very lucky to work with people who had much more experience than I had, and so I learned a lot from people who had years and years of experience, and they taught me about it. So I didn’t have to do all the mistakes myself.
Some billionaires, like Cai Dongqing, learn most from people with a different perspective.
The most useful advice is always by those who can give me a different opinion on my idea and point out its problems. Such advice is helpful and influential.
3. Learn Business by Practicing It
I asked Jack Cowin about the best way to learn to do business.
What is the best way to learn to do business? Obviously by experiencing it. You don’t learn it in a classroom. It’s by getting in and jumping off the dock into the water and learning how to tread water as you learn how to swim. Baptism by fire, not classroom theory. Getting practical experience. That’s how you learn.
Naveen Jain confirms it:
There is no better way of learning to do business than doing it. I don’t care how many books you read, I don’t care how many professors you talked to; the only way to learn to do the business is to do the business and have great mentors.
What is the best way to learn to do business? Obviously by experiencing it. You don’t learn it in a classroom. It’s by getting in and jumping off the dock into the water and learning how to tread water as you learn how to swim.
— Jack Cowin #BillionDollarGoldNuggets
Whatever your journey, remember that experience is the most precious jewel you gain in your life. Cai Dongqing explains it as follows:
Experience is the most meaningful content in our life, but only when it comes with a goal will it be enriched with inspiration and fulfillment. The goal needs to be in line with what we really want to do, so that we could enjoy the experience all the time no matter if it is suffering or comfort.
There is no better way of learning to do business than doing it.
— Naveen Jain #BillionDollarGoldNuggets
Stay Curious
For your development in business and in private life, it is essential to stay young in mind. Be curious. Be open to new ideas. Explore new opportunities.
Petter Stordalen considers being open-minded the most important character trait for a businessperson, next to honesty. It’s important “that you’re open. That you listen to people around you, rather than to insist you have the right answers.”
Openness to new ideas and asking the right questions are some of the qualities Narayana Murthy considers the most important for a businessperson.
It’s curiosity that helped Lirio Parisotto find a perfect marketing model for his business.
I always was curious so I took some money and I went to New York. This was the first time I saw a videocassette and the camera with my own eyes. The cassette was 10 kilos probably, an old model. And they had also a possibility to connect TV to the camera. And so in the Broadway area a salesman recorded outside, and it appeared immediately in the TV.
But for me it was clear: you didn’t need to go to the stores anymore. Because before the film was like a photo. You needed to develop it. And this one: do you need to develop? No! And also it was possible to re-record it, to use it over and over again.
They sold equipment, cameras, and also movies and some Broadway shows. So I took two suitcases full of movies and went back to Brazil to open a Video Club.
It was initially a retail store. They call it Video Club because people paid some monthly payment to become an associate of the club. They had the right to borrow the videos, but they have to pay monthly.
The secret was they needed the device. So, I started to sell the device as well, the device and also the TV. And this kind of client is a client with good purchasing power. And those are more open-minded people. They spend money to have a better TV, better sound, so the store started to grow.
But the most important part was not the Video Club. The Video Club was important to get the foot in. I put the Video Club in the end of the store. So the people needed to [laughs] walk in the middle of the equipment.
This way, Lirio was able to attract many customers and convert them into sales. Soon, he dominated the local electronic equipment market.
Engage in the Process of Constant Improvement
Being successful is one thing, but sustaining that success is another thing entirely. Keep on learning and improving in order to stay in the race. It’s not the state of being educated, it’s the process of learning that makes you successful.
Cho Tak Wong is somebody who learned everything he knows by himself. He went from a 14-year-old illiterate rascal to a billionaire and the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2009. He is a living example of what outrageous success is po
ssible for you if you work on yourself, no matter where you start. I listened attentively to what he told me about learning: “If you do not keep learning, then this will become your boundary.”
I heard similar words from another Chinese billionaire, Cai Dongqing:
You need to keep learning and self-transforming at all times, which I think is the key to continuous success. Keep learning and keep thinking. Learn everywhere and all the time.
Billionaires never stop improving. You would think you are perfect enough when you are the best entrepreneur in the world. Mohed Altrad became the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2015, and I asked him what he wanted to change about himself. His answer astonished me: “I want to be better at what I’m doing. Improve.”
Michał Sołowow doesn’t need inspiration to improve.
It’s rather my inner energy, that internal pressure that whispers to me “go forward,” “be better still.”
When I asked him about his success secret, he told me:
One important thing is the ability to draw conclusions from defeats. To continuously learn and after all self-improve. Or the ability to accept that you manage people smarter than yourself and take for yourself what is best in those people. And a continuous search for such people from whom you can keep learning
Michał’s advice is above all “to fight with your weaknesses and limitations.”
Tony Tan Caktiong is an excellent example of never-ending improvement. He went to the university after starting a successful business; and even now, as the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2004, he still goes to Harvard Business School for a week each year.
I wanted to study further, more for self-development, so I went to AIM (Asian Institute of Management). They were the most popular at that time in Asia, and they are based here in Manila. So I attended the top management program. Then I also went to Harvard for some programs. I believe in self-development. I have passion and interest in trying to understand more or to learn more, so I started doing these management programs. I think in the business side there is still a lot to learn. So I still keep on going back to Harvard on a yearly basis for a one-week program. And then from time to time I read some business books, so it’s still mostly on the business side. But also general knowledge.
The Billion Dollar Secret Page 25
