Learning Vision From Leaders
These leaders are not just leaders of companies that have a big vision and manage to implement it effectively. They are not people who have been on a successful career path their entire lives, having never had to worry about learning a new skill. Some of them might be even self-taught, but they all possess an uncanny ability to see what others cannot.
The world has changed so much and we’ve all seen how technology has completely changed the way we think about how things work and how business is done in general. Learning these skills will help you in the future when you need it most - whether that’s with your own business or as part of your job now.
The leaders featured in this article are all considered successful, but they all have one thing in common: they were not born with a silver spoon in their mouth.
Everyone featured here had to learn how to become the leader they are today, and to do so they had to take risks that others were not up for. It’s these risks that other people aren’t ready to take that makes these leaders stand out from the crowd and show their true potential. One of the biggest risk takers is Mark Zuckerberg; it was this risk that led him to start Facebook as a way for students at Harvard to connect with each other through a private social network. That took him years of working on it before it got off the ground, but once it did, he proved that it was worth far more than time and money spent.
Some successful people go about things in different ways; for example, many software-based products have no need of a physical basis because most people use them online. Some then argue that those products have already been built; however, these entrepreneurs are the men and women who know that the future will change how we live.
In this article we’ll meet these 20 leaders and their incredible visions for their businesses - as well as an insight into where they went wrong and how they overcame those setbacks.
Mark Zuckerberg, who founded Facebook at Harvard University in 2004, is a lot like Bill Gates. The two are fierce competitors, but they share many similarities. Zuckerberg founded Facebook when he was 19 years old, with Eduardo Saverin as his co-founder. Together they raised $3 million from investors to start their new venture and within a year of being launched there were more than half a million users and by September 2006 it had more than 10 million users. Later that year Microsoft made an offer to buy Facebook for $15 billion - Zuckerberg refused the offer and the following year Facebook received its first investment from venture capitalists, earning them tens of millions of dollars. Today Facebook is worth more than $100 billion and it’s used by about 1.3 billion people each month. There are some things you can learn from Zuckerberg:
• He took a risk when he created Facebook, as he knew that there was no other social network like it at the time. He didn’t just make the first of its kind - he had to make it better than anyone else could have done and offer users something that they would not be able to say no to.
• When he decided to turn down Microsoft’s offer, it was a gamble - but the result of this gamble was worth a great deal more than the funding.
Anita Genereux was born without arms or legs and soon after birth she learned how to walk on her hands and feet. It took her another four years to learn how to talk without people constantly asking if she was okay; at 15-years-old this was something she wanted to prove. She started working in media at the age of 20 and now runs four businesses from behind the scenes, including an online magazine with millions of subscribers around the world which has helped boost her earning power to $8 million annually - all while only employing two people. Before getting this big break into the world of online business, she was a systems analyst and was working to provide healthcare to those with disabilities by creating a product that would help them connect to others.
Robert Lefkowitz’s first job had nothing to do with computers; it was in the auto industry as a car mechanic. He got his first computer at age 17 and after college he went on to work for computer companies. In 1989 he began writing software code for Rich Software and within a few years he started his own company called SafeNet that would later become one of the largest providers of internet security software in the world. Lefkowitz has an estimated net worth of $1 billion after selling his company in 2011.
When you go from being a car mechanic to creating a billion-dollar company, you’ll have an easier time overcoming any odds that get in your way. This is the same path that Bill Gates followed - before he became CEO of Microsoft he worked in the computer lab at Harvard University.
Michael Dell was also born into a wealthy family and rather than attending college, he began working for Dell when he was only 17 years old. He had tried to attend college but couldn’t due to his obsessive interest in computers - instead, his dad gave him $1,000 and told him that if he could make more than that back without attending school then he would let Michael quit college. It took Dell only a year to earn the million dollars and in 1983 he began his own computer company. After moving the business from Texas to his hometown of Austin, Dell Computers Inc. was able to expand and the company made $64.5 billion in revenue in 2011 - which had grown at an average rate of more than 25% each year since going public in 1988. Today, Dell has close to $20 billion in assets as well as a market value of approximately $40 billion.
Dell has found success by making smart decisions and listening to customers. For example, Dell listened to a customer who said that it would be easier for his children to use his computer if the monitor and computer were separated. Dell made this change and later changed his company’s name to reflect this development.
Ralph Lauren was born in New York City; he turned out to be a very successful entrepreneur and is now worth $7 billion - almost all of which came from the clothing brand created by Lauren and his business partner at the time, Barry Schwartz. The pair chose a British fashion designer which fit with the name of the brand, Ralp Lauren. The company began with $500,000 in capital and since 1971 it has grown to include 1,800 retail stores and it’s worth more than $10 billion.
Lauren had a unique start when he created his clothing brand. He started by making clothes that he sold to people in New York City and then he expanded throughout the United States. He didn’t know anything about retail but he knew that if his customers liked his product, they would find a way to buy it.
There are many lessons in this story: Think of your target market as people who would appreciate your product or service rather than focusing on those who will spend money.
Conclusion
It’s never too late to take control of your own destiny.
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