It is truly amazing just how applicable the common sense and wisdom exists in the world that we can learn and use in the business world.
Each year for the past 75 years Esquire magazine (www.Esquire.com) interviewed individuals and asked them to share “What You’ve Learned.”
The January 2009 issue of the magazine profiles diverse individuals, a few in business but most from other fields, from each of the fifty states. Here are some of their profound thoughts that perhaps you might useful and humorous.
Toby Keith said that “I hammered on crossword puzzles until I could work the USA Today one in fifteen minutes. Vocabulary helps you in songwriting. It helps you in business. It helps you in everything.”
Duane “Dog” Chapman wasn’t always a bounty hunter. “When I was on the road selling Kirbys (vacuum cleaners, selling door to door) I’d check into the suite, because I knew that I had to be able to stay there. Everyone else was checking into the $39.95 (room). I wanted the $149 one with its own kitchen. And I worked harder.”
Whether it was on the college, NFL, or as a movie actor, Jim Brown was a winner. “Tell you what you got to do to compete. What you got to do to compete is compete.” (www.NFL.com)
Larry Bird reflected back on his life as a basketball player with “I never played when I didn’t want to be the best out there every night. Not once.”
He probably didn’t realize he was talking about business models when he said it, but actor John Goodman thinks that “if the mortar and bricks are laid right, the building will last for a while.” (www.IMDB.com). (Sounds like a verse in The Bible).
Goodman went on to mention that his mother taught him something very important. “She taught me persistence. My dad died a month before my second birthday. She didn’t have a shot in hell, and she just kept doing what she did. Taking in laundry, babysitting kids, working at the drugstore, working at the barbecue joint, and she raised her kids.”
You might know Dwight Schrute from “The Office” on television. His comment about work was thought provoking: “Have you ever really kept your nose to the grindstone? The amount of blood that comes out is shocking!” (www.NBC.com)
A few decades back, the song “Schools Out” made Alice Copper a rock hero. In his interview he says “Never be late. When you’re late, what you‘re saying is that your time is more important than the other person’s time. That’s pretty egotistical.” (www.iTunes.com)
The first man to break the sound barrier, Chuck Yeager, said “There was really no difference between Pearl Harbor and 9/11. In both cases, we let our guard down badly. Complacency will kill you.”
The governor of Tennessee, Phil Bredesen, believes that “It seems to me that kids who always have their heads up, looking around for the next opportunity, usually don’t do as well as the ones who put their head down and become really good at the job at hand.”
Phillip Glass, 71 years old, is a composer. Looking back on his life, he mentioned that “What I’ve noticed is that people who love what they do, regardless of what that might be, tend to live longer.”
Often we don’t think of sports figures as sources of great or profound knowledge, usually because far too many of them get into trouble in the public eye and gain a reputation for being intellectual lightweights and less than professional. Evander Holyfield, a boxer, described a specific moment: “I remember fighting Lennox Lewis for the first time, in Madison Square Garden. I’m sick. I’m getting ready to quit. But I see my son in my corner, looking at me. He sees something’s not going right. And I thought, if I quit, they are going to tell my son, ‘When the pressure hit, he quit.’ That’s the only reason I didn’t quit in that fight. I told him later when he got older.”
Clint Eastwood is old and gray, but remains thoughtful. “Children teach you that you can still be humbled by life, that you learn something new all the time. That’s the secret to life, really—never stop learning. It’s the secret to career. I’m still working because I learn something new all the time. It’s the secret to relationships. Never think you’ve got it all.”
Playing with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band made Steven Van Zandt a believer in facing the brutal facts and having “fierce conversations.” “Every successful person needs to have at least one person in their life who is not afraid of them. It’s easy to surround yourself with people who don’t know your character flaws and you can pretend to be God.”
These may be tough times and our lives may be filled with worry. Paris Hilton is known for being famous for no good reason at all. But she shares a thought we all should heed: “It’s good just to smile and go on with your day.” After all, a smile is free and we can all use more of them.
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