World’s greatest business minds share lessons and ideas for not only entrepreneurs but to every human being below:
Motivation by…
Mark Zuckerberg
GLOBAL CONNECTOR: COFOUNDER, FACEBOOK
My hope was never to build a company. I was driven by a sense of purpose to connect people and bring us closer together.
A couple years after starting Facebook, some big companies wanted to buy us. Nearly everyone else wanted to sell, but I didn’t. I wanted to see if we could connect more people. It tore our company apart, fraying relationships until, within a year or so, every single person on the management team was gone.
That was my hardest time leading Facebook. I believed in what we were doing, but I felt alone. And worse, it was my fault. It taught me that it’s not enough to have purpose yourself. You have to create a sense of purpose for others. And I hadn’t explained what I hoped to build.
That sense of purpose creates motivation and meaning for people beyond just surviving or making money. It attracts other people who are interested in the right things. People here build products because they want to do something meaningful and play an important part in how people use Facebook. The company has to be successful for us to keep going, but the real motivation is creating positive social change in the world.
I think that’s true for most good businesses. Building something like Facebook and running a community like ours requires some inspiration. A lot of our leadership team is wired that way. Our compass as a company is all about making our services available to the most people possible so we can give everyone around the world a voice.
People often ask me for advice about starting a company, and I always tell them your goal should never be starting a company. Focus on the change you want to make, find people who share your same purpose, and eventually you may have an opportunity to build something that helps create purpose for others and has a positive impact on the world.
Patrice Motsepe
ENTREPRENEURIAL ICON: AFRICA’S FIRST BLACK BILLIONAIRE
After I completed my first significant transaction, buying mines that were closed or about to close, with a demotivated workforce of 8,000, who for years had been told, “Guys, you’re not cutting it,” people asked if I was mad. But we ran our business differently and it worked – we paid our workers based on profitability, with bonuses based on aspirational targets that, if achieved, created money for the mineworkers, the company and its shareholders alike.
Nobility by…
Meg Whitman
CEILING BREAKER, COMPANY BUILDER: FORMER CEO, EBAY; CEO, HEWLETT PACKARD ENTERPRISE
There is a myth (at least I believe it’s a myth) that being successful demands that we give up on decent, commonsense values: honesty, family, community, integrity, generosity, courage, empathy, etc. As we advance in our careers, there is this belief that winning at all costs is winning nonetheless. I never bought into that myth. I respect ambition, but not ruthless ambition.
We have the opportunity today to use our values to help us reinvent our future during a time of great stress and economic anxiety. There are those who see a focus on values as a luxury for prosperous times, when we can “afford” to think about making the world a kinder or nobler place. I want to make a different argument: It is precisely during difficult times that we need to align our priorities and actions with the fundamental principles that ultimately create stability, efficiency, energy and even prosperity. Navigating by essential values can have a force-multiplying effect.
Openness by…
Tim Berners-Lee
VISIONARY: INVENTOR, WORLD WIDE WEB
I published my proposal for the World Wide Web in 1989. From the outset, I imagined it as an open, universal space, where anyone, anywhere could take their ideas and bring them to life without having to ask for permission or pay royalties. I hardwired these factors into the Web’s design and made a conscious decision not to try to copyright or patent it. In 1993, CERN, my employers at the time, agreed to make the code available to anyone, royalty-free, forever.
This openness is at the core of what makes the Web powerful. It has underpinned the decades of creativity and innovation, opening up access to information, letting us communicate and collaborate across borders, and creating new industries. But now, as the Web matures, this openness is under threat.
Some governments have stepped up censorship of information they feel threatened by, using Web-based technologies to monitor citizens or even shutting down the internet in their jurisdiction. And some companies are also trying to limit openness for financial gain by challenging the principle that all internet traffic is treated equally – net neutrality. The internet is both a market for bandwidth and a market enabler (content, social networks, etc.). Strong net neutrality rules separating these markets are key. Otherwise, one set of interests can control the other – a disaster for innovation.
The open Web has been fertile ground for entrepreneurs to build successful companies –without having to ask permission from internet providers to allow their idea to take off. You break that “permissionless” space, and you establish substantial barriers for the Web’s next big thing.
The open Web, like all open markets, demands rules to ensure it stays fair and competitive. For the economic, social and political benefit of all, the Web must be recognized as a public good and locked open through appropriate corporate and government action – including the preservation of net neutrality. No single individual can control the future of the Web, but together we can keep it open and build the Web we want.