I, however, have learned great lessons from other business leaders that have made an outstanding impact on the world. These leaders have started companies that have pushed the world forward. In no particular order, here are some business leaders that I admire and why I admire them:
Image via DailyTech
Elon MuskElon Musk’s ability to have a limitless mind is admirable. He is able to drum up out-of-this-world, crazy ideas then pursues them. Coupled with his outstanding work ethic and vision, Musk has been able to push the human race forward through the innovative companies he created. The most notable ones include PayPal, Tesla, and SpaceX. With PayPal, he was able to change the way transactions are conducted online. With Tesla, he’s proving that electric cars can perform and look as good as gas powered cars. Finally, with SpaceX, (which in my opinion is the craziest thing he’s done thus far) he was able to prove that NASA can be replaced with a private company. That is mind blowing to me.
Richard Branson
There’s one thing that Richard Branson does: He has fun! Branson is a constant reminder to myself that in whatever you do, make sure you have fun doing it. The Virgin Group founder has refused to live a life in which he is a slave to work that he does not enjoy. Whenever I read a blog post from him, no matter what the subject matter is, he constantly reminds his readers to make sure they enjoy what they do. I believe success is built on doing something you love with no regrets. This is a huge factor in many success stories, it allows individuals to move ahead without burning out.
Image via UCLA Anderson School of Management
Bernee Strom
As an intern at WebTuner, I had the honor of meeting Bernee Strom and see her in action. She always has a positive attitude, high energy, and is easy to talk to. One great trait I admire about her is she knows how to build winning teams. Bernee Strom’s focus on getting the right people on the team came through when she we had company-wide meetings in which she would constantly praise each team member individually. When she spoke about adding additional employees, she always mentions her one big rule: No assholes. Bernee Strom’s focus on company culture and its people is something I found very important in early stage business success.
Jeff Bezos
Jeff Bezos’ ability to tune out the world is amazing to me. His ability to trust his intuition and ignore investor/public opinion has been critical to Amazon’s continued success. Bezos has a way to train and nurture his investors to follow his rules instead of Wall Street’s short-term, profit-seeking mentality. Additionally, there’s been an extensive fight against Amazon to be more involved in the serving the public through community events and donations. We can all agree that Amazon does not donate as much as other Seattle big corps (Microsoft, Boeing, etc). However, the public outcry has not made Bezos barge, instead, he has focused on providing Amazon’s customers with low prices and great customer service. Lesson learned here: keep doing what you do best and tune out noise from the negative voices. Eventually, people will forget about it because you do what you do so well.
Those are some of the people in business that I admire. Do you think I forgot someone? Let me know in the comments below.
-------
Titus Kimbowa is a young entrepreneur living in Seattle, WA. He was born in Kampala, Uganda & moved to the States when he was 12. He’s currently a senior at the University of Washington and serves as vice-president of the UW American Marketing Association, and he's interning as the product marketing analyst for stealthy start-up Webtuner. He’s got past experience as part of the Zagat team at Google, Crown Social, TEDxYouth Seattle, and starting up an enterprise travel company. In his spare time (which he rarely gets) he likes to play basketball, read, and hang out around Seattle.
Find Titus on Twitter, and view all of his posts here.
Find Titus on Twitter, and view all of his posts here.
