Business Coach : Choose Success
-So now let me ask you this– is success still a choice if I am currently living in poverty, and I want to start a business or be a business coach? Is it possible for me to become successful if I currently do not have money, I’m in poverty, and I want to become successful? Is success still a choice, or how is it still a choice?
-It’s still a choice. There’s no doubt in my mind that it’s still a choice. It’s still an opportunity. But when you don’t have all of those things around you to propel it, it may be slightly more difficult than for others. But that’s where your own tenacity comes in. That’s where your own persistence comes in. Because you’re pushing. Because it’s for you. You want it. And you’re not going to let anything stand in the way of your getting it. If you need help in this journey, hire a business coach.
-I want to give just a couple examples here to give a little bit of context. Because this is huge here. This guy down here– I don’t know if you can see him. This is Ryan Tedder, who you know.
CLIFTON TAULBERT: Sure, I know Ryan.
CLAY CLARK: He went to Christian Chapel, the church we went to. And Ryan over here is a Grammy-winning artist. And Ryan went to college just like a lot of other people go to college. And he said, I would like to become a successful musician. I would like to become a– he never said he wanted to be a celebrity, I don’t think. But he wanted to be a successful musician. I knew him well. He didn’t need a business coach to push him in this area.
And one of the things that Ryan did, though, is after college– and I don’t want to exaggerate the times. I don’t have it more specifically written down here. But he basically worked at the Pottery Barn and he worked at other odds and ends jobs for about six years, trying to get his big break, interning for free for multimillionaires. He would intern for free for these award-winning artists and producers, and he wouldn’t charge them a dime. Because he felt like that was his entrance into the road of success.
Oprah Winfrey started off as an intern. You look at Andrew Carnegie, the world’s wealthiest man during his time, he at the age of, like, 16 basically working for free. It seems like that’s the entrance for all entrepreneurs is you start by just wherever you can, even if you don’t have money. That is what a business coach will tell you as well.
-I think that’s the key thing is starting wherever you can. And sometime wherever you can can be a small job in the mail room. But the thing about it is you are on your way somewhere. The key thing is not to be stuck in time, is to have this emotional movement as well as the corresponding physical movement.
-Now every entrepreneur that I’ve ever met has overcome some major adversities in their life. Oprah was raped when she was young. Walt Disney literally lost every dime and actually resorted to eating dog food. At the bottom, he was eating dog food to stay afloat. Russell Simmons had a speech impediment, yet he built his big record empire on the phone making calls. Richard Bronson– I was gonna call him Richard Branson– is severely dyslexic. The guy who started Virgin Records– he basically dropped out of high school. And I don’t think a lot of people realize that Walt Disney dropped out of high school. Bill Gates didn’t graduate from college. Steve Jobs didn’t graduate from college. Richard Branson dropped out of high school. A lot of these successful people– we all come from somewhere. How is success still a choice if I don’t have a formal education?
-Well, I think in today’s world technology has transformed our thinking in a great way. I think that a formal education will always be a plus, but is not always a sure ticket. The sure ticket will always be your own tenacity, your own ability to have a dream, to follow that dream and do what is necessary within the parameters of what is legal, to get it done.
CLAY CLARK: What is legal– he throws that in. He looks at me and says what is legal.
-Yeah, because if I say to do whatever is necessary, someone’s oh, wait. No, no, no. Whatever’s legal.
CLAY CLARK: Now you grew up in a time when buildings openly posted the sign “no colors allowed,” “no colored people allowed.” There were signs that said that.
CLIFTON TAULBERT: Oh, yeah.
-In a time of legal segregation, where Caucasians and African Americans could not coexist in the same physical space. They weren’t allowed to.
-Yeah, especially not– I mean, working conditions– there may have been some co-mingling. But in social settings, it was totally taboo.
-Now I cannot speak on this subject with any credibility given my background– how I was raised and my skin color. But I want to ask you. You see a lot of people out there that are still upset about the stereotypes. Maybe say I’m an Asian American. I’m frustrated at the stereotypes of how I’m treated because I’m Asian, or I’m Hispanic, or I’m African American.
Or maybe I’m a Caucasian in a largely African American community, and I’m upset about the stereotypes. How have you been able to choose to have success given your skin color and the time that you were raised?
-I think I made that decision. But that decision was also reinforced by people around me who supported my efforts, who supported my movement forward. Again, the circumstances said one thing, but my dream said something else. And I was fortunate enough to be able to latch on to my dreams as almost like a rocket taking off. And I caught on the tailwind of that. And said, I’m going where it leads me.
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