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Richard Branson - Chairman of the Virgin Group

Richard Branson, Chairman of the Virgin Group, shares his story as a successful entrepreneur with a diverse portfolio. Created by Kauffman Foundation.

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  • leaf green style avatar for user beachdudeinc
    I'm trying to understand how watching the successes of a very wealthy man in a completely different economic climate helps an entrepreneur in 2014 with little $$, even given that we have a massively sellable product. . .
    (11 votes)
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  • duskpin ultimate style avatar for user Vishal Mishra
    when we will see Lary Page or Mark Zuckerberg interviewed
    (8 votes)
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  • blobby green style avatar for user Vicki Lynn
    Gosh he mentioned he started his magazine when he was 50. I am wondering how old he is now. He has become so successful it seems in quite a short time! Quite an inspiration, he is.
    (5 votes)
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    • leaf blue style avatar for user Peterson
      Actually, Branson says (see about ) that he is 15, not 50. That changes a few things - he actually did not become successful quite a quickly as he would have if the magazine was started when he was 50. So, using that knowledge, we can now logically reason how old he is today. If he was 15 during the Vietnamese War, which took place roughly around 1960, then we can figure out that he would be about 60 today. (He was actually born in 1950, so he will be turning 64 this year [2014]).
      (11 votes)
  • piceratops seed style avatar for user theskillsbox
    research whatever it is you want to go into an insane amount....read at least 5-10 books on that subject so you can know the ins and outs and learn from other peoples mistakes instead of your own
    (7 votes)
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  • blobby green style avatar for user morales.sal
    Been a broadcast journalist all my life and i just turned 50. Bored. How do you reinvent yourself using your skills? Is it too late?
    (5 votes)
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    • blobby green style avatar for user Cameron
      It's not too late. I've seen people start companies at all ages successfully and I've heard of even more. Find out what you're good at, find out how to monetize it, and do it. That's really all I can tell you is to just do what you're good at and get someone to help with what you're not good at because when you do what you're good at not only are you happy and efficient but you'll almost instinctively be more compelled to learn more about it and get better at it, and that's what makes the competitive edge that pushes both people and companies alike forward. It's only too late when we die, and by the fact you wrote that post, it's not too late for you. Do it.
      (4 votes)
  • mr pink red style avatar for user David Lee Madison
    My problem has been lacking the coordination of people. I am a connector - in that I look for and meet people with various skills and like to put them together. Oftentimes, I've found that those people snarl at one another.

    What am I missing? How do I learn what people will go well together?

    I have this idea that it takes 6 people to create wealth: 1) The idea man 2)The connector 3)The Marketer 4)The Salesman 5)The Doer 6) The mediator. If you have these six people; I've thought that it would create it's own synergy. As long as each of these people both like, and are good at what they do.

    My problem is that I have failed much more in life than I have succeeded. I have emotional/mental issues; and I was homeless for 5 years, where the fear of dying was paramount to that of creating change in the world. Now, I have an apartment. I want to change the world; but I've found that I need to change myself - altering my habits so that they support me and don't drag me down. Until I begin mastering myself, I have no hope of impacting the world at large.

    So, the biggest question I have, is what does it take to ingrain new habits which support you, and eliminate those which destroy you?
    (3 votes)
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    • blobby green style avatar for user Simon Sheen
      There are actually 9 elements to a project check out Meredith Bellbin who developed the Belbin assessment of the individuals characteristics when placed in a team
      Plant Resource Investigator Coordinator Shaper Monitor Evaluator Team Worker Implementer Completer Finisher Specialist check it out you do not necessarily need 6 or 9 etc people but sufficient people that show the traits of these 9 characters
      (3 votes)
  • hopper jumping style avatar for user Alex Pluddemann
    will there be an interview with Bill Gates?
    (4 votes)
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  • female robot ada style avatar for user Katey Gordon
    Entrepreneurs are Leaders and have the skill of Leadership. What type of traits and skills are needed to be a leader ?
    (3 votes)
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    • starky sapling style avatar for user Jed Scratchard
      There's a lot of really useless information out there on being a great leader. Here's three things you won't hear from anyone else.
      1. The Vision, And You Being The Visionary. All great leaders have a vision for what they want their team to achieve, and they get people to follow it. People don't follow your goals, they follow your vision. If you say you want your company to hit a 100 million dollars in revenue, nobody cares because it's not something they can follow. But if you say you want to change lives by creating the iPhone and changing the way people communicate, that's something people can follow.
      2. Being The Leader They Want to Follow. In order for people to want to follow, you must be a reflection of who they are striving to be or who they want to be seen as. People want to be like Richard Branson. He's super wealthy, a great man, great socially and high status, and he has a lot of fun all while still working like an animal. Because of that, they are inspired by him, and want to follow him.
      3. Raising Their Standards And Self-Image, And Inspiring The Leader In Them. You connect each person to their own important individual purpose on the team, raise their standards, and as a result, raise their own self-image. Then you inspire the leader in them, because you know that even the people under you have greatness and leadership in them too. When you can bring that out in them and inspire them in that way, they will follow you for life.
      Credit to Jason Capital for all that wisdom :D
      (4 votes)
  • female robot ada style avatar for user Katey Gordon
    I have finished studying the entire Entrepreneur courses within Khan Academy but I do have one question.
    What Key skills should a Entrepreneur have to be successful ?
    (2 votes)
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  • blobby green style avatar for user haroldidemudia
    The financial challenges of start up are enormous how can an entrepreneur possibly overcome this crucial problem knowing that banks are not willing to finance start up business irrespective of the well thought plan especially in Africa where I operate.
    (1 vote)
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Video transcript

- There was the Vietnamese War was waging, and I was against the Vietnamese War. I was 15 years old. I decided to start a magazine to campaign against it. It was called Student, and it became sort of the national magazine for young people. The magazine didn't make much money, but it got a big circulation, about 100,000 young people bought the magazine. And one day, I took an advert in the magazine, Virgin Records, 10-60% off any album on any label, and listed the kinds of records we liked. Things like Frank Zappa rather than Andy Williams. And so it became very much the rock and roll mail order company. And then we started signing our own bands. Bands that we couldn't get other record companies to release, we released ourselves. There are bands everywhere that want to be found. It's finding the right ones. And I had a 15 year old boy called Mike Oldfield come to me with a tape called Tubular Bells, which he'd recorded all the tracks himself. I literally went to another record company, borrowed an artist called Sandy Denny's contract. And we typed out the contract. You know, we managed to get The Exorcist to take the music. And that took it #1 in America. It became a phenomenal success. Moved on and signed bands like The Sex Pistols and The Rolling Stones, and a lot of other iconic, great bands. In those days, there was quite a lot of money to go around the record business. You know, a big hit album could sell 10, 15 million albums. We went into the airline business because I had record companies all over the world and I was traveling a lot on other people's airlines. There was one time I took a flight from Puerto Rico to the Virgin Islands, and I got bumped by American Airlines. And chartered a plane. And I came out with a blackboard and for fun, I wrote Virgin Airlines, $29 to the Virgin Islands. Walked around to all the people who'd been bumped. I filled up my plane. And then as I was landing, somebody said to me, "Sharpen up the service a bit, "and you could go into the airline business." And I've started three or four airlines. Virgin Atlantic, Virgin America, Virgin Australia. And they've all gone really well. And the reason they've gone well is because they're the best airlines in their field. And if you're the best hotel or the best shop or the best club or the best airline, you survive. People who try to be second best, which who normally stumble. The key to our success is to offer people much more than they'd expect. So we offer a much better than first class product for our upper-class passengers, but we charge a business-class fare. We offer a class above what people would expect. We do lots of nice little things which surprise people. You know, just little things like, we give people an ice cream when they're watching a movie or popcorn. Or we have a limousine to and from the plane for our business-class passengers. And we put seat-back videos in our planes six years before anybody else did. We're smaller, we're more nimble. We're from the entertainment business so we know that people like to be entertained. Virgin is always evolving. I start businesses, not because I think I'm going to make money at a business. I'm not particularly interested in that. I start businesses because I think I can make a real difference. The main thing to remember though, is if you do go out to start a business, most people fail, but most people also pick themselves up and try again and again until they finally succeed.