How do we define success?
Schwartzman on success
Transcript
My definition of success has changed over the years.
You know, success—it's a little like asking a pole vaulter, what was success? Well, when he was in junior high school, if he could do sort of a ten-foot jump, this was fantastic. And by the time he's getting out of college and the Olympics, it was fourteen feet. And, you know, it changes each time.
You know, success my first year was really just meeting a payroll, and having some left over for me so I could pay the rent. That was success. And, you know, and at each step along the way, you know, it changes, and you modify your goals.
I think certain consistent things are, always try to be the best you can be. And also, objectively, trying to have an organization that is the best at what it does. Or at least, as I try and describe it to our own people, on any given Sunday we can play against any team in the world, and have a good possibility of winning. Like any, you know, sort of competitive league, no one wins, typically, all their games. You have setbacks. But at different points in one's career, you look at different aspects of what you call success. I mean, institution-building, recruiting great people. When you don't have great people, that becomes your number one goal. Because if you can get the highest quality people, you can build the best business in that sector, or among the best businesses in that sector.
And so I had a noncompete, for example. I couldn't hire people that I knew. And so the first few years were really, really tough to build an organization; hiring people, all who appeared plausible, most of whom you didn't know, in a field where people are quite verbal, and good presenters.
And so getting to the point where you had great people, which we do now, and I guess an outsider would call that the institutionalization of a business, that was really success.