Billionaire CEO Leadership Philosophy w/ David Rubenstein

Nobody ever won a Nobel prize hating what they did! David Rubenstein is a BILLIONAIRE businessman, author, show host, and has accomplished more things in his life so far than I could possibly mention! With a net worth of over $3 Billion, he’s the Co-Founder of The Carlyle Group, one of the world’s largest and most successful private investment firms, Chairman of the Boards of Trustees of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Duke University and the Smithsonian Institution.. just to name a few! I have admired David from afar for many many years and it is an absolute honor to have him on The Ed Mylett Show to share his knowledge with all of us. It’s hard to make money… but even harder to hold on to it! In this interview, David shares insider money management tips and shares his philosophy on how to build sustainable wealth, PLUS he’s revealing the most important thing you can do to hold to your money! We discuss the changing economy, forecast what you should expect in the immediate future, and share our predictions about the next recession. You’ll learn practical methods you can implement to become a great leader in times of crisis in your business, family, and your faith, how to use your potential to create personal happiness, AND David is sharing the top attributes that the greatest leaders of all time have in common. If you want to find financial success, become a great leader, learn how to gain influence, and overall make a HUGE impact on the world, you MUST watch this interview! Please SHARE the Podcast /YouTube channel With as many people as you possibly can. ⁣ ⁣⁣ 👉 SUBSCRIBE TO ED'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL NOW 👈 → → → CONNECT WITH ED MYLETT ON SOCIAL MEDIA: ← ← ← ▶︎ INSTAGRAM ▶︎ FACEBOOK ▶︎ LINKEDIN ▶︎ TWITTER ▶︎ WEBSITE Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Ed Mylett?

  I hear so many small business owners say the exact same thing. They just never have enough time in the day. Well, I measure time differently. I've compressed, condensed, heck, I've bent time. My first day is 6:00 a.m. to noon. My second day starts at noon and goes till 6:00 P.M. And my third day, 6:00 P.M. to midnight. I now get 21 days a week. Stack that up over a month, over a year, over five years, and my life's completely different than it would have been otherwise. And if you want to win as an entrepreneur, you have to compress your time, too. And you definitely can't afford to waste it. Waiting weeks on a big bank for capital? Your best bet's to work with my friends at Cardiff. They know how to compress time for entrepreneurs. They get your business approved in minutes and funded the very same day. They're America's favorite small business lender, and for good reason.

• 0:45Ed Mylett?

  Over 20 years in business, over $12 billion deployed to small business across America. Stop letting bank delays slow down your momentum. Head to cardiff.co/ed. That's cardiff.co/ed. Cardiff.co. Real growth, fast funding. Cardiff. Borrow better.

• 1:01Speaker 01

  Mr. President, my company, for me, of the explosion on our rig.

• 1:05Speaker 02

  On October 2nd.

• 1:06Speaker 01

  Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all heap the blame on me.

• 1:11Speaker 02

  Tom Cruise is. Digger got us into this mess. And Digger's gonna dig us up. From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 1:18Speaker 01

  What would happen if I stopped drilling? You stop, you freeze to death, that's what.

• 1:22Speaker 02

  With great power comes great deniability.

• 1:25Speaker 01

  I'm not the first nanny.

• 1:27Speaker 02

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17. Not a minute without parent.

• 1:39Speaker 03

  This is The Ed Mylett Show.

• 1:48Ed Mylett?

  Welcome back to Max Out, everybody. My guest today, I have admired from afar for many, many years. Very interesting man. When I was doing my due diligence on him, his upbringing surprised me. This is a guy who grew up basically in kind of a lower income area. Dad was a mailman. Mom was a homemaker. He ends up going on to, you know, estimated net worth is in excess of $3 billion. He's the founder of the Carlyle Group, which is a very well-known private equity firm. I'm doing this research and I'm thinking to myself, he's got the David Rubenstein Show.

• 2:23Ed Mylett?

  He's got, he's the CEO of so many different enterprises, the Kennedy Center, you know, the Smithsonian Institute. So I guess, David, my first question to you is, when are you going to get around to finally accomplishing something with your life?

• 2:37Speaker 04

  Well, you know, the, the truth is, I'm always trying to do something that's interesting and that I find rewarding and hopefully giving back to the country. Just like you, you want to do something in your life that you think is meaningful. So I've been trying to do that for a while and I got lucky later in life and some of the things worked out.

• 2:53Ed Mylett?

  Well, I got to tell you, one of the things you've done to do that is David's got a book called How to Lead. Wisdoms from the world's greatest CEOs. And when he says that, he's not exaggerating. This book, about five years putting it together, but signed the behind the scenes interviews, everybody. You're talking about people like Oprah Winfrey, Phil Knight, Jeff Bezos. There's a collection of people in this book that Fauci, you know, you talk about a collection of people in this book. Richard Branson, the list goes on and on. It's literally a who's who of leaders, regardless of their industry. It's the greatest collection of people in the leadership side of life that I've ever seen before. But my, the interesting part for me, David, was the beginning about you first. Cause I know you like to talk about other people. I do that too, but you're interesting to me.

• 3:38Ed Mylett?

  One thing on leadership, which is what we're really going to focus in on today, guys, and I recommend David's book, but completely. But one of the things that I've discovered when I work with leaders is many of them never take the time because they're busy and, you know, crises are happening. They never actually come up with a clearly defined leadership philosophy of their own. They don't put the time and intentionality in doing so. And you talk about yours in the beginning of the book. So share with us a little bit about your leadership philosophy that's probably evolved over time.

• 4:07Speaker 04

  Well, over time, I kind of observed two phenomenon. Phenomenon one is that life is divided into three categories, three periods. Early in life, when you're kind of getting educated. Second, when you're beginning your career and maturing as a professional. And third, when you've kind of reaped the rewards of what you've done in the second or first part of your life. And it's my observation that leaders in the first part, the Rhodes Scholars, student body presidents, all American athletes, who all we all think in high school or college are the superstars. They often turn out not to be so great in the latter part of life. And the leaders in the world really turn out to be people who weren't so great in the beginning. For example, most of the presidents of the United States would never have been thought to be potential presidents of the United States when they were in college or high school.

• 4:52Speaker 04

  The only exception in the last hundred years may be Bill Clinton, who was a student leader. So I would think about your own case. You're a well-known personality now. You're a leader in your areas. I don't know, were you a superstar in high school? And people say this guy's going to be famous and all that?

• 5:06Ed Mylett?

  Not at all, yes, of course not. No, you're exactly right.

• 5:08Speaker 04

  So I was not, I was, you know, not that famous, not that well-known. I wasn't a great athlete. I wasn't a great scholar. And I got lucky later in life. The second part of what I wanted to say in the book is that there are certain attributes that leaders have. Luck is one of them, but this persistence is another. A hard work is another. The ability to get along with people, communicating with people, sharing the credit, being ethical, and rising to the occasion. These are attributes that I think leaders have in common. Some are better than others in certain things. And humility is one that I think is probably good. Clearly, we've had a president recently who didn't specialize in humility. But as a general rule of thumb, I think people that you tend to admire are people that are somewhat humble about what they've done.

• 5:50Ed Mylett?

  I agree. I've come up with this nuance, I think, with leaders that I admire. And by the way, I don't know that the president before him was, you know, necessarily dosed in humility all the time either. And the reason, the reason I say that to you is, and by the way, I'm Non-political in that regard. I've, I want you to, I don't know if I was asking this before. What I observe, and some of these people in the books, I've actually got to know myself a little bit. There's this interesting combination because humility is so requisite, but it's almost combined. It's an odd nuance of a lot of confidence combined with humility. It's this road they almost seem to toe. It's very unique. I think of the former president that way. I think of Phil Knight that way. Uh, Bill Gates, who's in the book, you know, there's a tremendous amount of confidence combined with humility. Do you notice that as well?

• 6:35Speaker 04

  Yes, um, I picked up this in some sense, you're too young to remember this, but there was a President John Kennedy.

• 6:43Ed Mylett?

  Sure.

• 6:44Speaker 04

  Remember him? And what he did was something very novel. He would have every other week, a press conference at the State Department and answering questions from anybody and any reporter, and he had enormous amount of self-deprecating humor. He was able to make fun of himself. Why was he able to do that? Cause he had a lot of self-confidence. If you're insecure, you can't make fun of yourself. If you have enormous confidence in what your abilities are, you can make fun of yourself. And you'll find a lot of the leaders that ones you've referred to or ones in the book, they have so much confidence in what they've achieved that they can make fun of themselves. And they're humble because they know they had a lot of luck along the way. People that are insecure very often cannot make fun of themselves and are not able to be humble.

• 7:26Ed Mylett?

  Hmm. What do you think of, uh, wow, that's really interesting because their accomplishments has given them some of this. What about the idea of, and when I say this to you, I'm curious who comes to mind. Emotional maturity. That's one of the things that I've observed with the leaders that I admire the most that I've worked with in different, you know, different businesses I've been involved with is that, you know, under crisis, um, they're emotionally mature, they're composed. And when things are going very well, they don't seem to get too high. I think of like almost a Bill Belichick type person in football. There's this almost emotional stoic maturity about them that I think gives a calm to the people that they lead. Do you think of anybody when I say that and do you agree?

• 8:04Speaker 04

  I do, I mean, remember, people that are well-adjusted recognize that a football game or a sporting event or a television show isn't the most important thing in the world. There's so many other more important things, so they're not going to get panic over whether they won a football game or not. They might be upset if they lost, but they're not going to make it the most important thing in their life, because all of us recognize there are more important things in life. And as I like to say in my book and other times I've said, the most important thing in life and the most elusive thing in life is personal happiness. Very hard to get. Now, if you are happy, you can be happy in many different ways. You can be happy having a family and you're not famous, you can be happy with having fame,

• 8:47Speaker 04

  but it's hard to achieve it. And once you achieve it, you know, it gives you a certain serenity, because you know you're happy with life. Now, as you probably know, you know a lot of prominent people. How many of them are tortured souls and they're not that happy with what they're doing, even though they might be famous? I see a lot of those wealthy and famous people who are tortured. They're not that happy.

• 9:07Ed Mylett?

  I gotta tell you, as you were saying that, that's what I was thinking. I was thinking of those folks and sometimes I almost, I don't know, I think in general, humans struggle with happiness. It's one of the things I talk an awful lot about, but I think there's a, sometimes these mega achievers, there's an extra dose of it, because I think they thought all their life, "Once I get to this destination, once I get a certain amount of money, or the title of CEO, or my own television show, or I do get elected to office, or I win a Super Bowl, that then I'll be happy." And these destinations and achievements aren't what make us internally happy. So I actually see it maybe even more prominently in achievers than I do with everyday people. Is that crazy?

• 9:48Speaker 04

  Yes, because achievers are always thinking they've got to have somebody on the outside telling them that they've done a great job and that's going to make them happy. Then they realize later, they might be inside not that happy, even though they're outside thought to be happy because they're very famous. The happiest people I know... Very often, blue collar workers, people with very good families, people with nice family life, people who are not famous, but they're happy.

• 10:10Ed Mylett?

  I agree, and my philosophy behind that, since we're talking about it, and we're going to go into some leadership specifics here in a second, because you go five years interviewing the people, you interview President Bush and everybody else, we're going to pick some nuggets out of there. But one of the things that I think creates happiness is when your life conditions match up to the blueprint or the vision you have for it. So oftentimes, when you live a little bit more of a simple life, if that's what your blueprint was for what you wanted, or your expectations, and the conditions match it, that equals happiness. One of the things all the achievers listening to this need to be very leery of is, if you're constantly throwing it out there, in your current life, it's healthy because it causes you to grow, but it can be unhealthy in terms of bliss and happiness when your current life conditions don't match the blueprint or the vision you have for it.

• 10:55Ed Mylett?

  That lack of congruency sometimes causes people to be unhappy. Would you agree?

• 11:00Speaker 04

  I agree, and you know, a sad situation we find now is that you see people at all ages committing suicide at a higher rate than we've seen in generations. Why is that? Somebody is 25 years old and kills himself or herself, how can you explain that, other than they don't have personal happiness?

• 11:20Ed Mylett?

  And I think also the advent of social media has led people to have these just really unrealistic expectations, what they should look like, what they, it seems like everybody's having a party every single day, and you're at home, and everyone has 500 friends, and you have two, and one of them's giving you some hate on your social media account, and I think it's that blueprint not equaling your current life conditions. I really do, so.

• 11:42Speaker 04

  Well, in my case, I'm not on any social media, because I'm going to be embarrassed that Instagram would announce I have three followers. You know, Kim Kardashian has 80 million followers, I have three, so I don't want anybody to know how few followers I would have, so I don't have those accounts.

• 11:55Ed Mylett?

  Yeah, he also has one of the most prominent television shows on the planet, too, on Bloomberg, so don't let him fool you. But when I was researching, I'm thinking he doesn't have social, I didn't think he'd have Instagram, I gotta tell you, I thought you'd have a Twitter. I thought you'd have Twitter for sure, and I was surprised by that.

• 12:09Speaker 04

  I don't have it because my my staff people think I wouldn't know how to do it. Or I've watched, though, that some people that have Twitter sometimes say things they regret later on. You know, it's tempting to say something, and all of a sudden you realize 10 minutes later you shouldn't have said it. I've thought about trying to learn how to do it, and maybe maybe now that there's an account open with 72 million followers, maybe I could get that account.

• 12:31Ed Mylett?

  Just buy it. That's a good idea. You can afford it. Let's go through some practices of great leaders. Guys, I've never seen a collection. It reminds me of almost Andrew Carnegie back in the day or Napoleon Hill, where they did all this research of these very prominent people. Yet there's really not been anything written that way since that time. And this is the first leadership book I've read where I'm thinking to myself, General Padre, as Condoleezza Rice, Jack Nicklaus. I mean, it's just an amazing collection of conversations.

• 13:00Speaker 04

  Well, thank you. I did these on my TV show over about a four or five year period of time. It takes a while to line them up, and I generally have known these people for a while. So it makes the conversation easier rather than just showing up and interviewing somebody you haven't known. It makes it work better a bit, and you know, I enjoy doing it. It's not a skill that I realized I had. I never was a professional interviewer, and maybe you weren't a professional interviewer when you were younger. But you realize you have a skill in this area, people like it, and people think that the way I do it works out as well. But I didn't go to school to learn how to do this, nor did you.

• 13:32Ed Mylett?

  You have two things that I watch in great leaders, and I don't know you personally, but just, you know, from a distance observing you. And I think also makes you a great interviewer. One, you're incredibly curious. You're genuinely interested. And then, two, you have that combination of confidence and humility enough that you're really learning as you're asking the questions like I am today. I was preparing for a lot of interviews. And last night, as I was even doing a little bit more preparation, I was just really excited about this. I was your team had reached out to us, and I thought this is going to be really something else. And so I just want to let you know that it's an honor to be doing this with you. But I'm reading, I'm going to mispronounce her name, but let's go through some tactics.

• 14:06Speaker 04

  Okay, all right.

• 14:07Ed Mylett?

  And I'll mispronounce her name. It's the PepsiCo CEO. Is it Indra?

• 14:11Speaker 04

  Indra Newy.

• 14:12Ed Mylett?

  Unbelievable woman. And one of the things she does, I'd like you to share with her is these letters, because I want leaders, this is what can I do to build relationships, more connectivity, create culture? And she has this great strategy that seems very simple, but it's almost nobody takes the time to do this. So please share one.

• 14:30Speaker 04

  Here's her technique that she used quite, quite well. She would write letters, report cards, she would call them, to the parents of her senior employees. So let's suppose you're the mother of a senior person at Pepsi. You get a letter from the CEO saying, "Your child is doing a wonderful job. You did a terrific job of raising this person. I really hope this person stays here a long time." Well, the mother will then call the child and say, "You have a wonderful boss. Look how attentive she is to you, and by the way, you're doing a good job." That makes the employee even more loyal to the CEO. Because if your mother thinks the person is good, how are you going to tell your mother you're quitting the job? Because, you know, the CEO is so wonderful. So it really worked, and it was a good way to actually connect with the employees as well as with the parents.

• 15:10Ed Mylett?

  I agree. One of the things I do is I write personal letters still, because everybody gets email and texts. And just, you think about it, the last time you got, and by the way, my penmanship is horrific. But I still do, I think that personalizes me, humanizes me, although this guy can barely write. But I write them to the children of the people that I work with, because those ultimately end up going up on, you know, refrigerators, and it stays in their home, and it reminds them of those things too. So just for what that's worth, everybody, it's another kind of tactic that's in the book. And I, we don't want to go through the whole book, because I want you to get the book, everybody. But what about crisis? Right now, let's be honest, you talk about the former president, now there's President Biden. But anybody who's in a leadership position right now, even a leader in a family,

• 15:52Ed Mylett?

  or all the way up to the CEO of being a company at the same time, there's a lot of stress right now. This is a time in leading through crisis. Any things you've learned from these leaders of going through a crisis-type time that you would share with leaders of families, of businesses, of any enterprise right now?

• 16:08Speaker 04

  Well, that nobody has all the answers, that you've got to listen to other people. Oprah Winfrey in the interview said, "She's not a great interviewer, she's a great listener." And when you're a leader, you have to listen to what your troops are telling you, your employees are telling you. So I think many of the people that I've interviewed, they got ideas and get ideas from people that work with them, and they listen to those people, and I think that's a good thing. You can't think you have all the answers yourself. Today, we're living in a crisis where there are no perfect answers, but you've got to talk to people about what they're doing. How are you getting through the day on COVID? How are you working? How are you dealing with your children? Getting answers from people that have similar situations can be very helpful.

• 16:43Ed Mylett?

  Hmm. What about getting there as a leader as opposed to staying there? It's one of the things that's talked about a little bit because you know I have more friends that used to be wealthy than currently are and I have more friends that used to be leading something than currently are leading something. That's that's a very unique skill set.

• 17:00Speaker 04

  Right. Well, everybody works very hard to get somewhere and then when you get there, sometimes you forget the things that got you there. You could get your ego could get bigger. You don't pay attention to people. You're not listening to your troops anymore or you're spending time on things that aren't that relevant to your job. You're spending too much time at parties rather than running the company or whatever the organization might be. In terms of wealth, there's no doubt that one of the hardest things is to make money, but it's even harder to hold on to it when you have it because sometimes when you make the money, you think I'm a genius and I can keep making money and sometimes it's not that easy to keep making it and they then take risks that are too risky for you and therefore you can lose money. And it's always a sad situation to see somebody who was wealthy

• 17:43Speaker 04

  who made it honestly and then bad luck or whatever bad fortune he or she lost it and they're back to a situation that finds them very unhappy.

• 17:51Ed Mylett?

  You're so right. I find that there's a certain discipline in saving enough money to get wealthy. It's an entirely different discipline to hold on to the pile once you get it and continue to grow it and not have that temptation to blow it as I've seen so many people do.

• 18:05Speaker 04

  I tell you, here's what I tell people a lot when I give a talk on money management. Many people are good at making money in given area A. When they make the money, they think they're a genius in area B, C, and D, and they start doing B, C, and D, and they're not good at that. And the result is they have no money at the end. If you have money, the most important thing is not to lose what you have and therefore you don't take undue risk. Everybody's not George Soros or Warren Buffett and don't think you are just because you got lucky in one area of life.

• 18:34Ed Mylett?

  Oh, my gosh. Where were you when I was 30 years old? Because my father would say that my father was a working man, a brilliant man, but not a rich man. And my dad would say to me the same thing you just said. And he said to me, will you please stop investing in things you can't even explain to me that you don't understand? If you can't explain it in a sentence or two, you shouldn't put your money in it.

• 18:57Speaker 04

  That's true. Albert Einstein used to say, you know, if you can't explain in one or two sentences what you're talking about, you really don't understand it.

• 19:04Ed Mylett?

  Boy, I'm down to like three topics then.

• 19:09Ed Mylett?

  Let me ask you, since we're on this, and we'll go back to leadership in a second, but I can't have somebody that's accomplished what you have in the area of accumulating wealth without asking you this. It's been a long time since we've been in a recession. And I've had this sort of, you know, this notion of not losing money. Believe me, sometimes I wonder if I'm a real entrepreneur because I'm not a risk taker. I'm not one of these, you know, these people that were willing to really risk at all. I'm a, I'm a kind of afraid of being broke still. And I've had this feeling that a recession's coming for a long time. I look around the world, I think it's got to come here eventually. And then I thought, well, maybe when the election changes and regulations get tighter now that Biden's

• 19:51Ed Mylett?

  in, and maybe tax rates are going to go up on corporations, that now's the time. I'm just curious, your feeling about a pending recession, the possibility of it, the timing of it, et cetera?

• 20:04Speaker 04

  Nobody is really skilled at predicting when a recession's going to occur. You can take the best economists in the world, and they will always say, well, it could happen, it might not happen, I don't really know. Then when it happens, they will bring a memo out of the file saying, see, I told you this, but they didn't really tell you that.

• 20:20Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 20:21Speaker 04

  They're very good at predicting the recession that actually occurred, not the one that's going to occur. So I think right now, the biggest economic problems we all have to worry about are that COVID is getting, still to be a very significant problem, and it's really weighing down the economy. But that isn't the biggest problem. The biggest problem is, and of course vaccinations have to occur and all that, but the biggest problem with the economy is that the poorer people and the people at the bottom are going further and further down, and those at the top are getting further and further wealthier. In other words, the divide is becoming greater than it's ever been. If you are self-employed, you work in a food truck, you're a blue collar worker, you work with your hands, you probably are not in great shape. If you're a financial executive, if you're in the healthcare business, if you're in some

• 21:06Speaker 04

  business that's a technology related, you're probably doing very well. In fact, in my own business, private equity. If we, if you didn't know we were in COVID, it almost wouldn't make a difference because we're doing, doing things over Zoom and deals are getting done, finance and so forth, exits are occurring. It's the people at the bottom that are really suffering and they're going to fall further and further behind. And that is really going to weigh down the US economy because when you have an underclass that isn't able to get out of the underclass, it drags the whole economy down at some point.

• 21:33Ed Mylett?

  What do you do about it? Because the world is changing. And, and I think, I think COVID almost in some senses sped the inevitable up by 10 years in terms of the way people do business. And so there, you know, you hold up, you, you're an owner of a whole bunch of commercial office buildings, your world's changing now, more and more people. Now, the upside is we're entering a spaceless economy, right? You can now recruit and train and develop people. And I think it's occurring to more and more people that my pool of candidates isn't within 25 minutes of my office or my home anymore. But for these folks that are at the lower or middle end of the economy, you know, in some senses, we're raising the minimum wage. Well, more and more places are saying, well, if we're going to do that, I can have a machine check somebody out at the grocery store, not a human being.

• 22:16Ed Mylett?

  So what would, what would you say is the solution to this? If I'm someone working in these careers or if I'm leading the economy? I mean, you, you, you're very humble, but you've accumulated a fortune and you've done really well for other people as well. So what would your answer to that be?

• 22:33Speaker 04

  You should recognize that the industrial revolution took about 100 years to change the way we work and live. And then the internet, maybe 25 years, smartphones, maybe 10 years. COVID has changed everything in one year. In one year, we have gone from working in the offices or working in other places to working out of our home, to, to being dependent on computers and so forth. So if you are a person that wants to stay alive and financially and do well, you have to be computer literate, you have to have access to high-speed internet data.

• 23:05Speaker 04

  You have to be prepared to retool yourself. So if you were working in a food truck and that's all your skill was, you probably have to retool yourself and I people have to go back and get education, vocational education, or other kinds of way to retool themselves because it's now a situation where you could be left behind and you're never going to catch up again if you don't take advantage of the situation that you now find yourself in, which is you have some time to learn something new, you got to adapt, you got to change. And you know, I've changed what I'm doing and I assume you've changed what you're doing. I'm in my home 90% of the time now. And so I've had to learn how to work differently.

• 23:38Ed Mylett?

  Certainly, the interviews are different, just not the same as being with somebody in person and feeling their energy and their spirit.

• 23:43Speaker 04

  Absolutely, completely different.

• 23:45Ed Mylett?

  Yeah, it's very, very different that way. With that in mind, you know, I've always had this struggle as a leader. I love people. And so I get really close to people that I lead. I love them. I think one of the great qualities of a leader is that you genuinely love, care, and believe in people and you're very connected to what their actual giftedness or their superpowers are. Having said that, that's hurt me sometimes where people have gotten close and hurt me, or potentially we've gotten so close, I don't have that, I don't know if you call it moral authority or leverage, so to speak, as a leader. And there's these two camps, don't get too close to people, get as close as you can to them as a leader. What, where do you stand on that?

• 24:25Speaker 04

  Well, different leadership styles. George Washington never was close to anybody but an effective leader. I would say other people are political leaders and they are close to people and they really like people. And, you know, there are different types of political leaders. I would say you have to have a certain distance from the people that you are leading, because if you're so familiar, you can't fire them, you can't really tell them correctly what they should do because you're too close, it's personally too difficult. On the other hand, if you're so distanced from them, you don't feel what they're really feeling and they don't may not want to follow you. You can't be a leader without followers. So you have to do some things that want to make people follow you. But if you're so close to them, they feel that you're one of them, they may not really want to listen to you as much as they should if you have a little distance from them.

• 25:09Ed Mylett?

  This is so interesting to me. I want to ask you a question. It's gonna seem like the oddest thing, but I feel like people want to know this stuff. I have the benefit of this to some extent, but not to the extent that you do. You're in some cool rooms with some really interesting people. You know, Jamie Dimon's a guy I've been fascinated by for a long time and you've, you know, he's part of the book and part of your conversations.

• 25:33Ed Mylett?

  What's it like? In other words, is it what we would think it would be if you're at, you're in some private conversation with Jamie Dimon or Oprah Winfrey? Is it different than if you're at the coffee shop talking to a regular every day? I think most people would love to be a fly on the wall or be in some of these rooms or cocktail parties you're a part of. And I know it's not a normal question you would get in an interview, but I'm really curious as to how you would describe it. Is it as intimidating? Is it impressive or is it just like any other gathering you'd be at?

• 26:01Speaker 04

  Well, if you've, I've never been to the White House, for example, and all of a sudden you go to the White House and there are three presidents of the United States sitting in the Oval Office talking, you're probably going to be intimidated. But if you've worked in the White House or you've known these presidents, it's not quite as intimidating. Everybody that you meet, no matter how famous they might be, they, they have some insecurities. They have some uncertainties about what they're doing. And so I don't think it's that all in, you know, not that all struck, but I have to be honest. I am now at 71 years old. I've been around for a while. If I was 27 years old, as I was when I started the White House, I'd probably be more intimidated than I am today when I meet these people. Cause I realize these are people that, you know, put their pants on one leg at a time, like most people or men, I should say.

• 26:44Speaker 04

  And so I, I'm not as intimidated by them, but I'm sure if there are some people I would be intimidated by that I just haven't met before. And I probably might be, uh, you know, gulping a bit if I had to go meet, I've never met the Queen of England. Uh, I haven't met the current Pope. And I said, if you meet these people, I suppose you want to make sure you're on your best behavior.

• 27:02Ed Mylett?

  I, I ask that because I get asked it and there's been times where I've met people that impressed me to an extent that I didn't expect. But by and large, I've been struck by what you just said, people's insecurities, their humanity. And that there was some luck, but also they've got a couple of unique superpowers that they've, no pun intended, sort of maxed out in their chosen career that makes them special. But one of the things I've noticed about you, I think one of your superpowers, and maybe you could teach everybody listening to this, if you're conscious of how you do it. You have a unique ability to connect with people and you have a unique ability to connect with very successful people. And I'm wondering what that is because not everybody, in fact, almost nobody has that to the extent that you do.

• 27:46Ed Mylett?

  The collection of people that have been around you, and I know your show's helped with that, but these people seem to really respect and admire you and have a connection with you. That's respectful, they respect you. And I'm curious, at 27, all the way to 71, what were some of the skills you think you have or habits that help you connect with people? Because everybody wants to connect with a higher identity person to bring into their business, to bring into their life, to mentor them, et cetera. How have you done that? And don't be humble, really tell me.

• 28:14Speaker 04

  Well, I try to work hard, so I know what I'm doing. I'm generally prepared. My former partner, Jim Baker, said that the key lesson in life is prior preparation prevents poor performance. So be prepared. I try to be prepared, try to be well-read, I try not to say something that's going to embarrass me or somebody else. Try to be friendly with people and try to respect what they've done. But also, people like to talk about themselves in terms of their youth and their, and their childhood and their parents and so forth. And so I try to engage in that part of the conversation and, and kind of loosen people up a little bit so that they feel, you know, it's not just a business-related kind of interview. I also try to use humor a bit.

• 28:56Speaker 04

  I think typically self-deprecating humor, you know, is more, more effective. You know, if you make humor or make jokes about other people, it's not as effective. But I try to intersperse humor for a while to break up the interviews a little bit. And I am, you know, generally knowledgeable about the people because I've met them before. It's hard to do an interview if you've never met somebody before and make it the same as if you've met them many years ago.

• 29:17Ed Mylett?

  I gotta say two things about that, and then I've got one more question for you. I just want to acknowledge something that you said because for me, when I know I'm in the presence of a confident person, and you've said this twice, one very big telltale sign is they're self-deprecating. It's immediate. When I see someone sort of poke fun at themselves, I think, well, behind that is some sense of confidence and accomplishment. And it's just a very endearing thing. And so I, it's a huge thing. I'll let you comment on that. Then the second thing is, people's favorite topic is themselves, everybody. One of my favorite things is after a round of golf, if I played golf with somebody and they'll find a mutual friend and might say, well, I really like Ed. And then they'll say, what does he do?

• 29:57Ed Mylett?

  Because I spent the entire four and a half hours talking about what they do and their life and their experience. And we'll get around to me eventually. So do you agree? Those are two just very significant things.

• 30:08Speaker 04

  Well, the most commonly used word in the English language is I. Because people's favorite subject is themselves. So if you can engage in people and listen to them and not talk only about yourself, they will be more engaged and they're happy to talk about themselves. So that's, that's no doubt a factor. Um, also, I would say, when I was younger, working in the White House or so forth, I didn't have the confidence I do now. If you've gone out and made a fair amount of money in the business world, you have a, you know, a lot of positions that people respect. You have more self-confidence. So I have much more confidence than I did thirty, forty years ago. If I was doing interviewing thirty, four years ago, I would probably have been fired after the first interview because I didn't have the confidence I do now that I did have now. So it takes a while.

• 30:53Ed Mylett?

  I, uh, I, I told you one question, but I want advice is the last one, but what are these people? You said it in the beginning, but what in the world does Jack Nicklaus have in common with Bill Gates that has in common with Oprah Winfrey? That they share with, you know, Richard Branson? In other words, as I look at all these people, some of them have big visions, but not all of them. Some of them I think have really high IQs, but not all of them. So what is the diff, what are the similarities? I guess is the question between these people that seem to me to be so different in terms of personality and even their, their outlook on life.

• 31:28Speaker 04

  In the end, if I had to summarize anything, it's that people who become leaders and different ones you mentioned are examples of it. They had a vision of what they wanted to do. They wanted to be a great golfer. They wanted to build a great company. They wanted to become a well-known television person and they pursued it even though people told them they probably wouldn't be successful. So persistence, persistence, persistence, not arrogance, but persistence. It pays off. You know, you don't have to be the highest IQ in the world to be successful. In fact, I don't like to hire geniuses because they're impossible to manage. You want to hire people that are reasonably intelligent, but people who work harder are better than people are geniuses.

• 32:04Ed Mylett?

  So true. All right. Last question. By the way, I've enjoyed today so much. Everybody, here's the deal. Just go get David's book. I'm just gonna tell you, there's no collection like it anywhere. I've named so many of the people, but then there's, there's a whole bunch of others in there, too. They're just, it's, it's just, you've had an amazing life. And I think you've had one of the most interesting and fascinating lives of anybody that I've ever met before. And I, you know, you're in the middle of it. So it probably doesn't occur to you just how spectacular it's been.

• 32:31Speaker 04

  Well, the next book, I'm gonna interview you, and that'll be in my next book. Okay? How about that?

• 32:35Ed Mylett?

  I would, I would love that. And we'll sell five copies. But, you know, I know my mom would love to read it, David. And so we can at least get, we can get that. I'm in the middle of writing one right now. I'll talk you into having me on your show when it comes out.

• 32:47Speaker 04

  Well, that's a point that I would like to conclude with, before you ask your final question. You mentioned your mother, right?

• 32:54Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 32:55Speaker 04

  So, one of the most important things, I think, is for people that are successful to honor their parents for having helped them get there. And very often, people forget that. And so I like to remind people, it's very difficult to, or harder to honor your parents when they're not around. Bear Bryant was an Alabama football coach. And he did a famous AT&T commercial on Mother's Day, saying, please call your mother today. I can't. My mother's passed away. So try to do something to honor your parents while they're alive, and they can take pride in what you achieved. I assume you've done that. I try to do it. I should have done more.

• 33:29Ed Mylett?

  I should have as well. My dad passed away just a few weeks ago. And I think I did that when he was here. But even if you've lost somebody, one of the things that's funny, amazing to use the word honor, because I said this last week on the show, David, I said, one of the things, I just have a deeper commitment to honor my dad with the rest of the life that I live. And it just kind of gives you a true north. It gives you a compass. It gives you some inspiration that maybe you otherwise wouldn't have without doing that. So, thank you for that. I'm really glad you said that.

• 33:56Speaker 04

  And I made a mistake with my father, I should say. He, you know, he was proud of what I'd done. He was a simple, blue collar worker, very proud. But he, I didn't really do anything to honor him in a way, other than just doing what I did. When he passed away, I redid the Iwo Jima memorial. He had been a Marine. And in his honor, I kind of made the Iwo Jima memorial, which is an honor of Marines, better than had been. And I wish I had done that while he was alive.

• 34:21Ed Mylett?

  Wow. Well, that's quite an honor, after he had passed away. I'm really glad you said that. I I've been reflecting on that, too. Did I did I call my dad enough? Did I see him enough? Did I tell him I loved him enough? You know? Yeah, I should have done more, you know, and I anybody who's got living parents. I'm really glad you said it's a beautiful thing to say, because the most important role as a leader is in our own families. That's what really matters. That's one of the things I loved about my father is he understood that far better than I have.

• 34:49Speaker 04

  Right. And then when my mother did pass away a few years ago as well, I went through all of her materials and she had scrapbooks, not of my business successes or anything, but of the money that I'd given away. And she always told me that she was more proud of my giving away the money than making the money. And and that was reflected in the scrapbook she kept. She kept no scrapbooks about my business or anything, just my philanthropy. So that made me feel I'd done something that she was happy about.

• 35:15Ed Mylett?

  That's beautiful. That's wonderful. And my mom and dad would be the same way. Here's what's interesting. I'll bet the vast majority of people driving right now on the treadmill or watching this on YouTube are nodding, thinking that's what would make my mom and dad proud. And and so if that's the case, then then start to do those things, start to take it more seriously, because, you know, David's lost his parents, I just lost mine, and these times aren't given or promised. And honor your children, honor your spouse. Make that part of who you are. And so I gotta tell you, the more you read about David, you know, you're going to realize what I've told you is true. He's lived this just remarkable life and he's talked about his parents. I'll be candid with you, David. When I've watched you on television, just because of your presence and the way you talk, I thought this dude's a blue blood.

• 36:01Ed Mylett?

  I just figured this guy just has been around this. I wonder who his dad was, you know? Because you just you just know everybody. You've accomplished so much. You've accumulated this tremendous net worth and the influence you've had, the difference you've made. I just sort of figured this guy grew up connected. And then when I read about your upbringing, I fell in love with you. I'm like, this man's remarkable. And so the vast majority of people that are listening to this or watching it. Grew up like you and I did.

• 36:31Speaker 04

  Right.

• 36:31Ed Mylett?

  And they've got a dream they want to make come true. They may not even be completely clear on what it is, but anyone listening to my show, here's what I can tell you about them. You were asking us about the audience. They're dreamers. They want to, they wouldn't be taking this 45 minutes to an hour with you and I if they didn't want to make their life better. And they're ahead of 99.9% of the people in the world because they're actually at least investing this time to try to improve. As you know, most people just give lip service to it. What counsel advice would you give to somebody with your vast experience? Lastly, who's sitting there going, you know, David, I want to be somebody. I want to accomplish something. I want to honor my family and I'm lost. Covid's got me, even before Covid, I'm not so sure I had my act together completely.

• 37:14Ed Mylett?

  And I want to change my life regardless of their age. And they could run into you at that Starbucks we, I talked about earlier, instead of one of these high end parties. What would you say to them would be your best advice?

• 37:26Speaker 04

  Nobody ever won a Nobel Prize hating what they did. You have to find something in life you enjoy. Experiment, find something you love doing. If you love doing it, ultimately you'll probably be good at it if you work at it and you persist. And remember, the most important thing in life is not having money or not having fame. It is finding something that makes you happy. And the best way to be happy is ultimately pleasing other people and helping other people. And so I try to remind people, you should figure out what are you doing on the face of the earth? How are you making the earth slightly better than the place you, you were born into? And try to do something other than your career to give back to society and give back to our country. And that'll make you happy in my view.

• 38:04Ed Mylett?

  Beautiful. David, I enjoyed today so much. I'm really honored to have made your acquaintance and I consider you a friend now. Thank you.

• 38:11Speaker 04

  Thank you. Thanks very much. I, I won't get to know you better because if you got to know me, you might not think I'm as good as you now think. So I, I don't think I'm as good as you think, but thanks very much.

• 38:20Ed Mylett?

  There's the humility again. Everybody, please get David's book. We're going to put it up on the screen here and make sure you share this program. You don't get access to people like David Rubenstein every single day, everybody, but you can get access to him on Max out. Thanks to his team for reaching out.

• 38:32Speaker 04

  Thanks very much.

• 38:33Ed Mylett?

  And God bless you. God bless you.

• 38:36Speaker 04

  My pleasure. Thanks a lot. Appreciate it. Bye.