The Billion Dollar Secret

by Rafael Badziag

  When Jack Cowin graduated from the university in Canada, he got a job with an insurance company. He did well and was making good money. He got married, had a child, bought a house, had a small mortgage. He was 25 years old.

  And the only thing I knew for sure was I didn’t want to work for a big company. I wanted to get into my own business, to have the freedom to do what I wanted to do. That’s the only thing I knew for sure.

  How do I get into a role in which I can control my own environment?

  After five years on the job, he went with a friend to see a senior executive.

  We wanted to set up our own agency and become an independent agent. Here’s a big bureaucracy, big insurance company, one of the biggest insurance companies in Canada. We wanted to revolutionize this. And I could see his eyes glaze over. Here are 25-year-old kids coming in, and he could almost say, “Stop wasting my time.” He had no interest in what we had told him.

  So I left, came to Australia to get into my own business, and the other guy, he became a very successful franchisee of Canadian Tire and built a business. So we both did very well.

  In fairness, I had a house and a mortgage. I was able to sell the house, and boom, we moved on. But I hadn’t got into the stage whereby I said, “Do I really want to give all this up?” That was never an issue. I’m much more interested in the adventure.

  If you want to read in full detail how Jack started in Australia, go to:

  http://TheBillionDollarSecret.com/resources.

  Frank Stronach grew up in poor, war-destroyed Austria. When he was 21, he decided to take his destiny in his hands and change his environment. His account is a true dishwasher-to-billionaire story:

  I wanted to see the world. So I applied for many visas—South Africa, Australia, the United States, Canada. Canada came first with the visa. So I wound up in Canada; I went with a ship. The cheapest fare. I had $200 in my pocket. And there were times when I was hungry, because I had no money to buy food.

  My first job was in a hospital washing dishes. And the second job I got was in a very small factory. After half a year, I practically ran the company, so the owner said, “Look, I want you to be a partner of mine.” But in reality I couldn’t become a partner. He was a nice man, but he never wrote the offer down.

  Apparently, the owner wasn’t serious about it.

  So I left there, worked for another company where I made more money, and lived very cheap. Just a small room. Saved every dime.

  And then after two years, I bought some used machinery equipment, rented a small garage, and out I went, hustling. I said, “If a factory has a problem, I would like to look at it. And if I can’t fix the problem, they don’t have to pay me.” Simple.

  Today, Frank Stronach is a billionaire. He is the founder of Magna, one of the largest auto parts manufacturers in the world with revenue approaching $40 billion.

  Billionaires are people who set the rules of the game themselves. Brian Kim Beom-Su liked to play soccer. He usually took the role of the team captain and spiced up the game by putting in additional fun rules or making up an entire new game for friends. He smiled, when I remarked: “So don’t play a game when you don’t set the rules yourself, right?”

  Becoming self-dependent can have a cleansing effect on your psyche as it had on Brian, who for a long time during his life had difficulty with expressing his feelings, with getting angry, with crying: “It was during the time I had just begun my start-up and I was running the business during the day and coding and programming during the night, and there was the weight of doing something new and difficult, or scary, and I had to pay the staff as well. But there was also a strange sense of being in control, knowing that the company was under my lead and that I was independent, quit working for a company and having freedom. This fear and freedom met and formed a sort of catharsis when one day I was taking a shower, and I started crying. After that, taking a shower became a habit. Now I can cry even watching TV shows.”

  So, dear reader. If you want to fly, you have to leave the nest. Your destiny is in your hands. Get up and stand on your own two feet. Take responsibility for yourself and others around you. Start your own business as soon as you can. And take control of your environment and your life. Only this way can you embark on the journey to outrageous business success.

  - Drifters never leave the nest and never fly.

  - Millionaires leave the nest and try to fly.

  - Billionaires jump off the nest and fly high.

  For more stories on this topic, go to:

  http://TheBillionDollarSecret.com/resources

  CHAPTER 3

  Hungry Eagles Soar Highest

  Big results require big ambitions.

  —Heraclitus

  The scale of your thinking determines the size of your achievements, so you better be ambitious and dream big. In order to become BIG, you need to think BIG and have an insatiable desire for growth.

  Manny Stul, the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2016, has built two companies in his career. With the first, a gift distributor, he became a millionaire, with the second, a toy manufacturer—a billionaire. “I think desire is very, very important. If you desire to be a million dollars or you desire to be a billion dollars, very big difference. There’s a different scale and different scope about which you operate. I certainly had no desire to be a billionaire; I just wanted to be extremely successful. I’d say the difference is desire, scale, and vision. Thinking on a larger scale, thinking on a bigger scale. When I started my gift company, I could’ve just wanted to be successful in Perth, but I always wanted to be successful in Australia. With Moose, my second company, I didn’t want to be successful in Australia, I wanted to be successful worldwide. They’re just different scales of thinking.”

  Cai Dongqing, called the Chinese Walt Disney, stresses that you need to dare to dream and fight for it. Asked about the difference between millionaires and billionaires, he says: “They have different goals which will decide whether they will get going or feel satisfied with the status quo after they have reached the first level of success.”

  That’s also what Frank Stronach, the Canadian billionaire and founder of Magna, confirms: “Once you stop dreaming, you’re a dead person. There’s no limits in dreaming. It’s unlimited. Knowledge is limited. You must always have dreams. Once you have a dream, then you daydream, and then you say what you have to do to maybe fulfill those dreams.”

  I asked Lirio Parisotto, called the Brazilian Warren Buffett, what drove him in his enterprises. He told me how he stumbled upon his big dream when he had just one small retail store: “One night in the house of my girlfriend I saw a magazine that listed the 500 best and biggest Brazilian companies. Listed as number 221 I saw ‘Parisotto,’ just ‘Parisotto.’ So, who is this Parisotto? I did some research. In fact, Parisotto was the surname of the owner of a company involved in gross distribution. So I came up with the idea to put my company in the top 500 companies in Brazil as well. If you see one Parisotto here, why can’t I put my company here also? If he could do that, why can’t I do that?” In the year 2001, Lirio’s company, Videolar, got into the top 500 biggest Brazilian companies and got listed in this exact magazine.

  Dreaming big is one thing. Doing big things is another. Michał Sołowow, the wealthiest person in Poland, shares an interesting perspective on this: “I went into construction, because I have always believed that by making things big and expensive, I will obtain much greater margins than by doing small and cheap things. Therefore, instead of producing a hand-cleaning paste for a dollar, I preferred to build a building for $10 million. Assuming that by producing a hand-cleaning paste the margin will be none or minimal. In my construction industry the money was big, and in consequence I had more of it at my disposal and managed to use it.”

  So break up the limits that hold you back and do a bigger thing!

  Your dreams will keep you on track so you won’t lose your passion and motivation.

  As Cai Dongqing puts it: “
You need to have goals. When you have a goal, you will have a dream. So when faced with difficulties and challenges, you still have the motivation and passion to overcome them and keep moving ahead.”

  Your dreams will also inspire and attract top employees.

  Don’t Limit Your Thinking. Don’t Live a Limited Life

  Realize that the greatest obstacles are inside you. You should do everything to identify and overcome them.

  Naveen Jain, an American space entrepreneur, explained to me his view on this topic:

  I’m sure your parents and every parent will tell you, you are a bright son. You can do anything you want. Sky is your limit.

  And then you realize the sky is nothing but a figment of your imagination. There is no such thing as sky. Sky is what we imagine because we can’t see anything beyond. But when you go from here to the moon or Mars, you never pass the sky.

  We create our own sky, we create our own limits. If you believe something is impossible, it becomes impossible for you, not for anyone else. So your belief and your mindset of what is possible is what allows you to do what is possible.

  What is the next big industry? I believe it is space, because every resource that we think is limited on earth is in abundance in space. So, what if we can make space accessible? Why can’t you go out and get the resources that you need on the moon?

  That’s how my company Moon Express was born. To me, Moon Express actually became to a large extent my dream about showing people about what a moon shot is, and this was literally a moon shot. So I’m thinking about what will inspire the next generation of people to show that everything is possible.

  To me, going to the moon is the four-minute-mile problem. Nobody did it because people did not believe you can run a mile under four minutes until Mr. Bannister ran. And guess what? Within years, many more people did. So to me, going to the moon is that symbolic.

  If I can land on the moon, what will you do? What is your moon shot? And every one of us can have a different moon shot. Your moon shot can be “I can cure cancer.” My moon shot can be “I can cure poverty.” My moon shot can be “I can build world peace.” There is nothing that’s impossible.

  And I’m also building an unmanned space shuttle that’s already manifested to go to the moon.

  Naveen once got into trouble when he told an immigration officer at the airport his company was about to mine the moon, when answering the standard questions.

  He looked at me and he said, “You are a crazy person, we don’t allow crazy people in this country. I’m going to deny your visa unless you tell me what your company does.” And I said, “My company is still going to mine the moon, but I’m really a software guy.” He said, “That’s what I want to hear. You’re a software guy, you’re in.”

  The immigration man couldn’t fathom a human being who has the audacity to think he can mine the moon. And to him that was such a crazy idea. He thought I was mentally disturbed. And that tells you that people have lost the power to dream big. And society only progresses when you allow people to dream big and you take away the fear of failure.

  To me, going to the moon is simply symbolic of doing things which people think are impossible.

  Naveen likes to tell people: “Don’t tell me the sky is the limit; I’m gonna mine the moon.” He wants to be remembered as “the man who knew no limits.” If it works out, Moon Express will be, after the USA, Russia, and China, the fourth superpower that has ever landed on the moon. So dare to dream and do the impossible!

  Don’t sell yourself short. Be like Michał Sołowow, who didn’t accept living paycheck to paycheck. “That was how the majority lived back then. And perhaps I wanted to do something more and earn more.…”

  Manny Stul was born the son of Polish Jews in a refugee camp in Germany. At nine months, he came to Australia. His father used to say: “If you’re going to take a bite, take a really big bite. A really big bite, so your mouth is full, and there’s blood running down the side of your mouth and on your chin and onto your chest. That’s what you should be doing. Do something big and worthwhile. If you’re going to bother taking a bite, take a big bite.” So, Manny applied that attitude from when he got involved with Moose Toys. “If we take on a product, how big could it be? And is it worth the time and the energy and the effort?” Result: Within 15 years, Moose Toys became the fifth-largest toy manufacturer in the world, and Manny was awarded the World Entrepreneur of the Year 2016, the best entrepreneur in the world if you will. This transition from refugee to the World Entrepreneur of the Year shows the power of big ambitions.

  If you’re going to take a bite, take a really big bite. A really big bite, so your mouth is full, and there’s blood running down the side of your mouth and on your chin and onto your chest.

  — Manny Stul #BillionDollarGoldNuggets

  You don’t want to regret playing too small. Even some billionaires regret they haven’t played a bigger game from the beginning.

  I asked Ron Sim, the Singaporean creator of the OSIM empire, “What do you wish you knew when you were 20?” and he gave me this surprising answer: “I think I would have played a far bigger game. If I had what I had, I would play a far bigger game. I took a long road. It makes me very all-rounded, even more durable and stronger, but it shouldn’t have taken me so long.”

  You may realize you have outgrown your environment. It became smaller than your ambitions and it limits your further development. Walk away to try something bigger!

  Petter Stordalen, the later Norwegian hotel mogul, spent his childhood in the small town of Porsgrunn. He was supposed to take over his father’s two grocery stores.

  But then I went to a school where they teach people to be a leader of that kind of supermarkets in Oslo. I went there for one year and another year and went back to work with my father, but when I was coming back, I felt that the shop was smaller and smaller. I couldn’t work with my father, because I can’t spend all my life walking in his footsteps. I wanted to build something of my own. I don’t know why; I just had this thing inside. I told my father, “I’ll give this shop to my younger brother, because I can’t do it.” I think my father was very disappointed by my decision, but at the same time, he was very proud. He felt “Petter really has some ambitions.” I didn’t know what I should do with my life. I only wanted something different.

  Sometimes you need to leave school like Cai Dongqing, the Chinese entertainment mogul. Sometimes you need to go as far as to change the country you live in, because your country doesn’t offer enough to satisfy your ambitions. This is what many self-made billionaires in this book actually did.

  Be Hungry, Keep the Fire Burning

  Hunger, despair, and desire are the three emotions that fuel motivation. Your desire to achieve your goals creates a high level of energy in you.

  So how badly do you want it? How ambitious are you? Do you have the desire to build an empire?

  Ron Sim, the Singaporean billionaire I interviewed, sees life very simply:

  We say it in the Chinese way: “You do, you die. You don’t do, you also die,” right? You’ve got one bloody life. Do your best and die. So if that’s the case, then you should challenge yourself and maximize yourself. Leave a legacy as much as you can. There’s a sense of achievement. What do I live for? Sorry, I don’t live for God. I’m living for glory, the sense of achievement and what you can achieve before your run-out date comes. You create something and leave something behind.

  This hunger for success doesn’t seem to get satiated.

  So what’s the difference between a millionaire and a billionaire?

  Jack Cowin, the Australian billionaire with shares in over 3,000 Hungry Jack’s and Domino’s Pizza restaurants, told me: “A millionaire is thinking: ‘I had a very good idea, I’m successful, I built this business, I’m happy, and I’m prepared to accept the status quo of what the Good Lord has given me.’ The billionaire is thinking, ‘How high is high? Where’s the limit? What is possible?’”

  Billio
naires don’t ask the question “Why?”, they ask “Why not?”.

  “Why?” is just trying to understand; “Why not?” is “Let’s try and achieve it.”

  For Ron Sim, the difference boils down to: “How big is your heart? How big is the dream? That’s the key difference. How big your heart is determines how big is your vision.” And this, as we know, determines how big will be your results.

  So, one of the main differences between the mindset of a millionaire and a billionaire is how ambitious they are and how much they want to achieve in their lives. They rise to higher and higher levels as long as their hunger isn’t satiated.

  But there is a danger lurking behind the corner that stops most millionaires on their way up. And its name is complacency. Don’t get complacent! It will make you lazy! Complacency kills businesses.

  Frank Hasenfratz was an outstanding toolmaker. He had to leave Hungary after the uprising in 1958. When he got to Canada, he wanted to get a job in his trade. He applied to W. C. Wood, who had an impressive tool room, but was rejected. He was too cocky, and the general manager, Mr. Zotter, didn’t believe his claims. The first job offer he got was from the Canadian railroad. It paid very well. But his uncle advised him against it: “Don’t take the job. You cannot take that job.” “Why not?” “It pays too good, and you’ll never quit. You’ll never get anywhere. You’d have a good-paying job, better than anybody else, and it’s too comfortable.” So Frank turned down the job offer. Everybody was shocked. His cousins said, “You’re kidding! You didn’t take the job?” “No. Your father told me not to.” Frank went back to Mr. Zotter in humility pretending not to have the abilities he was claiming he had the first time. Mr. Zotter got angry: “Now you are lying again.” But Frank went: “Mr. Zotter, give me the job. Don’t pay me. My uncle will pay. He’ll bring me to work and I’ll stay with him.” Mr. Zotter agreed: “OK. One week and we don’t pay you.” At the end it turned out Frank was a very good toolmaker, and the owner even paid him for the first week. Frank had the job he wanted and could grow on the path he has chosen. Later, Frank built Linamar, one of the most profitable enterprises in the auto parts industry. The advice his uncle gave him made him a billionaire.