Lesson #3: Enjoy The Process
Lesson #3: Enjoy The Process
Throughout their years at Berkshire Hathaway, both CEO Charlie Munger and Buffett continued to receive their regular paychecks of $8,500 each month. Despite having a personal net worth in the billions of dollars, both Munger and Buffett rely just on their annual salary of $100,000 for their living expenses. He might be the second richest man in the world, but to look at Buffett one would never know it.
Buffett is unlike most of his peers at the top of the corporate ladder. He looks down on the luxuries that many of them indulge in, from boats to mansions to cars. He continues to reside in the first home he bought in Omaha in 1958, which cost him just $31,500. Meanwhile, Buffett prefers to take pleasure from the simple things that he has been enjoying since his early startup days – hamburgers, Cherry Coke, ice cream. He frequently drives himself to McDonald’s and Dairy Queens instead of five-star restaurants. His one indulgence was the purchase of a private jet, which he bought when too many people started recognizing him on commercial flights.
“We enjoy the process far more than the proceeds,” says Buffett. Buffett and Munger both detest the excess and waste that they see spreading throughout the executives of corporate America. Instead of seeing profits and wealth be put towards individual indulgence, Buffett prefers to save or reinvest his money. And, it isn’t because he plans to go on a wild spending spree once he has retired. Nor does he intend to leave much of it to his children.
Buffett was frugal, but he was by no means selfish. In 2006, Buffett became one of the most generous philanthropists in history when he announced that he would be giving 85% of his fortune away, primarily to the Bill and Melinda Fates Foundation. He wanted his money to be used for the well being of others and to make a contribution to society. He could have done this in many other ways – from creating a Buffett University in Omaha with an endowment larger than Harvard’s or by creating his own foundation to rival the Gates’. Instead, Buffett decided to take the ego out of his money. For him, that was never what business was about in the first place.
Many thought that Buffett would leave most of his fortune to his children, to ensure their security in future years. But, Buffett believed that the most important thing for them was to be productive members of society. “I want to give my kids enough so that they could
feel that they could do anything, but not so much that they could do nothing,” he says. Buffett had always taught his children the meaning of value and the importance of working for your earnings. He even went so far as to make his daughter write him a cheque for a $20 loan she needed to get her car out of a parking garage.
Buffett became a success not only because he understood how to make money, but also because he knew how to use it productively once he had it. And, his legacy will endure because of his willingness to give it all away.
Lesson 3 Enjoy The Process
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“It's not that I want money,” says Buffett. “It's the fun of making money and watching it grow.”
Throughout their years at Berkshire Hathaway, both CEO Charlie Munger and Buffett continued to receive their regular paychecks of $8,500 each month. Despite having a personal net worth in the billions of dollars, both Munger and Buffett rely just on their annual salary of $100,000 for their living expenses. He might be the second richest man in the world, but to look at Buffett one would never know it.
Buffett is unlike most of his peers at the top of the corporate ladder. He looks down on the luxuries that many of them indulge in, from boats to mansions to cars. He continues to reside in the first home he bought in Omaha in 1958, which cost him just $31,500. Meanwhile, Buffett prefers to take pleasure from the simple things that he has been enjoying since his early startup days – hamburgers, Cherry Coke, ice cream. He frequently drives himself to McDonald’s and Dairy Queens instead of five-star restaurants. His one indulgence was the purchase of a private jet, which he bought when too many people started recognizing him on commercial flights.
“We enjoy the process far more than the proceeds,” says Buffett. Buffett and Munger both detest the excess and waste that they see spreading throughout the executives of corporate America. Instead of seeing profits and wealth be put towards individual indulgence, Buffett prefers to save or reinvest his money. And, it isn’t because he plans to go on a wild spending spree once he has retired. Nor does he intend to leave much of it to his children.
Buffett was frugal, but he was by no means selfish. In 2006, Buffett became one of the most generous philanthropists in history when he announced that he would be giving 85% of his fortune away, primarily to the Bill and Melinda Fates Foundation. He wanted his money to be used for the well being of others and to make a contribution to society. He could have done this in many other ways – from creating a Buffett University in Omaha with an endowment larger than Harvard’s or by creating his own foundation to rival the Gates’. Instead, Buffett decided to take the ego out of his money. For him, that was never what business was about in the first place.
Many thought that Buffett would leave most of his fortune to his children, to ensure their security in future years. But, Buffett believed that the most important thing for them was to be productive members of society. “I want to give my kids enough so that they could
feel that they could do anything, but not so much that they could do nothing,” he says. Buffett had always taught his children the meaning of value and the importance of working for your earnings. He even went so far as to make his daughter write him a cheque for a $20 loan she needed to get her car out of a parking garage.
Buffett became a success not only because he understood how to make money, but also because he knew how to use it productively once he had it. And, his legacy will endure because of his willingness to give it all away.
Lesson 3 Enjoy The Process
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Dianne CramptonDianne Crampton is an executive leadership coach, team consultant, author and president of TIGERS Success Series, Inc. Dianne has been helping CEO's and Executives connect their employees to their core values and goals for over 20 years using the trademarked TIGERS team culture process, which stands for trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk and success. To download a free white paper on behaviors that build strong teams and behaviors that will predictably tear them down go here. - Visit Dianne Crampton's Website |
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Kim CastleWith nearly two decades in the advertising and design business, with clients like Domino's Pizza, General Motors, Direct TV, Pedigree, Wolfgang Puck, Higher Octave Music, Hollywood Celebrity Products, Disney, and Paramount, as well as thousands of entrepreneurs around the world define, structure, communicate, and position their business for greater profits, BrandU(R) co-creators Kim Castle and W. Vito Montone discovered that entrepreneurs could experience the same power that big brands command for a fraction of the cost with the world's only process-based results-drive Integral approach to business creation. BrandU(R) is helping entrepreneurs grow with the power of extreme clarity from idea...to brand...to market(TM) and helping one million entrepreneurs become successful and whole so that they can make a difference in the world. Are you one of them? If you want to experience clarity all the way to the bank(TM), get started now at http://www.brandu.com. - Visit Kim Castle's Website |
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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