I Spent 168 Hours With Richard Branson (Here’s What I Learned)

Welcome to the Growth Stacking podcast. This is Dan Martell. I spent 168 hours with Richard Branson and here's what I learned. A few years ago, I got an invite to spend a week with Richard Branson at his home in Switzerland. I had imposter syndrome out the ying yang, but I went and I said to myself, I'm just going to go with one specific reason. I want to see how the billionaire that every other billionaire wants to be like, how does he operate in his day to day? What is he like? How does he hire people? What are the kind of people that he hangs out with? And I watched him get up, eat breakfast with his assistant and leave for the rest of the day just to play. He spent most of his time with us not doing any work, not being distracted, not being stressed out, but just having fun and living life. And over a few days, I asked his assistant, how do you work with Richard? And that's when she shared with me the simple process that's changed my life forever. The first thing I learned is he doesn't touch technology. Every morning when they have breakfast, that is when she writes down all the things that she doesn't know how to deal with and presents them to Richard. And he gives her feedback and ideas and suggestions. And then she takes all of that and all the other requests that come in throughout the day and she moves those things forward while Richard is hanging out with us. So that way he can be so present in his day to day, he can hear for opportunities. He's listening, he's in the moment. And it's a fascinating thing to see because when you live in a world where everybody's distracted, here's a guy that's worth billions that is only there for the conversation. So he writes 100% of his conversation through his assistant. All the demands, all the requests, all the needs on his time, they go through one person and her name is Helen. Even all his emails, they go through Helen. He doesn't read them for the most part. He walks around with a legal pad and he writes down ideas and notes and I think he just rips them apart and puts them in his pocket. And when he gets a chance, he'll sit down and review his ideas with Helen, maybe over breakfast. And that's the degree of technology that he's got in his life. He keeps it so simple, it's not complicated. He doesn't have his login to his CRM or his email or to his bank accounts. He doesn't need that. He's a connector and idea guy. And I think a lot of us would benefit from learning how to do that better. The second thing I learned is he licenses his name. When people see the Virgin logo everywhere, like Virgin Records, Virgin Media, Virgin Mobile, Virgin Airline, they think like Richard owns all those companies. But the truth is, out of 400 companies, more than half Richard only owns a minority percentage of the businesses. Or it's a licensing deal. Companies pay a licensing fee to use the name. The Virgin Group of businesses is a $16.6 billion revenue as of, I believe, 2019, with over 71,000 employees. But many of those businesses, they only own a minority stake in them or their licensing deal where they've been paid to use the Virgin brand. I remember one night we were having dinner and I asked Richard a simple question. I said, in business, what is the most important thing that you've learned? I was like thinking, it's going to be some deep secret that nobody else has ever heard before. And he says to me, brand, the power of brand. And I'll be honest with you, at the time I didn't really get it because I'm a software guy. So I was thinking, there's gotta be more to this. What does he mean by the power of brand? And then I realized that most of the companies that he's involved in, he's licensed his brand to other businesses and they pay him for the Virgin name to be associated with the Virgin brand. That is a powerful idea where you can build a business that has such demand, like the Nike check mark, where you get paid to use that logo to create the essence of what that means. And the cool part is I realized, you know, it took me a few years, that the most powerful brand that we all have is our name. It's who we are, it's what we're about. It's. It's our reach and our reputation. And Richard just made me realize that had I been more deliberate back when I met him and continued to invest my personal brand, many of the dreams, many of the goals I've been out to accomplish would have happened a lot quicker. The third thing I learned is that he monetizes his passions. See, most people don't realize that wealthy people find ways to take essentially an expense and turn it into an asset. To take something that costs money and turn it into a revenue generating item. He does this with everything. I mean, the property we were staying in is part of the Virgin limited edition boutique hotels. Most of his homes from Necker island to his property in Africa. Every One of them, there are places that you can also rent for hundreds of thousands of dollars per week. But that's just one example. I mean, everything from space travel with Galactic to music with Virgin Records to kiteboarding. He's hosted an event called Mai Tai. You know, it's kind of the modern day golfing for Silicon Valley. I have friends that instead of putting their money in a bank account where it earns interest, they literally figured out how to hack cars, purchase these supercars, they get allocations, they buy, right? And over time, as an asset, it makes some money. Same thing with watches. If you know what you're doing, you buy at the right time. These things are investments that will hold their value and go up over time. Wealthy people do this with art for tax reasons. See, the rich know how to turn a passion from an expense into a revenue generating item. The fourth thing I learned is he's a master connector. A big reason that he has all these properties is because he likes to host events and meet other people. I mean, even on the trip I was on, there was probably 20 other entrepreneurs, from Tim Ferriss to Brian Johnson, the biohacker. And amongst the group, he ended up investing in three or four other projects through his venture capital fund. So I would say almost 70% of Branson's time isn't spent running companies, but meeting and connecting with entrepreneurs. Once he'll invest in, collaborate with, maybe start new companies with, maybe license his brand to. These are the types of things that leverage his zone of genius. And I was really inspired by it. I mean, I ended up starting hosting more dinners, organizing events, doing things like my ski trip with 48 entrepreneurs, to snow biking trips, to mountain bike trips. Like I just realized like, why not integrate everything into one? It just makes makes connecting with like minded entrepreneurs really easy. You've got an event or a moment throughout the year that you can invite new people to so that you can connect them with your friends. And new opportunities are going to come from that. I know my friend Janik, he's got a group called Maverick and they do a charity event every year at Necker island to help bring awareness to projects that Richard's involved in. But also you get to meet all these incredible entrepreneurs that write a check for the charity, but get to spend some time directly with Richard, you know, hanging out on his island, playing chess or going kiteboarding. Life gets a lot easier when you have the who, not how. You've got big problems. You want to find the person that's already solved this so they can connect with somebody on your team to resolve it. Your network is your net worth. Because it's all about relationship capital. And this is honestly what the top people in the world focus on the most. That's what I Learned from spending 168 hours with Richard Branson. And if you want to learn what I got from meeting a thousand millionaires, click the link and I'll see you on the other side. If you like this week's episode, be sure to visit itunes, leave a review that'll help us get in front of other founders just like you. And if you're looking for more resources and video trainings, be sure to check out dan martell2lsmartell.com to subscribe. Keep up the hustle, keep stacking your growth, and I'll see you next Monday's episode. Peace. Grow Peace. Bye Bye.