Biography Edition (Napoleon): The Conqueror's Guide to Revolutionary Painting Business Tactics

Welcome to the Profitable Painter Podcast, Biography Edition, where we delve into the lives of some of the most successful individuals to cover the strategies, tactics, and mindsets that propelled them to greatness. Today we're exploring the extraordinary life of a figure whose ambition, strategic genius, and leadership redefine what's possible. So join me as we navigate the, the journey of this remarkable individual and extract invaluable lessons you can apply to elevate your professional painting business. So get ready to be inspired, to learn, and to transform the way you think about success and leadership in your own entrepreneurial journey. So I read a couple books, Napoleon by David A. Bell and also The Mind of Napoleon by J. Christopher Harold. Both are great books. Uh, the first one, Napoleon, it's actually a very concise biography It was only a few hundred pages. I read it over the weekend. And The Mind of Napoleon by J. Christopher Harold is basically written by Napoleon himself. It's just edited by J. Christopher Harold. It's basically a consolidation of a bunch of things that Napoleon was recorded as saying or writing, and he just organized it by topic. So it was pretty, pretty interesting. So I'm gonna be basically referencing these two books throughout the episode. So let's jump into things here. I'm going to read a quote from David A. Bell's book. His life was enormously important, endlessly fascinating, and connected to some of the most controversial and constantly reinterpreted events in world history. So Napoleon's life was pretty grand in scale, and I think as business owners we can learn from what he accomplished. And so I'm going to try to highlight those things throughout this episode. Here's another quote from David A. Bell's book: He is a man who, born in obscurity, acquired the greatest military reputation in any European military commander in centuries while still in his 20s. At 30, he ruled France, and at 40, he dominated Europe as no individual had since Charlemagne. The wars he fought had changed the map of Europe forever. So basically Napoleon started from, from pretty much nothing, right? And he ended up being like the one of the greatest conquerors, if not the greatest the world has ever seen. So it highlights the fact of you should set your ambitions high. There's no reason, there's no reason you you should put any limits on yourself as you build your business. And this is actually a quote from Napoleon himself, from the mind of Napoleon. Ambition, which overthrows governments and private fortunes, which feeds on blood and crimes. Ambition is like all inordinate passions, a violent and unthinking fever that ceases only when life ceases. So that's a pretty intense quote from Napoleon himself on ambition, um, and that quote does pretty much describe, uh, his ambition and how it— and, and how far it took him. But one of the things Napoleon was really focused on was not just the military aspect of things. Obviously, he was a military general. He was also very focused on crafting a public image. And this is a quote out of David A. Bell's book: Stage management is as important as the drama itself for understanding Napoleon's life. From his first campaigns in the mid-1790s, he knew the political importance of actively crafting his message in all available media—print, painting, sculpture, oratory, even architecture. It is no coincidence that so many images of the man have achieved iconic status. And there's actually an anecdote in the book which kind of demonstrates how far he would take crafting an image and kind of creating a scenario where it would put him up on a pedestal. Here's another quote from David A. Bell's book: As armies faced each other indecisively, the royalist battalion commander steps forward. If you do not withdraw, he shouts hesitantly to Napoleon, you will be arrested. On both sides, hands nervously clutch loaded muskets. But then Napoleon orders his men to lower their weapons. An aide protests, but he insists. He steps forward, out in front of his own troops, within 20 feet of the royalist regiment. Soldiers of the Fifth, he cries, I am your Emperor. Acknowledge me. He walks a few more steps and in a dramatic gesture opens his coat, exposing his chest as a target. 'If there is any soldier among you who wants to kill this emperor, here I am.' For a moment there is silence. Then somewhere in the royalist lines a voice can be heard ordering men to open fire, but no one does. The line stands fearful and decisive. And then a different cry is heard: 'Long live the emperor!' A single voice at first, but immediately repeated by others. Long live the Emperor! In a moment, the entire royalist battalion starts shouting words. As they do, they throw down their weapons, surround Napoleon joyously, and rush to embrace the men who have come with him from Elba. Hardened soldiers burst into tears, and they clasp each other screaming deliriously, Long live the Emperor! As the clamor subsides, Napoleon smiles contentedly at his small army, which has just doubled in size. He prepares to move onward further north. So that's just a— I guess that was something that he actually constructed. He kind of had an idea that the royalist battalion would end up, uh, not actually attacking his force. But it just goes— he kind of goes through this whole dramatic thing where he goes out in front of them and, and it puts on the show, basically. So he— Napoleon was very focused on crafting a public image. And, uh, in controlling the message. So he actually purchased several French newspapers, printing presses, and put out his own story. And he was also always talking to his troops and managing public perspective, perception within his troops, and also public perception abroad, which I think is a very good lesson for us as business owners, you know, constantly talking to our team But also, of course, you know, putting our story out there, putting our brand out there, and controlling that and telling that story of what we're doing. Napoleon was a master at this, and, you know, he obviously— a lot of the military successes, he wouldn't achieve the status he did, but he was heavily focused on also the political side of things by controlling the message. And here's another quote from David A. Bell: political figures learn to appeal directly to ordinary citizens to gain power. The radical demagogue Jean-Paul Marat was only the most prominent revolutionary who used the printing press to forge intense bonds of attachments with his followers. And from Mind of Napoleon: Napoleon dictated all important army bulletins himself. Their purpose was multiple: to inform the public, to counter rumors, to mislead the enemy, and to stir up enthusiasm, serving as his own minister of propaganda. So basically, I think we can take away from this is that we should, we should take this as a, uh, as something serious for, for our own businesses. You know, we should act as the minister of propaganda for our own company, right? We should always be talking to our team, controlling the narrative, and then also our brand and, and controlling and telling that story of, of ourselves and of our business. Um, and here's another quote from David A. Bell's book. He made frequent addresses to them, praising, praising their bravery. He doled out medals by the barrelful while distributing 100 specially engraved sabers for especially valiant acts of heroism. He appealed to the soldiers' sense of pride and destiny. The Fatherland has the right to expect great things from you, all of which you wish to be able to say with pride upon returning to your villages: I was a part of the conquering army. He did not hesitate to give his men a share of the spoils. He took care to remain personally approachable. So he had this relationship with his men, you know, that he was always giving out those awards, recognizing them, making them feel important, and I'm proud to be a part of Napoleon's army. And so that's something that we can definitely take in our businesses. We constantly need to be motivating and showing our team that we care. Napoleon was very tied into the psychology of people. And he, he showed that in his actions on how he treated his, his team, his, his, his army, and how he tried to control that narrative with, uh, with the public abroad. Going back to David A. Bell's quote from the book here: Napoleon's balance of boldness and shrewdness. It is vital to understand this point about Napoleon Bonaparte from the start because it is all too easy to see him as a pure force and freak of nature who imposed himself to the world. Through sheer boldness and brilliance. Bold and brilliant he was, but also shrewd. He did repeatedly take enormous and dramatic risks in his battles. He did everything possible to maximize the odds in his favor. Napoleon was very bold and shrewd. This is actually a quote from Mind of Napoleon, uh, something from Napoleon himself. He said, what distinguishes Frederick the Great most is not the cleverness of his moves but his boldness. Boldness is the common quality singled out by Napoleon in the 7 great generals whom he cites as examples. So Napoleon was a student of history and he seemed to really admire boldness, and he also saw that in his own actions. He was a big fan of being bold and using the simplest moves possible. He has a great amount of fame for being a military strategist, but he actually didn't want to keep things very complicated. He wanted things to be as simple as possible in his tactical and strategic actions because he felt that the simplest moves were always the best because they could be easily communicated to his team. His team could easily execute, but he wanted to do it boldly and quickly, which increased the probability of success. So I think we can take this as a lesson in our own businesses, being bold in our business and not being timid, right? Getting out there, making things happen, and keeping things simple. You don't have to do some complicated marketing strategy for it to work. Just stick with the basics. Do it decisively and boldly. If you think of cold calling, like door-to-door cold calling, let's take that as an example. That's a pretty simple strategy, right? You go into a neighborhood where you have your ideal clients in, and you go from door to door, knock on the door, and say, "Hey, would you like an estimate, a free estimate for exterior painting?" or whatever, you know, whatever you're selling. Very simple, but it's a pretty bold strategy. That's— a lot of folks don't do it for that reason because it takes some guts to go up to some stranger's door and interrupt their day and pitch them your services. So it's a very bold strategy, but it's also very simple, and there are businesses that run off of that one strategy. I went to College Works Painting, I did the College Works Painting internship, and that whole— my whole marketing was based off of that door-to-door strategy. It's effective, it's just all in the numbers and your ability to execute. Uh, going back to the book here, looking at the defining impact of Napoleon's early education from David A. Bill's book. At age 9, Napoleon left his close-knit Corsican family dominated by his mother for an austere military boarding school. This was by any measure the defining experience of Napoleon's childhood. He spent 5 years out the school without once returning home. Historians have made much of the hazing he received from his fellow students on account of his accent, his fierce loyalty to Corazon or Corsica, and a first name unfamiliar to French ears. Scholars have speculated endlessly about the effects of the experience on his character, and it is indeed likely that he derived considerable resilience and self-sufficiency from it. Early in his life, Napoleon had a lot of challenges. You know, he was basically a foreigner and he had a weird first name, and this likely built a lot of resilience in him and self-sufficiency, which are common traits of entrepreneurs. Folks that go out on their own is that you have to be very resilient as a business owner. There's huge ups and downs and you have to be self-sufficient and do problem— and constantly problem solve. So, um, we definitely see that was something that, uh, Napoleon had faced in his, his early years. Something else we saw in his early years was that he was dedicated to self-education. Going to David A. Bell's book, Napoleon found comfort and companionship in books. By adolescence, the habit of intensive reading had already become deeply ingrained. I live like a bear, always alone in my room with my books, my only friends, he wrote. He kept copious reading notes in a file of obscure words that might lend weight to his own writings. And this comes from— this next quote comes from The Mind of Napoleon: The principles of warfare are those which guided the great captains whose deeds history has transmitted to us: Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, Eugène Savary, Frederick the Great. The history of their 83 campaigns would constitute a complete treatise on the art of war. The principles that must be followed in defensive and offensive warfare would flow from it as a common source. My son should read much history and meditate upon it. It is the only true philosophy. Let him read and meditate upon the wars of the great captains. It is the only way to learn the art of war. So here we hear that Napoleon wanted his son to read history because it was the only true philosophy. And so we can see that, you know, Napoleon didn't just, uh, become a military strategist just because he was a genius or something, which he may have been a genius, but, um, he did intensive study of his predecessors, and, and that's how he got to where he was. He, you know, he studied Alexander the Great, Hannibal, Caesar, Frederick the Great, etc. So he was all about learning and reading, and that's something that we should definitely take as entrepreneurs. Is constantly acquiring and learning new things and applying that in our business. Because, you know, learning isn't just about reading, it's also about applying, because you really haven't learned anything if you just read it. The act of learning is actually, you know, learning it, reading it, and taking it in, but then actually doing the thing. That's when you've actually completed that cycle of learning. And that's something that we see that Napoleon definitely did. All right, so now let's look at how Napoleon capitalized on changes brought on by the French Revolution. This is a quote from David A. Bell's book: What, what made it possible for Napoleon to follow the path of overweening ambition was the French Revolution. In an instant, everything has changed. From the depths of this nation, an electric spark has exploded. The The revolution was overturning age-old hierarchies and giving worldwide prominence to previously obscure figures. So, that's something to be aware of, you know, is the market changes, not just on a, you know, a country scale, but, you know, it could also be in a local market. You can ride that wave in your market. So, it reminds me, I had a recent conversation with Roger Carroll, who is a painting contractor out of North Carolina, and he was telling me that, you know, back in the Trump administration, there's a lot of money that went into improvement of military installations. And so there's a lot of government contracts that came about that he's just now reaping the reward on because it takes a few years for those to be implemented. And so he's basically riding a wave of a whole bunch of government contracts for things to be painted on military installations. And so basically recognizing and seizing those opportunities as they come in your own market, you can really ride a wave, you know, in your local market. So let's take a look at Napoleon's leadership and tactical genius. So here's from David A. Bell's book again: Napoleon showed political ruthlessness immediately. He also demonstrated his tremendous energy and military acumen by effectively reorganizing the artillery, identifying a crucial weak point in Toulon's defenses, and leading the attack against it personally. He demonstrated genuine physical courage as well, receiving a bayonet wound to the, to the thigh and having a horse shot out from under him. And here's a quote from The Mind of Napoleon: Caesar's principal principles were the same as Alexander's and Hannibal's: to keep his forces united, to be vulnerable at no point, to strike speedily at critical, critical points, to make use of every possible opportunity of increasing his chances of victory on the battlefield. So basically, do everything and you will win. Here's another quote from a letter that Napoleon wrote to Talleyrand, one of his contemporary political folks. He says, all great events hang by a single thread. The clever man takes advantage of everything, neglecting nothing that may give him some added opportunity. The less clever man, by neglecting one thing, sometimes misses everything. So it's important to take every— everything into account. Don't ignore the details when you're implementing, especially if you're implementing a plan, whether that's a marketing plan, production plan, whatever it is. Pay attention to those details, and so you can be confident in your plan and you can execute it with maximum, maximum efficiency and effectiveness. One of the things that Napoleon had that should be pretty self-evident is that he had an incredible self-belief. Here's a quote from David A. Bell's book: More than 20 years after defeating the Austrian army at Lodi, Napoleon confided that only after the battle did I believe myself to be a superior man, and did the ambition come to me of executing the great things which so far had been occupying my thoughts only as a fantastic dream. And this is a quote from The Mind of Napoleon: There is no immortality but the memory that is left in the minds of men. To have lived without glory, without leaving a trace of one's existence, is not to have lived at all. And so basically, we see here that Napoleon, um, really valued the importance of believing in yourself and striving for glory and, and kind of leaving an impression on the earth of the fact that you were here, right? And so that can— you can use that as fuel to kind of drive, uh, success in your own businesses, maybe having some sort of greater purpose, right? Whether that's leaving a lasting legacy for your family or whatever, have a lasting impression on your community, whatever that is, you can kind of use that as fuel to achieve your, your greater goals. So let's take a look at how Napoleon exploited the societal changes for his personal gain. This is from David A. Bell's book. It was the French Revolution that made this stupefying ascent possible. The revolution badly damaged the traditional hierarchy, hierarchies of French society, opening the door to radically new forms of social mobility. But history is not just a matter of impersonal forces, and nothing ensured that an individual would come along to exploit the changes as fully and spectacularly as Napoleon. Many opportunities have been lost for lack of talent or vision. In Napoleon's case, the man met his hour. So again, this is kind of showing us that Napoleon, he was in the right place at the right time. With the French Revolution, but he did have the tools needed. He had the military acumen, he had the focus on crafting the public perception through politics, right? He had those things in his toolkit, and so he was well positioned for the French Revolution to take advantage of it. And this reminds me of something that Charlie Munger says a lot. Here's a quote from Charlie Munger. He says, uh, when new businesses come in, there are huge advantages to the early birds. And when you're an early bird, there's a model I call surfing. When a surfer gets up and catches the wave and just stays there, he can go a long, long time. But if he gets off the wave, he becomes mired in the shallows. But people get long runs when they, they're on the right edge of the wave, whether it's Microsoft or Intel or all kinds of people. So basically getting on a wave and riding it, right? Napoleon basically rode the wave of the French Revolution. You can do this on a smaller scale in your local markets. You know, I give the example of Roger Carroll riding the wave of installation improvements, military installation improvements, but this could be maybe a trend of people wanting to paint their, the brick on their house. Like, you know, there's these trends where, you know, there's a whole bunch of brick houses everywhere, but now it becomes a cool thing to put, you know, color your brick white, which is great because that takes a whole bunch of product and you can make a good chunk of change. But maybe that's like a trend that happens in a local neighborhood and you can be the person or the company that provides that service, right? So let's look at some of the the things that, uh, we can learn from Napoleon, some of his mistakes. So the, the pitfalls of rapid expansion without a solid foundation. So here's a quote from David A. Bell's book: Impressive as it was from the outside, the empire was increasingly coming to resemble a skyscraper built in haste without a proper foundation. And it did not help that Napoleon, after his victories of 1805 and 1806, felt himself virtually invincible. Reminds me of a quote from David Packard. He says, more companies die from indigestion than starvation. I was talking to a painting business owner a few weeks ago, and he, he was doing like around $300,000 in revenue, and then the next year he shot up to about a million in revenue. But he had grown so quickly that his marketing and sales outpaced his production. And he had to really dial it back in the following year after that $1 million a year because he, his, the production side couldn't keep up and he was having a lot of production issues, basically indigestion, right? He was unable to keep up with the marketing and sales and the following year he had to kind of dial it back a little bit. He only did like $500,000. In order to scale successfully, grow your business successfully, you got to have a solid foundation of your people and your processes before you, you try to scale it up. All right, now let's take a look at the catastrophic consequences of hubris and poor planning. Here's a quote from David A. Bell's book: A week later, the French marched into Moscow and to find it largely deserted. Between straggling, disease, and death, Napoleon had almost lost more than a third of his men. Russian saboteurs carried out orders to burn Moscow. The fire destroyed nearly two-thirds of the city's private residences and killed thousands. The fire left Moscow uninhabitable, forcing the French army to withdraw, and Napoleon then made matters worse by delaying the army's departure for nearly a month, believing his men had plenty of time before winter set in. Instead, one of the coldest winters on record began earlier than usual. On one occasion, temperatures fell to lower than -35°F (-22°C). The French retreat from Moscow has deservedly gone down in history as one of the greatest military catastrophes of all time. Napoleon's forces were ill-prepared for the murderous cold, Frostbite seized appendages. Snow glare induced temporary blindness. Each morning the sun rose on the frost-covered corpses of men who had fallen asleep and frozen solid in the night. Horses, dead and living, were devoured raw while desperate soldiers sought warmth in the animals' eviscerated bellies. All in all, the original 655,000-strong force Scarcely 85,000 men made it back out of Russia. The aura of invincibility had disappeared. So, you know, Napoleon went into Russia with over half a million men, came out with less than 100,000. That's pretty devastating. And this, you know, pretty much ruined his, uh, his, his reputation, and he was unable to you know, use his propaganda machine to save him from this horrible loss against Russia. So it really is, you know, even though he apparently did read there's a prior general that had tried to invade Russia and Russia employed the same strategy, it's the same one they did in World War 1 as well, or excuse me, World War II. And basically Russia used their large landmass to buy time and to basically withdraw, withdraw, withdraw, and to draw the invading force further and further into their country while they burned all the supplies. And that's a successful strategy that they've done many times. You know, Napoleon probably was drinking his own Kool-Aid and thought he could— even though once before Russia had done this to another, uh, commander— he thought he could, you know, somehow do it differently. But he ended up doing the same mistakes that the prior general had committed. So, you know, you need to have humility in your planning, and you need to learn from others' mistakes, which, you know, early in his career Napoleon definitely did this, but he didn't— he definitely did not do this in this scenario. And so that is something that we should definitely take into consideration, you know. As an entrepreneur, even though you're getting those wins and things are seeming to go great, you know, at any point in time, if you make the wrong decision, you know, those wins can turn into losses pretty quickly. So I definitely recommend you grab a copy of The Mind of Napoleon and also Napoleon by David A. Bell. Both are great books. I enjoyed them immensely. I think there's a lot of lessons that we can learn on being bold in our businesses really communicating well with our team and building our brand for others to see. And also, you know, being ready to ride the wave of those things in your local market, you know, having prepared ourselves to ride those waves. Like, we've prepared ourselves mentally because we know our We know our industry, we know our marketing, we know our team, and we're ready to ride that wave in our local market and to first recognize that wave and then ride that wave, whatever that might be. And the importance of believing in yourself that you can accomplish great things and for you and your business, but being aware of overextending ourselves, right? And not falling into that trap of trying to scale too quickly without having that proper foundation and realizing that you are not invincible. And you know, even though you might have many wins under your belt, you are always susceptible to losses and, and being knocked down. So I think those are great lessons that we can take for our own businesses. And with that, I'd love to hear your thoughts. And any ideas that you have for future biographies. And with that, I'll see you next week.