Hey everyone, welcome to episode three of The Grind. I couldn't be more excited to have our next guest on the show. He had a really unique childhood before going on to Harvard Law, after which he pivoted into business, ended up leading one of the most iconic companies in the world. Since then he's joined the boards and helped govern some of the most interesting organizations, really a diverse group of organizations from the NCAA to Harvard to Bloomberg Philanthropies to Airbnb, Facebook, IBM, Berkshire Hathaway. It's like an unbelievable resume, unbelievable list of groups that he helps lead. I got to meet him about a few years ago and since then we've developed a great relationship. He's been super helpful to me. I've learned a lot from him and I think you all will too. If you haven't guessed already, his name's Ken Chenault.
So, for me, one of the things that I really believe strongly is we don't decide when we get born. And there's the luck of the draw. The luck of the draw for me was I was literally born three years before Brown v. Board of Education. It wouldn't have mattered how good I was, how competent I was, there's no way that I would have succeeded without that beginning of Brown v. Board of Education and the civil rights movement.
So from a childhood standpoint, it's a tale of not just two cities but three or four cities. One is a very happy childhood until I was around eight years old. My father, who was an incredible and is an incredible role model, finished number one in his class at Howard Dental School, got the highest score ever at that time taking the dental board exam.
Morehouse to Howard. And you know, was just someone very involved in the issues in the community, involved in the civil rights movement, had a nervous breakdown. And at that time the stigma and the issues, it was very, very challenging and not something you talked about. So you can imagine as a young child I never talked about it with my friends. He recovered after a few years. But that was a really challenging time because it had a real impact on the family, a real impact on me and my siblings. But you know, it's the old story that those types of challenges can make you stronger.
And one of the things that I think has helped me in business and life is that I'm a very resilient person. And that I think is just some of the challenges that I've had. So I was a very, to put it mildly, uneven student. I love to read. I was a pretty good test taker, but I just didn't focus on things that I didn't really enjoy or I wasn't interested in. And so I might get an A in mathematics and a D in Latin. And it was pretty frustrating for my parents who were very focused on education. But you know, I just wasn't disciplined. In my family, you know, one of the things, dinner was a really important time and dinner was when our parents would engage us in conversation. We'd talk about current events. We'd obviously talk about what was happening in the civil rights movement. But one of the things that we would talk about and my parents would talk about is you can overcome, doesn't matter what the challenge is. My father had a great saying: focus on what you can control. And the one thing you can control is your performance. So whenever I would complain or make excuses he would say that you control your performance.
But at the same time he clearly admitted and identified here's where prejudice is. You can't accept that. But his view was you can't use that as an excuse.
Right. That's super powerful. You know, this focus on what you can control. What was the dynamic in terms of your parents clearly establishing of expectations for you and your siblings? Was it more of a pressure that they put on you all or was it we believe that you all can do great things and we expect you to reach your potential?
It's a combination of both. It's a combination of both. And you can imagine, you know, I had a sister who was a good student, my older brother was a good student, my younger brother was a good student, and Ken was not.
So fortunately I had a few teachers who recognized my potential. You know, one of the things that I remember is I got a report card. It was not a very good report card. And the teacher wrote in the margin, Ken is very bright. He is totally undisciplined and he is really frustrating.
Yeah. So, you know, and I sometimes would act up in class, not in a major way, but I would tell jokes or I would do this and so it took me a while. And the turning point, and I think this is important, TAD, is I always had aspirations. I didn't know much about business. So, I didn't have an aspiration to be successful in business, but I had aspirations that I would go into politics at some point. And even though I wasn't performing as a student, that didn't stop me.
And I think that's really important that I had real aspirations.
But I had aspirations and I think that's really important.
Yeah. I mean that makes a lot of sense. And obviously growing up during the civil rights era, you know, was that a big part of why politics was...
Yeah, it was a big part. I mean, I thought I would be a civil rights leader maybe or I'd go into politics. And you know, I had, you know, there were some moments. I remember my father took us to see Martin Luther King and he was speaking in the neighboring town.
And that was an incredible experience. And then I remember he actually came to Hempstead where I grew up and he went to a really poor section of Hempstead and I remember our three brothers and I, we heard in the neighborhood he was there. We ran down into the projects and we caught a glimpse of him in the car and that was unbelievable.
And then the third time which was incredibly impactful is we saw him two weeks before he was assassinated.
He came to speak at a church that was near and I just remember both the feeling of seeing him up close and speaking again. And I was a junior in high school.
Wow. One of the things I talk about and really feel is I grew up the height of the civil rights movement, black power movement, Vietnam protests. You know, it was a time of incredible turmoil.
In this country, but I also think it's given me a sensibility to think about things more broadly than just I'm in business. I think part of what one needs to do in business is how are you impacting the broader society and I don't think there should be a conflict between profit and purpose.
Right, yeah, I mean there again it's consistent, you know, looking for broader perspective.
Wow, I mean so you start off relatively mediocre student but you've got ambitions.
You've got people who are believing in you, your parents who are setting high standards.
Headmaster it sounds like who also can recognize your talent. Even the teacher who's writing in the margins. How do you, if you're unlucky and you talked about the luck of the draw with life, I always call it the lottery of life, but some people don't have obvious people around them who are pouring into them saying they believe in them. They weren't lucky to stumble upon a MLK speech. How do you get motivation? And how do you build confidence when you haven't had maybe as lucky of a draw in terms of being surrounded by people who can help you in that way?
So I think one of the things, which is something that I did do, is you want to reach out intellectually. So one of the things for me that I just recommend to people is I've always been a voracious reader of biographies. And you know, at the end of the day, if you want to do something, read about some great people.
And one of the things you'll see is that they were also mere mortals. They had challenges, they had issues to deal with, but they were able to overcome it. And there are some really valuable lessons that you can learn from the stories of others.
Right. Second, in the world we live in today, podcasts.
Yeah. Listen to The Grind.
I mean, there are people out there who are really grinding. And you know, one of the things that I see, there are two qualities that I think are very consistent in people who are successful. One, they are intellectually curious. I think that's really important. Find some things that stimulate you.
Find some things that stimulate you. Second, they've overcome some adversity no matter what their backgrounds are. Now, clearly it's more pronounced. So, you grow up in a really troubled household, you know, you've got really tough challenges growing up and the question is part of your quest should be who are some role models that I can find. And I will tell you for me, there were two autobiographies that I took a lot of strength in particularly, both in my high school years. One was the autobiography of Malcolm X and the other was the autobiography of Frederick Douglass. And to see and to read how all of the issues that he overcame, it was improbable.
You'd say, how could this happen? You know, it doesn't compute.
It doesn't work. And the reality is I'm a firm believer that individuals can overcome almost anything. But you've got to have some examples. You've got to have some stories. And you've got to have a level of self-awareness that what you're going through, you're not alone. You're not the first person that has ever encountered a set of challenges.
The question is how do you cope with that? And I think one of the things you can find is there are tremendous examples that you can get from a range of media that will be very instructive of how to overcome those challenges.
You know, it's fascinating because on one hand, your parents, their parents before them, your generation, my generation, your son's generation, there is, you know, sort of this unambiguous march towards more progress.
You know, obviously, as you know, black folks in America, there are more opportunities, you know, than there have ever been historically. And yet challenges remain. How do you channel that perspective that you all seem to have had, responsibility, a mission, these kinds of things into this generation? I do seem to get a sense from a lot of my, you know, sort of millennial peers of frustration instead of inspiration.
Yes. And you know, reasonably so, at the pace of progress that, you know, we in many cases feel has gone too slow.
How do we reframe this to be more of a positive, you know, motivation?
Good. So I think one of the things that's absolutely critical and it goes to, for me, my leadership mantra as you know is the role of a leader is to define reality and give hope. So I think one of the things is it's absolutely appropriate to define here are the tough aspects of that reality but we also have to focus on here are some of the opportunities in that reality but then what are the reasons to be hopeful, what are the tactics and the strategies. So I think one of the things that is critical is on an individual basis, we need to focus on reaching positions in our society that allow us to exert power. I think that's really important.
I think second is, and I certainly felt this at Harvard from that group, is what can we do to be supportive of each other and helpful to each other but also to hold ourselves to a tough standard. And you know, one of the things that I think was really important is academically we held ourselves to a tough standard.
Was there a competition? Sure. But not... there was competition and certainly I'm sure there was some competition amongst people but a real focus on we need to perform. And so one of the things I think that is critical is we actually have more power than we think. You know, the reality is since I've been in business, the reality is it was in the 80s I knew almost anyone who was successful in business in America who was black. Now I don't know.
Right. That's really terrific.
