Now, here's Michael Smerconish. Lloyd Blankfein was chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs from 2006 through 2018. He's now the author of a brand new memoir. It's called Streetwise: Getting to and Through Goldman Sachs. Hey, Lloyd, it's nice to have you here. Thank you so much. I enjoyed the book.
Oh, Michael, thanks so much for having me.
Let's talk about that title, Streetwise, because I like to use the word or words street smart. And I always wonder whether having street smarts is something that you can acquire or something that you're born with. Clearly, you have it. So, which was the case in your situation?
Well, I can't say it's all of one or all of the other, but I certainly, you know, I grew up in public housing. I had a kind of streety kind of background. So I think it was an early imprint on me. I don't know that if I had been born in Newport, Rhode Island on the beach, I don't know if I would have come out the same way.
I asked the question in part because as a father of four, I perceive myself, I hope that I have street smarts. Maybe not to the extent that Lloyd Blankfein does, but I hope that there are lessons I've been able to teach my kids. Sometimes I think that they're sort of oblivious to the world in which they live. And I don't know whether it's something that can be taught.
Well, kids grow up differently. I know I talk to my wife sometimes and I have certain expectations of my kids and my wife points out, you know, Lloyd, they just didn't grow up the way you did. So you can't expect them to react the same to the same stimulus that you react to in the same way.
It's a good point. Okay. I got to test your bona fides. Are you ready? Big mahoff of Wall Street that you are. I've got three choices and I want you to pick the winner. Trading Places, Eddie Murphy and Dan Aykroyd. Wall Street, Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen. Or Bonfire of the Vanities. And I'm talking the book by Tom Wolfe, not the movie. Which one?
Okay, good answer. Tell me why. I loved it all 14 times I've seen it.
There's something about Trading Places that didn't have a scintilla of expectations that you thought any of it was real. Whereas the other movies try to suggest that this is the way people really think, but they don't. And so I kind of roll my eyes at the other two and the first one, Trading Places, is just a lot of fun.
And it's Philly based for the most part. I mean Duke and Duke was in a building where in law school I clerked for all three summers at a firm that was in, and everybody local was just ecstatic that that building, the then the Fidelity building, was on the map.
You know, here's a little fun fact. I don't know why I know it and I certainly don't know why I remember it, but when they filmed that in the pit, which by the way doesn't exist anymore because all the trading is more or less electronic. But all those people waving their hands and buying and selling in the purported orange juice futures market was really the gold pit where people were trading gold on the COMEX. And I guess I do know that because I started out when I got to Goldman Sachs, I was working as a trading precious metals and gold. So I was familiar with those people. So they had a great time doing that.
Lloyd Blankfein, worth a fortune today for sure. Not born with a silver spoon in your mouth. In the book, I spent the first 20 years of my life with less privilege than most Americans. Talk to me about that background.
Well, you know, it's very funny because I labeled the first part of it advantages, not disadvantages. And I think there are a lot of advantages that come from that as long as you end up in the right place afterwards, which is, by the way, no foregone conclusion. But I did, you know, I grew up in a very blue-collar kind of family and in what we call here the projects in New York, public housing. I went to a kind of then failing high school shortly after I left it. A failed high school that was shut down that was on triple session. And so, you know, I had to make my way a lot of it. But it gives you, aside from the rigor and the challenges, it also kind of makes you more empathetic because I've been on both sides of the divide between the haves and the have-nots. And so my empathy flows in the direction of the waiter in the restaurant, not necessarily always the person I'm having dinner with.
I appreciated the fact that you were admitted and attended Harvard, seemingly without any pull, unless there's a part of the story you didn't tell in the book. It was purely on the merits and, you know, they took a shot on you.
They did and I'm a lot grateful. You know, these schools, the fancier the school, the more time and more money they invest in kind of sourcing people. It's kind of the opposite of, so I got into Harvard and I didn't get into some other colleges but Harvard took me. And, you know, story in and of itself because my school didn't really have a college placement office so I wandered over to a high school in a different district in Brooklyn and there were different manned booths and there was a guy sitting behind a desk from Harvard and gave me an application. I chatted with him and filled it out and I was sort of relieved of the burden of high expectations. So, you know, with respect to my own kids and other people, you know, people study for their SATs and work on their college applications for about 10 years before they submit it. I didn't have the burden of all that stuff. I filled out my college application like you'd fill out a landing form at an airport and it actually worked out a lot better. It was less stressful and probably was a better outcome and probably read as a lot more authentic than other people. And I talk about it in the book. I got an interview and the interview of course naturally was at the Harvard Club in New York City and at that point, you know, in Manhattan I was from deepest darkest Brooklyn and I remember and I write about this because it's kind of seared in my memory. I had probably gone into Manhattan from Brooklyn probably only a few miles away as the crow flies but the crow didn't fly for me. I took a subway and it was like one of a couple of times I'd gone into Manhattan by myself and I was so nervous that I'd be late, you know, because there was a bus to a subway from the subway to finding the address and blah blah blah. And so I ended up getting there about two hours early. And I spent about two hours walking around the block so I wouldn't look silly walking in so early. And I walked into this building which was, you know, again the Harvard Club and it's this Georgian, one of the greatest interior spaces in Manhattan, red and white kind of building and I knew it wasn't the home of the person that was meeting to interview me but I kind of thought that his house must have been like that. And so, you know, it was just, you know, again even at the time I wasn't crazed by it in hindsight it feels even to me kind of charming to even me now given my subsequent experiences. But, you know, I learned to read my audience and to adapt.
Lloyd Blankfein goes from the projects, public housing in Brooklyn to Weld Number 32 at Harvard. When you get to Weld 32, I guess it's the tradition. By the way, my producer also went to Harvard and I know that some of these traditions run deep. There had been a prior and famous resident of that same room. Who am I talking about?
Well, what they do is when you get in, you know, being Harvard and being self-aware of that Harvard and, you know, kind of being pretty pleased with itself for being Harvard, they naturally put a list of the former occupants of the dorm room that you're in. And one of the, and by the way, there was several whose name I recognized, but the most prominent one was John F. Kennedy.
Was that the pinch me moment when you're like, 'Holy crap, how did I end up here? Look who has literally slept in this bed.'
Michael, I'm smiling now. And now I would think that if I were hearing the story for the first time, but frankly, I was just terrified the whole time.
So when I got there, I was a fish out of water. No one in my family had gone to college. I had an older sibling who didn't go to college.
So when I saw that, I was terrified when I walked in the room and when I saw that name, it just pumped up the temperature.
Lloyd Blankfein was the chair and CEO of Goldman Sachs for a period of years. He's just published a memoir. It's called Streetwise. Lloyd, we're doing radio. We're live on SiriusXM right now, but we're also on video for the benefit of a YouTube audience. Are you able to see me clearly?
Okay. I have dressed in your honor today. Do you have any idea how I've dressed in your honor? Take a good look at me.
Well, given that there's a red check pattern on a blue background.
Oh, I got it. The crimson, the red, although to my eye.
It's the best I could do. It's the best I could do. Go ahead.
Crimson shirt. Yes. I wrote in the book that one of the, you know, I was pretty impecunious when I got there and when I noticed that I was dressed a lot differently than everybody else around me and in those days, I don't know what I could, and you know, I'm not necessarily have my finger on the pulse of the pop culture today but at that moment in time everybody in college is walking around with a Lacoste tennis shirt. And so I said I have to get one. And by the way I got one and that was it. I bought a Lacoste, that was like my big purchase of my life up to that point was I bought a Lacoste shirt not from a thrift shop but from a real store.
And then you shrunk it and nevertheless it was your one ticket into acceptability or so you thought when you were dressing.
Right. Right. Obviously I'd never done laundry before. My first time I put it in and, you know, and then I bought the exact precise right size for me, you know, fresh off the shelf and, you know, first time I laundered it it looked like Mickey Mouse's shirt. But, you know, something I wasn't going to buy another one.
