Lessons from a billionaire on success and faith

Hey Friend,

I like to believe that life is logical. If I learn from the best and work hard, I’ll be rewarded. I’ll be able to avoid bad things through smart decision-making. Overall, I’m in control of my fate.

My guest for the next podcast episode (available on Apple & Spotify) begs to differ, and he has the stories to prove it.

Len Green felt he was dealt a bad hand in life. Growing up, he struggled with dyslexia, heavy stuttering, memory, and almost anything intellectual.

He flunked out of 3 universities, was fired from one job after another, and made a living for a time teaching Jewish youth groups, unable to hold anything else long enough to support his pregnant wife.

Despite this, Len is a successful and much-loved entrepreneur, professor, and mentor to thousands. He has founded companies with multi-billion dollar exits and taught thousands of students over 20 years through his course at Babson College, the “Ultimate Entrepreneurship Challenge.”

However, these reasons alone are not why I chose to interview him. Over my time knowing and interacting with Len at Babson, I observed his clear dedication to his Jewish faith. He would visit and speak at Babon’s spiritual center, emphasizing his faith’s role in his success and demonstrating his humility in the face of God.

This is why I wished to interview him.

And not only was he kind enough to accept my request, but he showed up with more authenticity, vulnerability, and sincerity than I could have ever asked for.

Despite being shorter than my previous episodes, this one is an emotional rollercoaster that I guarantee will leave you humbled and speechless.

Just a few of the topics we cover include:

• What he did when he found himself in $17m of debt while only making $17k/year

• How he published a book in 1 month to get back his job as a professor

• How his wife’s donation to an underground hospital unexpectedly led to her surviving cancer for 20+ years

• Why he turned down an offer to sell Blue Buffalo for $2.2 billion, and the nonsensical way he got $8 billion instead

• The one prayer he repeats to himself every single day

• And much more…

I can only hope that I did justice to Len’s story and message. I procrastinated recording the intros and outros to the episode, because I didn’t know what to say.

Personally, there is one lesson I’m taking away from this experience more than anything: A large part of success is luck. That doesn’t mean not to try, but to acknowledge and have gratitude for serendipity.

I experienced this recently when a startup reached out to me a couple months ago to interview for an open position that was the perfect fit for me. I worked hard to impress them and ultimately got the role.

Can I credit myself for this “success?” Partially, but I need to acknowledge the huge stroke of luck that they reached out in the first place. And all of us have this luck to acknowledge.

If you’re reading this, it means you have access to the internet, technology, and probably many other very desirable things that a large fraction of the world still does not. Heck, 46% of the world’s population doesn’t even have access to basic sanitation. 26% don’t have access to clean water.

If you were born/raised in a developed country, you immediately have enough to be on-your-knees grateful for for the rest of your life.

This is something I’m doing my best to be hyper-aware of, and helps combat arrogance. How can you be arrogant about your achievements if you acknowledge the luck involved in reaching them?

This it something it seems the genuinely faithful have figured out. They know it is ultimately “in God’s hands” embrace success with humility and suffering with…trust?

Still figuring that one out. Next podcast?

I hope you all enjoy this episode with Len. It was a special moment for me and, like I said, I hope I did it justice.

Once again, its available on Apple and Spotify. Thanks all.

Until next time,
Ryan