He asked 1 Question – and it made him a Billionaire.

He asked just 1 Question -- and with that 1 Question, this Manager became a Billionaire.

Atlanta, 1981, The Tower, which came to be called The Bunker. Coca-Cola’s top managers were in summit.

Roberto Goizueta (“Goy-zwehta”) stood before his chiefs. He was a man of impeccable suits, an uncluttered desk, and a broad smile he used like a mask.

He’d worked his whole career for Coke. Born in Cuba four centuries after Cortes had gone west to conquer Mexico, Goizueta began work as a chemist at a local Coca-Cola plant. He moved north to the States, went into management, and rose to become Chairman of the Board of Directors of Coca-Cola.

Now he asked his general staff, “What is our market share?”

Marketing had the figure. “45 %.”

Then Goizueta asked, “How many ounces of liquid does a human being need to drink each day?”

A Senior VP answered, “64 ounces.”

“ ‘64 ounces.' Okay -- now of all our brands,” Goizueta asked, “of Coke, Tab, Mr. Pibb, Sprite, all the Fanta flavors, the fountain syrups, everything – on the average, how many ounces does a human being drink of Coca-Cola products each day?”

That stat was handy. “2 ounces.”

Now the CEO repeated his first question, “What is our current market share?”

At Coca-Cola, Roberto Goizueta’s strategic questions and global answers yielded unprecedented value for its shareholders. He was a shareholder himself. And it marked the first time in history that a manager who was not a company founder became a billionaire.

Conclusions:

Coca-Cola CEO Roberto Goizueta asks Marketing a question and it is the questionwhich holds the value, not its answer.

How much value? That year alone it put sixty-two million dollars in his wallet, and much more in the wallets of Coca-Cola shareholders. Just by knowing the right question to ask.

It is the question that drives the strategy.

The example of Roberto Goizueta illustrates what the competitive CEO does. As a strategist, he looks to improve his position, even the intangibles in his position.

As CEO, he revitalized the meaning of market share. He championed a new approach to positioning Coke. Coffee was the enemy, tea was the enemy, milk was the enemy, even water was the enemy.

From colas to juices to water, market by market, he strengthened his core product's position, and therefore he strengthened his company.

Goizueta positioned Coca-Cola’s flagship product at the core of corporate strategy. He positioned Coke to survive the cola wars and maintain its leadership position.

Coke -- the product -- became what I call a "strategic positioning unit" in the struggle of Coca-Cola – the company -- with its rivals.

Essential to marketing the product was availability of the syrup. So Goizueta established a network of anchor bottlers -- in Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Australia, Southeast Asia, and Latin America – to serve entire regions of bottlers. That strategy captured one-half of the international soft drink market. It built the market capitalization of the firm to one hundred fifty billion dollars, reflecting the growing brand value of Coke the product.

And Then I Held A Glass Of Water To Her Lips While She Was Tied Up

I wanted to make money. When I moved to NYC to get a fulltime job I was rich. I was making $40,000 a year. This was a huge move up from my prior salary of $28,300 a year.

I thought I should be able to hire a butler on that kind of money.

I bought a suit. I started looking at nice apartments. I figure I could afford the massive budget of $800 a month, give or take a "few hundred".

One time there was an apartment available uptown. I met the real estate guy. While we were checking out the apartment he accidentally dropped his suitcase and about a dozen porn magazines fell out. He apologized while he picked them up and stuffed them back into this suitcase.

I couldn't afford his fee of 5% of the year's rent. I had no money other than what was coming up on my next paycheck.

So I lived with my parents which meant I had to get on a bus at 6am and I didn't get back from the city until about 10pm each day.

Finally, I was hanging around Washington Sq Park doing nothing and I met Elias and he needed a roommate. It was just $300 a month. I got the futon and he got the couch. It was one room. The broken shower was constantly running and the kitchen was so bad I didn't set foot in it once.

We kept different hours so I was usually asleep when he got home. With a girl.

He and the girl would go into the bathroom and start having sex with her perched on him while the wall pushed back and forth, as if it were ready to burst and they would fall right through. My bed was against the wall and I'd try to sleep but also I'd stay up and listen.

Elias was a strong chessplayer and made his money gambling chess in the park. His brother Jorge maybe is the most talented chessplayer in history but never really pursued the game after he was a teenager.

One time I was sick and in the middle of the night Elias woke me and told me we were getting kicked out of the apartment.

Then I decided I needed to make even more money.

Nobody had websites then. I thought this was a big problem that I wanted to solve. Everyone needed a website.

My brother-in-law and I did a website for a diamond wholesaler on 47th street. "If you tell anyone you are doing this website," he said, in his thick Russian-Jewish accent, "I'm going to have to kill you." People say that as a joke but he was serious.

And now he's dead. He was looking for diamonds in an obscure part of Russia and his plane crashed.

Nobody on the street (known as the Diamond District in NYC) was allowed to know that a wholesaler was selling direct through the Internet. We charged $35,000 for that.

My take was $17,500 which I used to pay for a year's rent at the Chelsea Hotel in NYC.

It was all cash. I gave it to the owner of the Chelsea in a paper bag and he said, "are you a drug dealer?" I don't think he was asking this to see if I should live in his building or not. I think he was just curious.

Then we did HBO's website for close to $100,000. I was working at HBO and outsourced the site to my brother in law. Then we did AmericanExpress.com and LoudRecords.com, BadBoy, NewLine, and Miramax.com and TimeWarner.com and websites for The Matrix, the Wu-Tang Clan, Con Edison, and many others. We were in business.

I worked all day at HBO and then all night at Reset, the name of the company. We got an office, then we got a bigger office. We had big parties.

Maybe five other companies knew how to do websites in NYC at the time and we were the smallest but I like to think we did the most creative sites.

We did a site called "Shoebox". I asked one of my neighbors at the Chelsea, who was a professional submissive, if she would let us photograph and interview her and her girlfriend, a professional dominatrix who was around 7 feet tall and had some sort of extra chromosome that enlarged everything about her and made her constantly lactate.

They came over to our office where we had a big photo studio and they had about 20 pairs of shoes and all of their lingerie. The highlight for me was holding a glass of water up to Maria's lips when she was completely tied up and thirsty in between takes.

The site was so popular that Con Edison came over and said, "that's what we want our website to look like."

Nobody knew what they were doing.

It's hard to be a first-time entrepreneur. I should've made our services into a product, for instance, raised money, and aimed for a big IPO.

Instead we sold for a multiple of our profits. Maybe the only Internet company back then that was profitable. Stupid.

I knew technology but I knew zero about business. I wish I had just even one mentor then who could've told me about the business side of things.

We also wanted to try out different ideas. While we were running a website business we also tried to be a rap label, a producer of TV shows, and even a tea company.

We found a rap group we liked and almost signed them but then lost interest.

About half the companies we worked with had employees who asked for bribes in order to throw business our way. "Bribe" is a strong word. Sometimes it was more subtle. "Favor". Nevertheless, we always paid the bribe.

Humiliation was common for me. I'd fly out to California to pitch Jim Carrey's agent about doing his website. "This is going to be HUGE!" his agent said. "you HAVE to go to a party with us later tonight." And an hour later I would call for directions to the party and the agent would say, "Wait, wait, wait a sec. Who is this?"

Another time I hired someone to be CEO while I was still working full-time. He's a good guy but I didn't understand how to make a deal. He wanted 10% of the company that would vest in six months. In six months and one day he took his 10% and quit and made a sitcom for MTV.

Water under the bridge. We're good friends today.

We felt like we were the wild west. Rappers with guns would stroll into our offices. Trent Reznor would hang out throwing around ideas for the Nine Inch Nails website.

Miramax executives would scream at me over the phone if one pixel was out of place on their logo. One day we spent the day tasting different teas. We wanted to pitch Honest Tea but it didn't work out.

Clients would get shot and killed at awards ceremonies in the music industry. HBO one time wanted to buy us but that's when I had to admit that I was at both places and had to quit working at HBO.

My first day on the job I cried because I had no idea what to do or who to do it to and people stopped returning my calls after I left HBO.

Then we started getting calls to get acquired. One guy said, "I don't know a hamburger from a website but I know that a stock with an Internet company is going to go up." He was from a company that manufactured burn gels and they wanted to buy us so they could put ".com" at the end of their name.

I went on a vacation to Paris. There's a restaurant at the bottom of the Eiffel Tower. The guy sitting next to us was celebrating. He had just sold a chain of Papa John's pizza stores. When I got back to New York he kept calling me and wanted to invest. Maybe he would've been my smart investor but we never took in any money.

Eventually we sold. Eventually people realized that it doesn't cost $75,000 to make a three page website about Dennis Miller. Eventually the entire web design business went bankrupt as an industry before it reinvented itself as "full services" in the Internet space.

I didn't know what to do after we sold the company. I felt totally lost.

I had money and it seemed lonely sitting in a bank account. So I bought a house. I rode helicopters every week to Atlantic City. I made a lot of new friends who all wanted something and none of them speak to me anymore.

I played poker every night for 365 straight days. "Ingrid says hi", Brian Koppelman, the writer of Rounders, wrote me the other day. Ingrid was usually in charge of the Mayfair Club, the best poker club in NY in 1999. Portrayed by Famke Jannsen in the movie.

Every day was a mask to fool someone into having a relationship with me. Into doing business with me. Into not firing me. Into buying my company.

When I actually had to "be myself" I went broke and lost all of my relationships almost instantly.

I no longer even speak to my partners in the business, all of whom are blood relatives. I was drinking, gambling, running businesses into the ground, spending, and betraying.

I could say, "I wish someone had given me advice" during this time but perhaps many people tried to.

I wish I could say, "I listened" but I honestly didn't have the ability to listen. I didn't even know what listening meant.

Listening is a more difficult skill than "Doing". Because you know the difference between "done" and "not done". But there's no line that tells you whether you listened or not.

This is the entire reason why the self-help business is a scam.

There's absolutely nothing that could've helped me. I would later lie down in the street and pray for a car to run over me while my baby girls were upstairs playing.

I wish I could re-live the entire experience. Like the blizzard of 1996 when we all went to work at midnight to finish a website and it felt so good to deliver. Or when I was scared I'd have to fire everyone because I lost a big client and didn't tell anyone. 

Now when people ask me what I would do differently I always say the same answer, "I wouldn't change a thing".

Why 9-5 Won't Work For Millennials

My mother is sixty something and anxiously counting down the days till she could retire her nurses uniform for good. She's been working consistently for 40 years, and when she speaks of retiring I can sense relief still mixed with a bit of anxiety.

The sense of relief is obvious, but it boggles me that after 40 years of dedicated work, rarely calling in sick and in fact winning awards for her diligence and treatment of patients, that my mother is still concerned about whether or not she will be financially secure once she calls it quits.

I see the position my mother is in right now and as much as I admire all that she has done - raising three kids on her own on top of 60 hour work weeks - I look at her and say to myself "that can never be me." I can not, under any circumstances, put in that amount of work to still not feel completely secure about my future. Furthermore, I don't want to wait till the latter years of my life to be able to live with the level of freedom that comes with formal retirement.

"Freedom 55 has no appeal to our generation"

I believe that I speak for most Millennials when I say 9-5 isn't enough. Please understand that when I use the term 9-5 I use it loosely to refer to restriction. The barriers that accompany the 9-5 life - feeling replaceable, not getting paid according to quality of work, scheduled breaks, the hurdles to really create measurable impact - none of these boundaries are in line with how we Millennials hope to make our mark.

We want more for ourselves, expect more from ourselves, and are willing to put in the work to ensure more is the outcome. But the work we put in can not necesssarily be quantified by hours. We aim to be judged by the impact our output creates, not the time spent in an office or workstation. We want to enjoy our lives to the fullest right now, concurrent to our most social years. Freedom 55 has no appeal to our generation.

And while others may see this as us feeling entitled, I feel that we are, and to a large degree already have, changing the way people, employers, governments define "career." We are entitled to control our own futures, to feel certain that if we work effectively and efficiently that we will be rewarded with financial security.

So call us what you want, but by the time I am sixty something we Millennials will have changed the world more sharply then many generations before us. And we will have done so with a smile on our face every step of the way.

11 Simple Concepts to Become a Better Leader

Being likeable will help you in your job, business, relationships, and life. I interviewed dozens of successful business leaders in my last book, Likeable Business, to determine what made them so likeable and their companies so successful. All of the concepts are simple, and yet, perhaps in the name of revenues or the bottom line, we often lose sight of the simple things - things that not only make us human, but can actually help us become more successful. Below are the eleven most important principles to integrate to become a better leader:

1. Listening

"When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen." - Ernest Hemingway

Listening is the foundation of any good relationship. Great leaders listen to what their customers and prospects want and need, and they listen to the challenges those customers face. They listen to colleagues and are open to new ideas. They listen to shareholders, investors, and competitors. Here's why the best CEO's listen more.

2. Storytelling

"Storytelling is the most powerful way to put ideas into the world today." -Robert McAfee Brown

After listening, leaders need to tell great stories in order to sell their products, but more important, in order to sell their ideas. Storytelling is what captivates people and drives them to take action. Whether you're telling a story to one prospect over lunch, a boardroom full of people, or thousands of people through an online video - storytelling wins customers.

3. Authenticity

"I had no idea that being your authentic self could make me as rich as I've become. If I had, I'd have done it a lot earlier." -Oprah Winfrey

Great leaders are who they say they are, and they have integrity beyond compare. Vulnerability and humility are hallmarks of the authentic leader and create a positive, attractive energy. Customers, employees, and media all want to help an authentic person to succeed. There used to be a divide between one’s public self and private self, but the social internet has blurred that line. Tomorrow's leaders are transparent about who they are online, merging their personal and professional lives together.

4. Transparency

"As a small businessperson, you have no greater leverage than the truth." -John Whittier

There is nowhere to hide anymore, and businesspeople who attempt to keep secrets will eventually be exposed. Openness and honesty lead to happier staff and customers and colleagues. More important, transparency makes it a lot easier to sleep at night - unworried about what you said to whom, a happier leader is a more productive one.

5. Team Playing

"Individuals play the game, but teams beat the odds." -SEAL Team Saying

No matter how small your organization, you interact with others every day. Letting others shine, encouraging innovative ideas, practicing humility, and following other rules for working in teams will help you become a more likeable leader. You’ll need a culture of success within your organization, one that includes out-of-the-box thinking.

6. Responsiveness

"Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it." -Charles Swindoll

The best leaders are responsive to their customers, staff, investors, and prospects. Every stakeholder today is a potential viral sparkplug, for better or for worse, and the winning leader is one who recognizes this and insists upon a culture of responsiveness. Whether the communication is email, voice mail, a note or a tweet, responding shows you care and gives your customers and colleagues a say, allowing them to make a positive impact on the organization.

7. Adaptability

"When you're finished changing, you're finished." -Ben Franklin

There has never been a faster-changing marketplace than the one we live in today. Leaders must be flexible in managing changing opportunities and challenges and nimble enough to pivot at the right moment. Stubbornness is no longer desirable to most organizations. Instead, humility and the willingness to adapt mark a great leader.

8. Passion

"The only way to do great work is to love the work you do." -Steve Jobs

Those who love what they do don’t have to work a day in their lives. People who are able to bring passion to their business have a remarkable advantage, as that passion is contagious to customers and colleagues alike. Finding and increasing your passion will absolutely affect your bottom line.

9. Surprise and Delight

"A true leader always keeps an element of surprise up his sleeve, which others cannot grasp but which keeps his public excited and breathless." -Charles de Gaulle

Most people like surprises in their day-to-day lives. Likeable leaders underpromise and overdeliver, assuring that customers and staff are surprised in a positive way. There are a plethora of ways to surprise without spending extra money - a smile, We all like to be delighted — surprise and delight create incredible word-of-mouth marketing opportunities.

10. Simplicity

"Less isn't more; just enough is more." -Milton Glaser

The world is more complex than ever before, and yet what customers often respond to best is simplicity — in design, form, and function. Taking complex projects, challenges, and ideas and distilling them to their simplest components allows customers, staff, and other stakeholders to better understand and buy into your vision. We humans all crave simplicity, and so today's leader must be focused and deliver simplicity.

11. Gratefulness

"I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought, and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder." -Gilbert Chesterton

Likeable leaders are ever grateful for the people who contribute to their opportunities and success. Being appreciative and saying thank you to mentors, customers, colleagues, and other stakeholders keeps leaders humble, appreciated, and well received. It also makes you feel great! Donor's Choose studied the value of a hand-written thank-you note, and actually found donors were 38% more likely to give a 2nd time if they got a hand-written note!

The Golden Rule: Above all else, treat others as you’d like to be treated

By showing others the same courtesy you expect from them, you will gain more respect from coworkers, customers, and business partners. Holding others in high regard demonstrates your company’s likeability and motivates others to work with you. This seems so simple, as do so many of these principles — and yet many people, too concerned with making money or getting by, fail to truly adopt these key concepts.