Richard Branson; Translated by Park Seul-la; Readers Book; 399 pp., 16,500 won
Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Group, knows the power of branding. He created and nurtured the Virgin brand over the last four decades.
He says what wakes him up every morning is the idea that he will make changes.
That’s why he doesn’t want to operate a big company.
Virgin is a group of many small companies. For Branson, in business, fun should come ahead of everything else. He finds joy in creating small, innovative businesses. Pleasure is also closely associated with adventure.
Branson’s definition of success is to create something that he can take pride in. Profit is nothing more than something needed to invest in the next project and to repay shareholders. It’s not the ultimate end.
He says nobody is remembered only for the amount of money he or she earned.
What’s more important is what you have created and whether you have helped change other people’s lives. Complete with a sense of humor, he seeks to do things differently and creatively.
He knows that by taking himself and his business less seriously, others will take him more seriously. One can get a true sense of the Virgin Group and Branson through the book and it is also a breeze to read.
-CHO JAE-HYON