Two international success stories from strikingly different industries shared the stage and a few of their insights from the top as part of the Inspirational Leaders Series at the 2003 H. Naylor Fitzhugh Conference.
One of nine children born in Port Antonio, Jamaica, Michael Lee-Chin is chairman and CEO of AIC, a Canadian mutual fund company he acquired in 1987, that has since grown from $1 million to more than $14 billion in assets under his management.
Russell Simmons, from Queens, New York, is credited with transforming hip-hop into a global culture. As chairman and CEO of Rush Communications and co-founder and chairman of Def Jam Records, Simmons, who produced recording artists including the Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, and LL Cool J, presides over businesses in television, film, fashion, advertising, and publishing.
Lee-Chin offered a simple, three-step formula for success in any field:
- Find a role model.
- Kneel at the role model's feet and ask how they did it—get the recipe.
- Don't tweak the recipe! Don't be arrogant.
| Try to be present and focus on what's happening now and don't be afraid of failure. |
| —Russell Simmons, Rush Communications |
He made no secret of the fact that Warren Buffett was his chosen role model and the source for AIC's investment philosophy to buy and hold stock in a relatively small number of well understood businesses—five stocks, for example, account for approximately 60 percent of the value in the company's AIC Advantage I and II funds.
Investing successfully over a lifetime doesn't require a stratospheric IQ, Buffett told Lee-Chin; one needs only a sound intellectual framework for making the right decisions and the ability to keep one's emotions from interfering with those decisions. "This is simple, but not easy," Lee-Chin said.
Don't fear failure
Financial success, said Simmons, quickly loses its sheen—buying the third Rolls Royce doesn't mean much.
"Give what you want without being attached to the results," he told the audience. "Try to be present and focus on what's happening now and don't be afraid of failure."
| Our behavior today will be our history tomorrow —we have to make sure it is well written. |
| —Michael Lee-Chin, AIC |
The entrepreneurial spirit can't necessarily be learned at school, Simmons continued; it's a cultural phenomenon. In his experience with the record business, the ultimate test is not how many degrees an executive has but whether or not he or she can find and cultivate the talent that will produce a hit record.
When an audience member asked about some of the negative images and stereotypes associated with hip-hop and rap, Simmons suggested that the movement should be recognized for its place in a long continuum of African dance, music, and culture.
"I'm shocked by the difficulty some blacks from older generations have had connecting to young people's power," he added. Through the Rush Philanthropic Arts Foundation—a nonprofit he founded with his brothers in 1995 that brings arts education to inner-city youth—Simmons said he has seen evidence of the positive influence of hip-hop culture in students inspired to express themselves through rap. "I hear the struggle and the solutions through their poetry," he said.
Asked about a trying moment on the road to becoming one of three African-American billionaires in North America (the other two are Robert Johnson of Black Entertainment Television and Oprah Winfrey), Lee-Chin recalled September, 1999, when hundreds of AIC's clients defected to tech stocks and an editorial in the Toronto Globe and Mail foretold his firm's demise.
"The Chinese definition of crisis is opportunity," said Lee-Chin, born to a Chinese-Jamaican father and a Jamaican mother. Rather than follow the dot-com herd, he "busted open the piggy bank" and invested $100 million Canadian in MacKenzie Financial, one of AIC's core holdings. The purchase calmed skittish investors; eighteen months later, when Investors Group bought MacKenzie, he sold the shares for twice the purchase price.
"I always try to remember that the more successful one becomes, the more important it is to maintain the routines and character traits that contributed to that success," Lee-Chin said. "Our behavior today will be our history tomorrow—we have to make sure it is well written."