I saw a movie the other day – American Gangster.  It’s a story based upon the life of a man by the name of Frank Lucas. Under the most incongruous of conditions, Frank (more or less) entrepreneurs his way to the very top of his profession.
 
The profession? Well, it seems that Frank Lucas understood supply chain management, because in the 1960’s, he built an organization that brought illegal drugs non-stop from the poppy fields of Southeast Asia to New York City. Depending upon whose estimates one chooses to believe - this was a half-a-billion dollar a year operation.
 
Did I mention that Frank Lucas was illiterate? Did I also mention that he never attended even one day of school in his entire life?
 
One day, Frank is sitting in a restaurant when he spots a pretender to his throne, who also happens to owe him money, starting to get mouthy. Frank calmly leaves the restaurant and walks up to this man - asking right there that he pays the money that he was owed.
 
The gangster wanna-be told Frank, “no” and that Frank would just have to deal with that fact (“After all”, the man said, “What can you do about it … shoot me?”) Wherein, Mr. Lucas calmly pulled out his handgun and shot him dead.

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Perhaps the finest businessman that I have ever known in my life was an old partner of mine by the name of Mike Lopes.  Mike’s middle name could easily have been “Ziplip” because he almost never let you or anyone else know what he was thinking.  This is good not only from the standpoint of “curbing one’s tongue,” but he was just as penurious with the written word as well.  

I once asked Mike what the secret to his uncanny ability to “hold his water” might be.  Of course, he said nothing.
 
But I do know that his father was highly ranked in the Central Intelligence Agency with 99% of his motivation towards the end of his career being to outlive Fidel.  For a talent like Mike’s, I would have to spend 30 years in the CIA.  But somehow, I doubt that they would consider a hot headed, non-tongue-holding entrepreneur like myself.  

While on the subject of saying too much, one of my gripes these days is email.  I very seldom use it for a number of reasons.  First, because every word that one types in an email is permanently etched somewhere.  As my Grandfather used to say, “Don’t ever put in writing anything that you don’t expect to end up on the front page of the New York Times.”  I have learned to, and at a minimum, keep my emails as short as possible while practicing abstinence altogether in almost all cases.

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In situations like these, I always revert back to, “What would grandpa have done?”  Because he was just about the smartest and mentally-toughest person I have ever met - a product no doubt of having lost his father at the age of 14, when he was mistaken for a deer in the Banksville section of the city and shot.
 
Of course, I’m referring to the rather stunning election of Luke Ravenstahl.  I would almost have given you even odds on Mark DeSantis.  That’s how certain I was that not only would Mark pile up votes on his own, but on top of that I just couldn’t shake my belief that the people of this region both sensed and still DO sense the same impending disaster as me.
 
Jake Haulk (CEO of the Allegheny Institute for public policy) and I once had a conversation that compared southwestern PA to a forest that was now more than halfway “burned through” to the other side.  In our analogy, the city was the forest and the so-called “public officials” (custodians of the city, if you will) were now faced with a “let it burn / no, put it out!” decision.  Of course, being spectators, those in charge always had the “do nothing” option as well; which now seems to be the option they have chosen.
 
Have you ever noticed that in any game involving high-stakes, the guy with the largest pile of chips always seems to end up winning?  This is true because instead of having to start making wildly inaccurate plays (like drawing to an inside straight) the guy playing with house money can simply say, “pass” to such propositions.  In fact, he or she really, and most often, doesn't have to say or do anything.
 
OK, we all know that DeSantis did not win this mayoral (or, as it has been mispronounced so many times over the past 24 hours, “Mayorial”) election.  So let’s call this “Fact #1”.
 
But how about some that people aren't considering. 

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I’ve started ten businesses in my thirty-plus years as an entrepreneur and I like to say that my record is “7-2-1.” The “one” being a liquidation where nobody got hurt and nobody got rich.

In all, I have one huge “score”, a few “decent paydays”, and a spectacular bankruptcy (the best learning experience of them all, BTW) on my resume.

But you know … there is one thing about starting and growing businesses that as I grow older, seems to be immutably true: “the second ‘Hit Record’ is very, very difficult to produce!”

Oh, we all try. And sometimes (sadly), we end up “giving back” every single dime from both our “decent paydays” AND our “one huge score” along the way! More likely however, it seems that smart entrepreneurs will lose a significant part of their aforementioned “pile” of cash before they find some graceful way to slink out the back door.

But very few entrepreneurs ever make a second hit record that even approaches the magnitude of their first. As Yogi Berra once said, “It’s true --- you can look it up.”

Think about it --- Go back and read stories from nearly any business magazine in the eighties and you’ll read articles and see names of wonderful entrepreneurs who really slammed one out-of-the-park.

But today most of these same guys are virtual unknowns --- slaving away at some vacuous reprise that, and alas, will likely never take the substantive form of their forbearer company.

Why is this? Well, I personally think that while so much of “hitting a home run” is the idea and the skill and perseverance to capitalize on that one great idea, there is also more than just a small portion of luck involved as well.

“God smiles on start-ups”, a caller to my radio talk show once said. And this is also true. For some reason (and you guys who have “been there” know this better than anyone!) good things “just happen” in a start-up that is destined for the stars. For example, the “right” people show up to work for you precisely when you need them. Early customers prove to be the “right” customers --- they are not too demanding, they overlook your indiscretions, they pay their bills on time, they give great references, and so on.

And don’t forget markets --- sometimes your product or service is “just right” for a vortex market “wave” that is still a hundred yards offshore and just beginning to form its curl as it roars towards the beach. All of a sudden, you find yourself “in the pipeline”, getting the surf ride of your life; and if you’re honest with yourself, you don’t even know why!

Right now I can envision many of you veteran entrepreneurs nodding your heads and saying, “A-Yup. The guy’s right”

 Hey --- I ain’t no Miss Cleo, I’ve just lived a long time. I’ve just seen this stuff happen way too often.

So what’s a successful entrepreneur to do?  After all, it is very hard to climb down off of an F-18, “rejoin the working world”, and then just sit and read books, is it not?

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A few weeks ago, while in Europe, I had a free day and decided to spend it in Liverpool, England visiting a museum dedicated to The Beatles.

Now for those of you 40 years of age and younger, I might have to explain that Liverpool is the home of the venerable rock group “The Beatles.”  The Beatles were “war babies,” John Lennon was born in 1940 and George Harrison (the youngest Beatle) was born in 1943.  

These kids were from the hardscrabble parts of a very hardscrabble town. Liverpool is a blue collar city that fancies its soccer (make that football) team far more than any of cultural icon, of which there are quite a few.  Liverpulians are descended from dockworkers who tend to the nature harbor that includes the Mersey River.  Like I said, blue collar all the way.  

The Beatles were in their teens when they began to gain notice around Liverpool and found their way to a club called the “Cavern.” The Cavern was pretty much what it sounds like ... a basic World War II bomb shelter turned into a nightclub.  I’m claustrophobic, so it was very difficult for me to stay in the Cavern once my mind began to remind me of exactly where I was.  Picture walking down the narrowest alley you have ever been in, turning left into a flight of very close stairs, and then descending even further into a sweltering pit that was so closely crowded with people that the walls themselves perspired!

For 294 consecutive nights, The Beatles turned up to play at the Cavern.  Along with them were the hard core fans; these were the people that would arrive early and sit and wait in the alleyway until the club would open.  In time, club management (sensing a good thing) even added a lunchtime show.  

Two-hundred ninety-four nights.  Think of it.  No matter how much you love what you do, this has got to become aggravating at some point.  

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