Bloomberg by Bloomberg

BLOOMBERG is a name that reverbrates around the world's economic circles. Mr Bloomberg has established an iron-clad reputation for himself. He now tells you his success story with candour and honesty. He has earned to right to tell it as it is.
IT has been some time since a book written by a self-made tycoon gripped a
reader's attention like a vice. Bloomberg by Bloomberg succeeds in doing
this, as admirably as he does many of his other projects.
Once in a while, someone comes along and sets your imagination ablaze
with his enthusiasm. Bloomberg is such a man. And his book reflects his
personality.
He is refreshingly honest. He likes it that way. That's the way he was
brought up. That's the way he tells his stories and life's philosophy, up
to the last page.
This streetwise broker earned his spurs in what used to be the smartest
and tightest outfit in Wall Street. For 15 years, he was one of the
hotshots at The Salomon Brothers. He traded in stocks and bonds and
outpaced most of his peers and many of his seniors.
But as life would have it, Bloomberg got the boot when Salomon Brothers
merged with Phibro Corporation in 1981. At the ripe old age of 39, he was
shown the door, much to his dismay. Looking back now he remembers "the
thrill of getting fired."
Since that fateful rendezvous with destiny, Bloomberg has thanked all
those involved for kicking him out into the real world. From the cushy,
posh interior of a Wall Street office to the dog-eat-dog world, he
gleefully enrolled himself in the School of Hard Knocks.
But Bloomberg had a bonus from Salomon Brothers. When they fired him,
they gave him a very useful farewell gift - US$10 million. Anybody would
have been glad to get out.
He speaks fondly of the three friends who pooled their talents and
resources with him to form Innovative Market Systems - Chuck Zegar, Tom
Secunda and Duncan MacMillan. Their first client was Merrill Lynch & Co.
and their first product was an on-line system that spews up-to-date market
information and analytical data. What was so wonderful then was that
Bloomberg sold Merrill Lynch a product which he did not have.
His enthusiasm was stronger than his sense of reality. Fortunately for
Bloomberg and friends, that do-or-die situation only served as fuel to
overcome what seemed impossible odds. The rest is history in the making.
As far as Bloomberg is concerned, the game is still on. With one exception
- he is now in the major league.
Today, Bloomberg's empire stretches from New York to Tokyo. His
organisation has more than 5,000 customers covering over 40 countries. His
multimedia corporations are Bloomberg News, Bloomberg Information
Television, Bloomberg Business News and Bloomberg News Radio. His name has
become synonymous with the products he sells.
Bloomberg Information TV is a 24-hour, seven-days-a-week multi-screen
format all-news programme anchored in New York, Sao Paulo, Tokyo and
London. Bloomberg News started on a handshake with Matt Winkler (who
contributed to the creation of this book), a reporter working for The Wall
Street Journal.
Bloomberg News' major coup was going into battle with the 114-year-old
Dow Jones and the 147-year-old Reuters in the financial news game. For an
up-and-coming company which had nothing to lose and was `stupid' enough
not to understand failure, Bloom-berg matched these two giants blow for
blow. In the end, he earned the money, and the respect of those who count
in the business.
Every student of entrepreneurship should read this book. It has all the
ingredients of a good Hollywood movie script. It is about an all-American
young man who showed traits of being a born leader at a very early age;
the schoolboy who had the honour of being one of the nation's youngest
Eagle Scouts; and the fresh graduate who wanted to fight in Vietnam but
was rejected because of flat feet.
Bloomberg rides the crest of his success with panache. His writing style
is almost flamboyant. He has lots of good stories in his personal library
of experiences and he tells them wonderfully well. There is no trace of a
condescending attitude. There is no arrogance.
He says of his staff: "We've got the best people in the world working
here. All of them think they walk on water. All of them are workaholics.
Once they come, they stay for the rest of their lives because they love
it. They've built the better mousetrap. They're doing something important.
Giving the little guy the information he needs to fight. Having fun.
Staying ahead." Bloomberg might well be describing himself.
Those can-do people who became millionaires very much the same way he
did have only nice words for the `emperor' of the Bloomberg empire.
Rupert Murdoch, the chairman of News Corporation, who also shook the
world in his own inimitable way, says: "Michael Bloomberg is the most
creative media entrepreneur of our time, and with Bill Gates, perhaps the
most successful."
The appealing qualities of Bloomberg's book lie in the man's honesty.
Call it "shooting it from the hip" or "straight from the shoulder".
Bloomberg treats his ups and downs with the same kind of candour and
courage he has had to muster when facing some of his biggest challenges.
Here's one man who can truly say: "I did it my way." A man who readily
admits to being "a David among the Goliaths of the industry", "a legend in
his own mind". You just cannot help but like the man and his book.