A Billionaire’s Mind: Adventures with Ross Perot
By: Tim Moore
Tags: Abundance Mindset, Self Improvement, Visualization, Texas, Fulfillment

About 12 or 13 years ago, a friend of mine — Jim Champy, co-author of the legendary business book, Reengineering the Corporation — recommended me to work on a project with Ross Perot. Ross, as you may recall, ran for President of the US in 1992 and 1996 as a third party candidate.

So I called up my friend Stewart Emery — co-founder of est, Father of the Modern Human Potential Movement, and developer of the MasterCard Priceless ad campaign — and asked him to accompany me. I wanted Stewart’s immense talents as an interviewer at my side.

We flew to Dallas, drove to Ross’ company’s offices in Plano, got to the front desk, announced ourselves, and were escorted to Ross’ office.

The exterior office was about 50 X 30 feet in space. The walls were covered in Anglo-American art and artifacts, as were tables arrayed around the room. But on the far wall I noticed a glass case with temperature and humidity controls inside it. As I walked up to the case, I beheld a large book, opened to display two pages.

The pages were filled with old world calligraphy, with its bright colors and handwritten flourishes. I thought: what could this book be? It had to be at least 500–600 years old — or, maybe more.

As I was admiring this wonder, I heard a voice behind me say: ”Hi, I’m Ross Perot”. (Those of you who are old enough may hear that nasal, Texas, staccato cadence of Ross’ voice in your head.) Without introducing myself or saying hello — yes, I was that struck by the book — I said to Ross: “What is this?” “The Magna Carta”, he said, “there are only 4 of those in the world. But I sold it yesterday for $21,000,000.” “You sold it? Why’d you do that?”, I said rather incredulously. “I’m donating the money to my Education Foundation. It will be spent well here in Texas”, he replied.

Wow, quite an introduction.

Magna Carta

So I finally introduced myself and he brought Stewart and me into his office. Another room filled with Anglo-American art and artifacts. We sat down, and he asked me a question, to which I replied: “I don’t know the answer to that, but I can find out.” Well, he asked me 2 more questions, and to each I had to give the same answer. Needless to say, I was beginning to feel rather stupid. “Well, this will be a short gig”, I thought.

Finally , he asked a question for which I had an answer, and I proceeded to answer it.

Next, and this is the truth, he starts laughing and says “You did great. I asked you 3 questions I thought you would not have the answer for and you admitted you didn’t know the answer. Most people I do that to try to bluster and BS their way through with non-answers. I like that.”

That was the end of the interview, and then he proceeded to show us each item in the office, the outer office, and to conduct a tour of the entire building.

And then we went to the company cafeteria, each of us grabbing a platter and standing in line to make our selections.

After lunch in the cafeteria, we sat down to interview Ross in his conference room. We spent parts of 4 days doing that.

Along the way, we started asking questions about the early days of his entrepreneurial career. You see, in the early 60’s he was working for IBM, which at that time had nearly 100% of the mainframe computer market. He came up with the idea that IBM should go into what he called the software business and develop applications (as we called them years later) to sell to companies so they would not have to bear the expense of developing those applications themselves (which was hugely expensive, given how few engineers did that then.) The brass at IBM HQ dismissed him perfunctorily.

That pissed Ross off.

So he borrowed $1000 from his father-in-law, bought a map and marked where every IBM mainframe had been sold (177 locations at that point), got in his car, and began driving to each location across the US. As he was telling the story, he mentioned that he had gone to 110 locations to sell them on the idea, and got 110 Nos. I said to Ross: “Now, I know how the story ends, and I know that you are now worth $6 billion as a result, and I’m not. But, with all due respect, didn’t you kind of think at this point that maybe you were on the wrong track?”

He pounded the table, and said, “NO. I knew it was a good idea. I had thought deeply about it, and I knew I was right. I only needed one Yes and I would be off to the races.”

You guessed it. He got a yes on the 111th visit.

Later, when Stewart and I were driving back to the hotel, I said to Stewart, “You know, we learned something today. The great achievers think differently than everyone else. They develop an idea, test it in their mind, and when it is ripe — it is already reality. It just needs some work to be actualized.”

I’ve talked and/or spent time with a Prime Minister of the UK (Tony Blair), Rudy Guiliani (only months after 9/11), 4 billionaires (including the current President), Henry Kissinger, Ken Blanchard, and many other people of great achievement. They all think the same way: with an abundance mentality that helps them see the world differently and believe in that vision as actualized before it is.

Apple under Steve Jobs was right, although ungrammatical: Think Different. (And then work ferociously to get it accomplished.)

Ross and his Presidential campaign slide show (all the slides were exhibited in his company’s HQ)

Here is a young lady who has an abudance of an abundance mentality. She is a testament to what each of us can do if we believe.

Hollis Belger is a young lady who started a philanthropic enterprise called Juggling for Jude when she was 9 years old. She is now 16, and in the interim she has raised over $450,000 for St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital where children with cancer are treated free of charge. Her next goal is $1,000,000. She’ll get there. Believe.