Warren Buffett Moment
One of my former Professor’s recanted a story about resiliency and not giving up, no matter what. She was working on research for her dissertation on the topic of Philanthropy and was looking for people who were knowledgeable on the subject and could provide some feedback. After reaching out to leaders of several local companies and receiving a subdued response rate, she felt like her requests for feedback were falling into the infamous black hole of no return and no feedback. But one day, while in the line for a coffee at Starbucks, and as her phone began to ring, she looked down at the unfamiliar telephone number, picked up and said hello. On the other end a voice said that Warren had received and read her letter, and replied that he didn’t consider himself a philanthropist, but he felt his one son was and could help her out, so his contact information was relayed to my former Professor. The Warren, whose Assistant called my former Professor that day while in the line at Starbucks was none other than Warren Buffett. At a later date she traveled to meet with Warren’s son for a day to complete her research. This story was inspiring to me because here is a man who is incredibly well known publicly and who is probably one of the busiest person on the planet who could’ve had his Assistant discard the request and go along with his and her day, but instead the letter made it all the way to his desk where he opened it, read it, and felt he owed my former Professor a response.
My Warren Buffett moments came soon after I published my first book, The House of You: 5 Workforce Preparation Tips for a Successful Career. Soon after publishing, I reached out to many college Dean’s, Chair’s, Professor’s and Athletic coaches with a personalized letter and copy of my book. After a couple of weeks had passed since sending the packages out, I started to get down on myself because I, too, was receiving the black hole treatment. While not expecting everyone to get back to me, I did expect at least an acknowledgement that my packages made it to the intended audience. At least that’s what I thought should happened, but what I thought should happen didn’t matter. So, on May 3, 2018, I opened my email and was absolutely floored because I had my first of my Warren Buffett moments. On that day I received an email from men’s head basketball coach at Duke University Mike Krzyzewski that read:
“Justin,
Thank you so much for your note and the copy of your book, The House of You. I truly appreciate you thinking of us. You are right about the main objective of a great university and that is to prepare our student athletes for the work force. Overall, we have done a very good job of doing that but you can always learn how to do it even better. I am sure that your book will help us and appreciate you sharing it with us.
Please take care and again, thank you for your thoughtfulness. I wish you the very best of luck with your book.
My Best Wishes Always,
In the days following this Warren Buffett moment, I also received hand-written notes from men’s head football coach at The University of Michigan Jim Harbaugh, Dabo Swinney from Clemson University and Lincoln Riley from The University of Oklahoma. To me, these are some of the top coaches AND most importantly, people in all of college sports. It meant a lot to me that they took the time out of their day just like Warren Buffett did for my former Professor to send personalized communications to me. What this showed me was that no amount of money or fame could take the genuine human being out of these coaches. This is a trait that I try to not only to speak about, but practice.
Have you had a Warren Buffett moment?
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