Andrew Carnegie

I want to tell you a story about Andrew Carnegie and a young business consultant named Frederick Taylor.

Andrew Carnegie led the expansion of the American Steel Industry in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s and was one of the wealthiest Americans in history. Today when you think of wealth, you may think of Bezos, Gates, Zuckerberg etc. While they are a good benchmark, at the end of Andrew Carnegie’s life, his wealth (in today’s dollars) was estimated to be 372 billion which well exceeds that of today’s tech giants.

The story goes that in 1890, Carnegie met a young business consultant named Frederick Taylor at a cocktail party in Pittsburgh. Carnegie told the young man, if he could give him some good advice about how to manage more effectively, he would pay him $10,000. In today’s dollars that is $280,000. Frederick told him to make a daily list of the top ten most important things he needed to accomplish that day and put a number next to each item with the most important being #1, then #2 and so forth until there was a priority number next to each item. He told Carnegie to stay on #1 until the task was either completed or he had taken it as far that day as he could. Only then, move to #2 and so forth through the list. A week later Andrew Carnegie sent Frederick Taylor a check for $10,000 ($280,000 today) and told him it was the greatest business and management advice he has ever received. Andrew Carnegie went on to build one of the greatest fortunes in America history all because he made a daily priority list and then followed the list.

Now for true funny story. Last week, I was in Costco picking up some things and went to check out at the self-check area. You scan your member card and then scan each item and place them on this big tray until after you pay. I used my credit card and waited for the receipt to pop out and then proceeded pushing my cart to the door where the sweet lady checks your receipt. We exchange pleasantries and I hand her my receipt. She looks at my cart and then at the receipt and says, “where is your stuff?” Confused, I look down at the cart and realize it was empty and I had left all the stuff I just purchased on the big tray at the self-check-out. I laughed out loud and went back where my stuff was still sitting on the checkout tray and standing next to it, was a manager that had a confused look on his face.   

Closing – Start your workday off with a written plan (a numbered list,) because who knows, it may help you as it has helped me all these years. Best. KT

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