Learning from the Great

All credits goes to Michael S. Dell.

Michael S. Dell Keynote Address
Chairman and CEO • Dell Computer Corporation

Thank you President Faulkner.

I want to start by congratulating the Class of 2003 on your great success!

It’s an honor for me to be here. I know that many of you, both graduates and parents, have been waiting for this day for many years. I’m very proud to have my parents with me today, who have also been waiting for many years. Mom and Dad … I have some bad news for you. I may be on the stage, but I’m still not going home with a degree.

Though I left UT prior to the achievement that you’re all celebrating, this school has been a big part of my life in many ways: as a source of guidance and counsel for a young start-up company, as a constant resource of talent and support for a growing and established business, and as the foundation for a dream that this community has helped to build. I feel a tremendous connection with this university, and that’s why I’m so honored to be with you this evening.

I’d like to share my remarks tonight in memory of Dr. George Kozmetsky—a longtime friend of Dell, the University of Texas, and the Austin community. George was a visionary leader who recognized the potential in people and helped fuel their success with his wisdom and counsel. I was fortunate to be one of those people.

Over the years, I’ve had the opportunity to travel a less-traditional path. But I’ve managed to cover a fair amount of territory. There may be some lessons that I’ve learned that could help you in some small measure on your road ahead.

As you stand here tonight, you are at the starting point of a wonderful journey. But it’s a journey that can only begin with your decision to embark. We are a nation of accomplishment, and this ceremony is a great testament to that. But the unspoken requirement of a commencement is that you now must commence. There are countless contributions and achievements that never occurred, all due to a failure to begin.

Early in the history of Dell, we recognized that our path to greater success led us out of Austin, out of Texas, and even out of this country. So as a three-year-old company, with just 150 employees, we opened our first international operation in the UK … to great skepticism. The only true believers were the Dell team … and of course, our customers. Since then we’ve expanded to serve customers around the world. But it all started with that first decision to embark.

And now you’ve accomplished something great and honorable and important here at UT, and it’s time for you to move on to what’s next. But you must not let anything deter you from taking those first steps. You have an abundance of opportunities before you—but don’t spend so much time trying to choose the perfect opportunity, that you miss the right opportunity. Recognize that there will be failures, and acknowledge that there will be obstacles. But you will learn from your mistakes and the mistakes of others, for there is very little learning in success.

Fourteen years ago, Dell had the opportunity to learn two big lessons … the hard way. One lesson was from a failure to manage our inventory properly, and the other was from a failure to listen to our customers when it came to developing new products. But we followed the advice that Dr. Kozmetsky gave me, and we fixed our problems as fast as we found them. Today, we set the standard for managing inventory and listening and responding to customers, and we owe those strengths to a willingness to try, and to fail, and to learn.

With the understanding that you will face tough times and amazing experiences, you must also commit to the adventure. Just have faith in the skills and the knowledge you’ve been blessed with and go. Because regrets are born of paths never taken.

Then, as you start your journey, the first thing you should do is throw away that store-bought map and begin to draw your own. When Dell got started, it didn’t come with a manual on how to become number 1 in the world. We had to figure that out every step of the way. And with each new product and new market, the industry “experts” said we’d fail. Just a few short years ago, we announced plans to build powerful computers at the center of the Internet (“servers” for those of you from the engineering school.) Through the chorus of naysayers, we emerged as a world leader in servers, and we continue to gain momentum. And as always, we did it our way, with customers—not the experts—in mind.

You too have an advantage that you’re not encumbered by years of conventional thinking. You have a new and fresh perspective with which to view the world. Your time at this great university has helped sharpen your sense of discovery, and there is no better catalyst for success than curiosity.

It’s through curiosity and looking at opportunities in new ways that we’ve always mapped our path at Dell. Of course, we didn’t invent the concept of selling directly to customers, and we didn’t invent the personal computer … and we certainly didn’t invent the Internet. But there’s always an opportunity to make a difference. There is always the chance to refine something, to eliminate unnecessary steps, or to look at something in a new light. You can stand on the shoulders of the giants who came before and see a little further. And sometimes there’s an opportunity to achieve a major breakthrough with a completely new idea that re-defines the subject.

But whether it’s evolution or revolution, there’s always a better way to build a computer, or map a genome, or liberate a country, or take a basketball team to the Final Four. Just work to understand the world around you. Read books. Read websites. Read other people. Circle the pitfalls and highlight the opportunities. Then build a vision of how it could all be better and work like hell to make it happen.

We are fortunate to live in a country that accepts and even encourages experimentation and new ideas. America’s greatness is based on the fundamental belief that our greatest individual contributions are achieved along the course we chart for ourselves.

As you walk the path you’ve chosen, remember that the road ahead is paved with relationships. I’ve enjoyed some great fortune, but none of it would have happened without the people who shared their wisdom, the hard work of the Dell team worldwide, and the love and support of my family and friends. Remember … there’s no such thing as a self-made success.

As Dell has grown over the years, many critics have asked me when I would finally step aside and let others run things. But the truth is, other people have been helping run things at Dell for a long time. The greatest mistake you can make is thinking you can do it all by yourself.

My most important role at Dell is growing and developing a strong team … and I give all of myself in that effort. I learned very early to surround myself with talented people who challenge convention, offer new ideas, and relentlessly drive for improvement. And to let those people thrive.

Try never to be the smartest person in the room. And if you are, I suggest you invite smarter people … or find a different room. In professional circles it’s called networking. In organizations it’s called team building. And in life it’s called family, friends, and community. We are all gifts to each other, and my own growth as a leader has shown me again and again that the most rewarding experiences come from my relationships.

And even as you keep traveling the road ahead, you must always remember where you came from. Each of us carries the dust and dreams of the places that helped shape us, and all of us can count our blessings that our path has taken us through Texas.

There’s no other place that so purely preserved a centuries-old heritage of hard work, self reliance, and initiative like Texas. There’s no other place whose sons and daughters have so consistently set the standard—from government, business, and music, to sports, education, and technology—like Texas. And there’s no other place that can stir such jealousy in New Yorkers, such disdain in Californians, and such contempt in the French—yet hold their utmost respect—like the Lone Star State.

The spirit of Texas is the purest concentration of the American spirit. Texas is to this country, what America is to the world. And there is no greater embodiment of that spirit than The University of Texas at Austin. During your travels, remember where you came from, and do right by Texas.

Finally, many times along the way you’re going to ask why. Why am I on this path? What is it all about? You’ll ask yourself those questions in 10 years and in 20 years as often as you’re asking them now. Well … I have an answer for you. It’s all about winning. That’s right, winning.

But I’m not talking about the most points, or toys, or market share. (Though I certainly like market share.) I’m talking about winning in a contest with your own potential. I’m talking about believing in yourself enough to become the best accountant, engineer, or teacher you can possibly be. I’m talking about never measuring your success based on the success of others – because you just might set the bar too low.

I was fortunate to find my passion early in life. I started as a UT biology major and soon realized that all of those stacks of computer parts in my room were trying to tell me something. (And my roommate had a few things to say as well.) So 19 years ago, when I was 19 years old, I started Dell in that dorm room right over there. And despite juggling my classes and a computer company … I just knew there had to be something easier than organic chemistry!

But many people find their passion later in life, and others never find it at all. And for some, their greatest passion is the search itself. But whether you’ve found your calling, or if you’re still searching, passion should be the fire that drives your life’s work.

The key is to listen to your heart and let it carry you in the direction of your dreams. I’ve learned that it’s possible to set your sights high and achieve your dreams and do it with integrity, character, and love. And each day that you’re moving toward your dreams without compromising who you are, you’re winning. Look around you. At a school this size, with an international reputation for greatness, you might think of yourself as just a number. However, I recommend that you choose the number 1.

I’ve talked today about a journey, one that each of us travels. Often we travel together, as all of you have during your time at UT. But in the end, it’s your journey. Your path to travel and your responsibilities along the way. You are free to choose, and you are free to succeed. It just takes hard work and a dream. Most who finally leave this great university never imagine that they’re going to change the world. Yet every one of you will. How you change the world, is all up to you to decide.

I wish you all a great adventure on the road ahead.

Thank you.

Silent Reading time!

sixguys respects the words below.

All credits go to Adrian Tan.

Adrian Tan, author of The Teenage Textbook (1988) was the guest-of-honour at a recent NTU convocation ceremony. This was his speech to the graduating class of 2008.
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I must say thank you to the faculty and staff of the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information for inviting me to give your convocation address. It’s a wonderful honour and a privilege for me to speak here for ten minutes without fear of contradiction, defamation or retaliation. I say this as a Singaporean and more so as a husband.

My wife is a wonderful person and perfect in every way except one. She is the editor of a magazine. She corrects people for a living. She has honed her expert skills over a quarter of a century, mostly by practising at home during conversations between her and me.

On the other hand, I am a litigator. Essentially, I spend my day telling people how wrong they are. I make my living being disagreeable.

Nevertheless, there is perfect harmony in our matrimonial home. That is because when an editor and a litigator have an argument, the one who triumphs is always the wife.

And so I want to start by giving one piece of advice to the men: when you’ve already won her heart, you don’t need to win every argument.

Marriage is considered one milestone of life. Some of you may already be married. Some of you may never be married. Some of you will be married. Some of you will enjoy the experience so much, you will be married many, many times. Good for you.

The next big milestone in your life is today: your graduation. The end of education. You’re done learning.

You’ve probably been told the big lie that “Learning is a lifelong process” and that therefore you will continue studying and taking masters’ degrees and doctorates and professorships and so on. You know the sort of people who tell you that? Teachers. Don’t you think there is some measure of conflict of interest? They are in the business of learning, after all. Where would they be without you? They need you to be repeat customers.

The good news is that they’re wrong.

The bad news is that you don’t need further education because your entire life is over. It is gone. That may come as a shock to some of you. You’re in your teens or early twenties. People may tell you that you will live to be 70, 80, 90 years old. That is your life expectancy.

I love that term: life expectancy. We all understand the term to mean the average life span of a group of people. But I’m here to talk about a bigger idea, which is what you expect from your life.

You may be very happy to know that Singapore is currently ranked as the country with the third highest life expectancy. We are behind Andorra and Japan, and tied with San Marino. It seems quite clear why people in those countries, and ours, live so long. We share one thing in common: our football teams are all hopeless. There’s very little danger of any of our citizens having their pulses raised by watching us play in the World Cup. Spectators are more likely to be lulled into a gentle and restful nap.

Singaporeans have a life expectancy of 81.8 years. Singapore men live to an average of 79.21 years, while Singapore women live more than five years longer, probably to take into account the additional time they need to spend in the bathroom.

So here you are, in your twenties, thinking that you’ll have another 40 years to go. Four decades in which to live long and prosper.

Bad news. Read the papers. There are people dropping dead when they’re 50, 40, 30 years old. Or quite possibly just after finishing their convocation. They would be very disappointed that they didn’t meet their life expectancy.

I’m here to tell you this. Forget about your life expectancy. After all, it’s calculated based on an average.

And you never, ever want to expect being average.

Revisit those expectations. You might be looking forward to working, falling in love, marrying, raising a family. You are told that, as graduates, you should expect to find a job paying so much, where your hours are so much, where your responsibilities are so much.

That is what is expected of you. And if you live up to it, it will be an awful waste.

If you expect that, you will be limiting yourself. You will be living your life according to boundaries set by average people. I have nothing against average people. But no one should aspire to be them. And you don’t need years of education by the best minds in Singapore to prepare you to be average.

What you should prepare for is mess.

Life’s a mess.

You are not entitled to expect anything from it. Life is not fair. Everything does not balance out in the end. Life happens, and you have no control over it. Good and bad things happen to you day by day, hour by hour, moment by moment. Your degree is a poor armour against fate.

Don’t expect anything. Erase all life expectancies. Just live. Your life is over as of today. At this point in time, you have grown as tall as you will ever be, you are physically the fittest you will ever be in your entire life and you are probably looking the best that you will ever look. This is as good as it gets. It is all downhill from here. Or up. No one knows.

What does this mean for you? It is good that your life is over.

Since your life is over, you are free. Let me tell you the many wonderful things that you can do when you are free.

The most important is this: do not work.

Work is anything that you are compelled to do. By its very nature, it is undesirable.

Work kills. The Japanese have a term “Karoshi”, which means death from overwork. That’s the most dramatic form of how work can kill. But it can also kill you in more subtle ways. If you work, then day by day, bit by bit, your soul is chipped away, disintegrating until there’s nothing left. A rock has been ground into sand and dust.

There’s a common misconception that work is necessary. You will meet people working at miserable jobs. They tell you they are “making a living”. No, they’re not. They’re dying, frittering away their fast-extinguishing lives doing things which are, at best, meaningless and, at worst, harmful.

People will tell you that work ennobles you, that work lends you a certain dignity. Work makes you free. The slogan “Arbeit macht frei” was placed at the entrances to a number of Nazi concentration camps. Utter nonsense.

Do not waste the vast majority of your life doing something you hate so that you can spend the small remainder sliver of your life in modest comfort. You may never reach that end anyway. Resist the temptation to get a job.

Instead, play.

Find something you enjoy doing. Do it. Over and over again. You will become good at it for two reasons: you like it, and you do it often. Soon, that will have value in itself.

I like arguing, and I love language. So, I became a litigator. I enjoy it and I would do it for free. If I didn’t do that, I would’ve been in some other type of work that still involved writing fiction – probably a sports journalist.

So what should you do? You will find your own niche. I don’t imagine you will need to look very hard. By this time in your life, you will have a very good idea of what you will want to do. In fact, I’ll go further and say the ideal situation would be that you will not be able to stop yourself pursuing your passions. By this time you should know what your obsessions are. If you enjoy showing off your knowledge and feeling superior, you might become a teacher.

Find that pursuit that will energise you, consume you, become an obsession. Each day, you must rise with a restless enthusiasm. If you don’t, you are working.

Most of you will end up in activities which involve communication. To those of you I have a second message: be wary of the truth. I’m not asking you to speak it, or write it, for there are times when it is dangerous or impossible to do those things. The truth has a great capacity to offend and injure, and you will find that the closer you are to someone, the more care you must take to disguise or even conceal the truth. Often, there is great virtue in being evasive, or equivocating. There is also great skill. Any child can blurt out the truth, without thought to the consequences. It takes great maturity to appreciate the value of silence.

In order to be wary of the truth, you must first know it. That requires great frankness to yourself. Never fool the person in the mirror.

I have told you that your life is over, that you should not work, and that you should avoid telling the truth.

I now say this to you: be hated.

It’s not as easy as it sounds. Do you know anyone who hates you? Yet every great figure who has contributed to the human race has been hated, not just by one person, but often by a great many. That hatred is so strong it has caused those great figures to be shunned, abused, murdered and in one famous instance, nailed to a cross.

One does not have to be evil to be hated. In fact, it’s often the case that one is hated precisely because one is trying to do right by one’s own convictions. It is far too easy to be liked, one merely has to be accommodating and hold no strong convictions. Then one will gravitate towards the centre and settle into the average. That cannot be your role. There are a great many bad people in the world, and if you are not offending them, you must be bad yourself. Popularity is a sure sign that you are doing something wrong.

The other side of the coin is this: fall in love.

I didn’t say “be loved”. That requires too much compromise. If one changes one’s looks, personality and values, one can be loved by anyone.

Rather, I exhort you to love another human being. It may seem odd for me to tell you this. You may expect it to happen naturally, without deliberation. That is false. Modern society is anti-love. We’ve taken a microscope to everyone to bring out their flaws and shortcomings. It far easier to find a reason not to love someone, than otherwise. Rejection requires only one reason. Love requires complete acceptance. It is hard work – the only kind of work that I find palatable.

Loving someone has great benefits. There is admiration, learning, attraction and something which, for the want of a better word, we call happiness. In loving someone, we become inspired to better ourselves in every way. We learn the truth worthlessness of material things. We celebrate being human. Loving is good for the soul.

Loving someone is therefore very important, and it is also important to choose the right person. Despite popular culture, love doesn’t happen by chance, at first sight, across a crowded dance floor. It grows slowly, sinking roots first before branching and blossoming. It is not a silly weed, but a mighty tree that weathers every storm.
You will find, that when you have someone to love, that the face is less important than the brain, and the body is less important than the heart.

You will also find that it is no great tragedy if your love is not reciprocated. You are not doing it to be loved back. Its value is to inspire you.

Finally, you will find that there is no half-measure when it comes to loving someone. You either don’t, or you do with every cell in your body, completely and utterly, without reservation or apology. It consumes you, and you are reborn, all the better for it.

Don’t work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone.