Speaker 1: You're listening to Math and Magic, a production of iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 2: What drove me was not like, oh, I need to
Speaker 2: make a whole lot of dope, and that was never
Speaker 2: motivating for me, and I did well in working for
Speaker 2: other people. But here's the truth. How hard can it
Speaker 2: be when someone hands you a business card that says
Speaker 2: president of twentieth century Fox doing something totally from scratch,
Speaker 2: Like totally from scratch. That's challenging and that'll be a
Speaker 2: real test.
Speaker 1: Hi.
Speaker 3: I'm Bob Pittman, and welcome to Math and Magic. Today.
Speaker 3: We have someone who has built a career and a
Speaker 3: life by excelling at both. He manages to find the
Speaker 3: next creative spark and nurtured well and at the same
Speaker 3: time put a strong business foundation under it, whether it
Speaker 3: be large or small businesses, or cutting edge or traditional.
Speaker 3: He wears a number of hats, but his two main
Speaker 3: ones are as chairman and CEO of Take two Interactive Software,
Speaker 3: the publisher of Grand Theft Auto, and as an astute
Speaker 3: and successful inventster best known for Zelnik Media Capital, his
Speaker 3: private equity firm focused on media and technology investments, and
Speaker 3: he is a longtime friend. He's Straus Selnik. Strauss had
Speaker 3: business success at an early age and has an incredible resume.
Speaker 3: Let me give you a few examples. In the eighties,
Speaker 3: he was president and Chief Operating officer of twentieth Century Fox,
Speaker 3: and had been president and COO of Vestron Video back
Speaker 3: when Vestron was the dominant player in the home video business.
Speaker 3: In the early nineties, he was the president and CEO
Speaker 3: of Crystal Dynamics, a super hot interactive entertainment software company startup,
Speaker 3: and in the late nineties he was President and CEO
Speaker 3: of BMG Entertainment, at that time one of the world's
Speaker 3: largest music and entertainment companies with more than two hundred
Speaker 3: record labels and operations in fifty four countries. He also
Speaker 3: has an impressive academic resume. He has an MBA from
Speaker 3: the Harvard Business School and a jd from the Harvard
Speaker 3: Law School. He's known for his incredible commitment to physical
Speaker 3: fitness and his commitment to the life he really wanted
Speaker 3: to lead. I've been close to him for about forty
Speaker 3: years and looking forward to digging in with him today. Strauss, welcome,
Speaker 3: Thanks for having Dog.
Speaker 2: Great to be here.
Speaker 3: Before we jump in, I want to do you in
Speaker 3: sixty seconds if you prefer cats or dogs, dogs early
Speaker 3: riser or night out early Rassler West Coast or East Coast,
Speaker 3: East Coast, New York or Boston, New York. Soccer or basketball, basketball,
Speaker 3: sleep or workout, workout, coke or pepsi coke, beach or mountains, beach,
Speaker 3: rock and roller, country country, coffee or tea coffee, walking
Speaker 3: or running, walking, books or movies, books, cook or read out, cook,
Speaker 3: Godfather or Star Wars, Star Wars, comedy or drama, comedy,
Speaker 3: Hamburger or Tofu rap Hamburger caller text text about to
Speaker 3: get harder. All time favorite music artist.
Speaker 2: James Taylor, first job, Columbia Pictures, Television favorite TV show.
Speaker 2: But that's really tough, friends, smartest person you know David Remnick,
Speaker 2: childhood hero, John F. Kennedy, secret talent, personal trainer.
Speaker 3: What did you want to be when you were growing up?
Speaker 2: Head of the film studio?
Speaker 3: Okay, let's jump in. One of your hallmarks is how
Speaker 3: well you manage creative people and creative hits driven businesses
Speaker 3: yet still make them successful businesses. How do you strike
Speaker 3: that balance and how do you build and manage your teams?
Speaker 2: You know, I try to build businesses that take enormous
Speaker 2: creative risks and no financial risks. I try to be
Speaker 2: creatively risk forward and financially risk averse. So my companies
Speaker 2: are all underleveraged. If they're leveraged at all, and they
Speaker 2: are I hope, rationally run and cash flow generating businesses.
Speaker 2: And it's amazing how many people in the entertainment business
Speaker 2: don't bother to think about that part. That's important because
Speaker 2: if you have a strong P and L and a
Speaker 2: strong balance sheet, creative teams understand that even if they
Speaker 2: make a mistake, the company can live to play another day,
Speaker 2: and the company can afford to make creative mistakes. And
Speaker 2: if you're unable to take meaningful creative risk and therefore
Speaker 2: run the risk of making horrible creative mistakes, then you
Speaker 2: can't play in this business. I try really hard to recruit, retain,
Speaker 2: and motivate the best talent in the business. I'm proud
Speaker 2: of the fact that I've run every kind of entertainment
Speaker 2: business there is, and my teams have had the highest
Speaker 2: hit ratios of any teams operating the business at that time.
Speaker 2: And that's without exception, and put that in context. I'm
Speaker 2: not the one sitting in the corner office calling someone
Speaker 2: up and giving them notes. I'm not reading scripts, I'm
Speaker 2: not making video games, I'm not producing music, I'm not
Speaker 2: directing TV shows, and I've never done any of that,
Speaker 2: So what's the trick. The trick, in my opinion, is
Speaker 2: truly being able to distinguish talent from almost talent, or
Speaker 2: near talent or not talent, and then creating a structure
Speaker 2: that not only allows talented people to pursue their passions,
Speaker 2: but insists that they do so. I'm not sure this
Speaker 2: is much of a skill, but the skill that I
Speaker 2: have is that I seem to be able to identify
Speaker 2: talent in others, and then I seem to be able
Speaker 2: to encourage those talented people to work within the system
Speaker 2: that I'm managing and to do their best work. And
Speaker 2: I'm very proud of the fact that in my entire career,
Speaker 2: I've never lost any talent that I didn't want to lose,
Speaker 2: not once actually, and to this day, I think even
Speaker 2: my competitors would have to acknowledge that Take two in
Speaker 2: its affiliates have the best collection of creative talent in
Speaker 2: the interactive entertainment business. I mean by a wide margin,
Speaker 2: and our results reflect that our hit ratio reflects that.
Speaker 3: So I'm going to dig into this little bit. I've
Speaker 3: watched you do this for decades. You've taken an interest
Speaker 3: in developing people, not people who already had skills, not
Speaker 3: people that everybody's bidding on because they're the person, but
Speaker 3: you really had an interest in developing the next generation
Speaker 3: of leaders. How do you think about that and how
Speaker 3: do you do it? And is it driven by just
Speaker 3: good business giving back or something else.
Speaker 2: There's an element of giving back because people bet on
Speaker 2: me when I was young and inexperienced, and I like
Speaker 2: to think that that paid off over and over again.
Speaker 2: It's true that some of the very talented people who
Speaker 2: run businesses for me today are people who I recruited
Speaker 2: when they were unknown and inexperienced and in their twenties.
Speaker 2: Carl Slatoff, was the president of Take two, has worked
Speaker 2: with me in one enterprise or another since you graduated
Speaker 2: from business school twenty seven or twenty eight years ago.
Speaker 2: Andrew Vogel and Jordan Turkoitz were co CIOs of ZMC,
Speaker 2: started with me when they were associates, very very early
Speaker 2: in their careers, and now they're very senior at ZMC.
Speaker 2: And it's a very long list actually across all of
Speaker 2: my enterprises, and I have a whole alumni base as well.
Speaker 2: I like to think, of course, there's an element of
Speaker 2: being of service to others. I spend twenty to twenty
Speaker 2: five percent of my time coaching and mentoring people, try
Speaker 2: to help people, and most of those people are not
Speaker 2: in any economic system of mind now and then they
Speaker 2: are though, So it seems to me that the hardest
Speaker 2: thing to do is convince established talent to leave where
Speaker 2: they're happily employed and come to your system. And it's
Speaker 2: a lot easier to develop your own if you have
Speaker 2: a facility for identifying and developing talent to people, whether
Speaker 2: they're on the creative or executive side. And as I said,
Speaker 2: I think it's probably my only true skill in business.
Speaker 2: Well maybe I'm a reasonably good capital alligator, but yes
Speaker 2: you are. But really, I mean, because I work in
Speaker 2: creative businesses, knowing the difference between good and great, that's
Speaker 2: the whole shooting match, and then being willing to you know,
Speaker 2: to work with them. So I don't think this is
Speaker 2: talking out of school. When I got to Fox, Jim
Speaker 2: Cameron was finishing up the ABYSS and he had a
Speaker 2: reputation for being a challenging person to work with. And
Speaker 2: I worked closely with Jim Cameron, which is to say,
Speaker 2: whatever he wanted to do, I basically said yes to
Speaker 2: because it was obvious to me that he was a
Speaker 2: creative genius. It was, by the way, equally obvious that
Speaker 2: I could say no or yes and he was still
Speaker 2: going to do what he wanted. We could do this
Speaker 2: easy way of the hard way, like why not do
Speaker 2: it the easy way? So what I basically did was
Speaker 2: to the extent he ever was interested in it, I
Speaker 2: tried to hold his hand and support him, very very
Speaker 2: very Occasionally he would be interested in my opinion or
Speaker 2: ask for advice and I would offer it, and you know,
Speaker 2: I was there to support and encourage him. And as
Speaker 2: a result, he made more pictures for Fox, including after
Speaker 2: I left. He had great success because I was right,
Speaker 2: he was immensely talented, and I wasn't going to add
Speaker 2: anything all to the creative quality of what he was doing.
Speaker 2: So my choice was to say, let's make this experience
Speaker 2: great for all involved, and like, let's get that hit
Speaker 2: to market.
Speaker 3: Let's talk about the people you help too. You've helped
Speaker 3: people some on their way up, some already there. But
Speaker 3: what do you learn from them?
Speaker 2: I think you can learn from everyone, you know. I
Speaker 2: have numerous friends who are decades younger, and by the way,
Speaker 2: numerous fends who are decades older, and I can learn
Speaker 2: and do learn from all of them. I find that today.
Speaker 2: One of the reasons that I can continue to be
Speaker 2: relevant and capable is that I spend a lot of
Speaker 2: time with young people, so I don't have to play
Speaker 2: catch up to figure out what TikTok is. I was
Speaker 2: involved with Discord like days after it launched because I
Speaker 2: have my ear of the ground with people who are
Speaker 2: decades younger. That's very much informed what I do, particularly
Speaker 2: in businesses like interactive entertainment, a big segment of which
Speaker 2: is youth oriented.
Speaker 3: We're talking about people here. Let's take a one more
Speaker 3: step talk a little about the power of teams and collaboration.
Speaker 2: I have mixed feelings about that. You know, it's funny.
Speaker 2: I worked for Joe Roth at Fox, who was chairman
Speaker 2: of the studio when I was president, and he said,
Speaker 2: you know, creativity is ultimately a singular exercise. I agree
Speaker 2: with that. I defy you to show me a big
Speaker 2: hit that truly was created by a massive team. Generally
Speaker 2: there was one powerful creative voice driving that. On the
Speaker 2: other hand, particularly in businesses like interactive entertainment, you can't
Speaker 2: execute anything without a big team, at least not currently.
Speaker 2: So the true creative genius is in our business as
Speaker 2: someone who can add value as an individual contributor creatively
Speaker 2: and motivate a massive team to create value and then
Speaker 2: ultimately pull the property together with some element of singular
Speaker 2: focus to deliver a hit. I mean, I think that's
Speaker 2: what a great director does. I think the showrunners play
Speaker 2: that role in television, and producers play that role and
Speaker 2: record of music and that's why you can listen into
Speaker 2: music and certain producers had very specific sounds associated with
Speaker 2: their approach. So I think it's both. To answer your question,
Speaker 2: there's an element of singular creative leadership and engagement, and
Speaker 2: then there is an element of encouraging and leading and
Speaker 2: managing and motivating a big team to usher that vision
Speaker 2: into reality.
Speaker 3: You had a great career we touched on a little
Speaker 3: bit at a very young age, huge jobs in your twenties.
Speaker 3: Did that early head start shape you and make you
Speaker 3: different from the leaders who are probably in their forties
Speaker 3: before they reach those levels.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, there's nothing more pathetic than dining out
Speaker 2: on your early success in life. I think maybe what
Speaker 2: shape me is that I didn't get diverted later on
Speaker 2: by stuff that maybe diverts people. So, you know, I
Speaker 2: met all the stars, and I had a parking space
Speaker 2: with my name on it very early in my career. Thankfully,
Speaker 2: I'm not a person if it motivated by stuff like that,
Speaker 2: So the thrill wore off really quickly, and I think
Speaker 2: that allowed me to work and create a fields because
Speaker 2: I'm not looking for an invitation to your cocktail party,
Speaker 2: and I'm not starstruck, and ultimately, I don't confuse myself
Speaker 2: with talent, and I'm not there for social purposes. I'm
Speaker 2: there because I'm passionate about making extraordinary entertainment and because
Speaker 2: I like running really good businesses. So I think maybe
Speaker 2: doing well early allowed me to not get diverted by
Speaker 2: stuff that does. Sometimes people who have access to these
Speaker 2: fields later on where they're like, wow, this is amazing,
Speaker 2: Like I can meet so and so and they can
Speaker 2: come to my house and like next thing, you know,
Speaker 2: they're making horrible business decisions as a result.
Speaker 3: Yes, we've seen a lot of those.
Speaker 2: Well I'll give you an example actually, because it's a
Speaker 2: fun one, go for it. So as a twentieth century Fox,
Speaker 2: and we were signing a deal to make a movie
Speaker 2: with Warren Batty. So we're signing up this deal and
Speaker 2: it had been long negotiated, was very tough. His order
Speaker 2: was bird Fields. He didn't have an agent, and he
Speaker 2: was intimately engaged with his own business affairs, and there
Speaker 2: were some contentious elements of the deal. But finally had
Speaker 2: gotten done and it was ready to be signed, and
Speaker 2: I get a call from someone on his team saying
Speaker 2: we're going to have a closing and we want you
Speaker 2: to be there to sign the documents. And I was like,
Speaker 2: I don't really do that, like like you just signed
Speaker 2: the document, like you know, we're closing. So it wasn't
Speaker 2: like we're buying a house. But okay, so there he said, Nope, nope,
Speaker 2: mister Baty wants to have a closing and it's very
Speaker 2: important that you'd be there to sign the documents. He
Speaker 2: will be there to sign the documents. So I'm like
Speaker 2: picking up the pen, ready to sign, like completely not
Speaker 2: understanding why we're there. Very happy to meet him. By
Speaker 2: the way, and he says, wait, wait, you know before
Speaker 2: we sign, there are a couple things in the contract
Speaker 2: that really, like, you know, just like mean a lot
Speaker 2: to me if we could change. And he had fully
Speaker 2: contemplated that the three or four sticking points it ultimately
Speaker 2: had been resolved that he really wanted in a different direction.
Speaker 2: He figured if he could get into a room with anyone,
Speaker 2: they'd be so starstruck that they would just sign the documents.
Speaker 2: And I said to him, Oh, sorry, I thought we're
Speaker 2: here to have like a ceremonial closing, like I'm not
Speaker 2: here to renegotiate the deal with you, mister Batty, And
Speaker 2: I left the room. That was the end of it.
Speaker 3: Did you ever change the points?
Speaker 2: No? Then when you realized the gamp it didn't work,
Speaker 2: they sent over the signed documents.
Speaker 3: We did not have a certain very funny so New York.
Speaker 3: Do you think you would have had the same level
Speaker 3: of success if you had not been in and around
Speaker 3: New York? Just New York give you an edge in
Speaker 3: any way?
Speaker 2: You know. I did work in California for five years
Speaker 2: so and they were the right locations for those jobs.
Speaker 2: But when I had the opportionity to turn around and
Speaker 2: build up a record company I was located in New York.
Speaker 2: I was actually happy to come back, because the truth is,
Speaker 2: I was always more of a New York type person,
Speaker 2: East Coast person in California when I was in the
Speaker 2: movie business in the eighties and nineties and the Tellivision business,
Speaker 2: the home entertainment business. Speaking grammatically wasn't necessarily like a benefit.
Speaker 2: You may recall, and my multiple degrees from elite Eastern schools,
Speaker 2: that was not a benefit that was detriment. There was
Speaker 2: there no doubt that New York was maybe a little
Speaker 2: more congenial. But it's a great question because as you know,
Speaker 2: I started ZMC and that led to Take two. And
Speaker 2: I do think that only could have worked in New
Speaker 2: York because we had access to capital and access to
Speaker 2: counterparties and access to deals that I don't think would
Speaker 2: have come our way outside of New York.
Speaker 3: Your book, Becoming Ageless The Four Secrets to Looking and
Speaker 3: Feeling Younger than Ever, was put out in twenty eighteen.
Speaker 3: Your four secrets are forever fuel eating for you, unlocking
Speaker 3: inner strength, fitness three, bulletproofing the body, health and prevention,
Speaker 3: and finding your soul connection. Community purpose? What motivated you
Speaker 3: to write the book and seven years later, would you
Speaker 3: amend any of the secrets?
Speaker 2: What motivated me was people ask me all the time
Speaker 2: how I managed to stay in reasonably good shape while
Speaker 2: having an active professional life and an active personal life.
Speaker 2: David Dizenko, who was at the time the editor in
Speaker 2: chief of Men's Health, encouraged me to write the book
Speaker 2: and published it through his label through Simon and Schuster. Ultimately,
Speaker 2: I actually did it from a point of view being
Speaker 2: of service to others. There are a number of things
Speaker 2: I would amend. Probably the area that has evolved most
Speaker 2: would be diet. So there's a whole bunch of diet
Speaker 2: recommendations in the book, and they sort of err on
Speaker 2: the side of ultra low carb and I'm no longer
Speaker 2: of the view that that's a really good idea.
Speaker 3: I like this. You're saying we can eat a lot
Speaker 3: of carbs. Now this is the best news I have heard.
Speaker 3: I'm saying you can eat a balanced diet that includes carbs,
Speaker 3: and that I was low CARBD for a while. I
Speaker 3: wouldn't publish something that wasn't accurate, and what I found
Speaker 3: was that it really didn't allow me to be my
Speaker 3: best self in any way, but certainly not physically. Actually
Speaker 3: went on a cycling trip when I was in sort
Speaker 3: of really low carb diet. I kept cramping up because
Speaker 3: you can't really retain enough water to avoid cramping if
Speaker 3: you're ultra low carb. I defy you to find a
Speaker 3: runner a marathon or who's truly low carb, it's virtually
Speaker 3: impossible to do. In the late nineteen nineties, we were
Speaker 3: in Jamaica together and we worked out, and I remember
Speaker 3: at that workout saying, oh, this guy's pretty serious about
Speaker 3: his workout, but you looked nothing like you do today
Speaker 3: in terms of what you've done. So what was it
Speaker 3: that sort of brought this about? What sort of coalesced
Speaker 3: around the idea of I'm going to be in shape
Speaker 3: and I'm going to wake This very important in my life.
Speaker 2: If someone's avidly going to the gym and I acknowledge
Speaker 2: some element of vanity, then they're just not being candid.
Speaker 2: So there is an element of wanting to look my best.
Speaker 2: My view actually is it looking your best is a
Speaker 2: sign of respect for yourself, and part of that is
Speaker 2: being in reasonably good shape. In my case, working out
Speaker 2: speaks to me in so many ways. First, because I
Speaker 2: actually enjoy the process itself, and secondly because I like
Speaker 2: the result, and then third and now these days, probably
Speaker 2: most importantly, I work out with a huge fitness community
Speaker 2: and these people who become my tribe.
Speaker 3: And so do you work out every day or do
Speaker 3: you take some days off?
Speaker 2: Well, here's what one should do. If you work out avidly,
Speaker 2: you probably ought to take one or two rest days
Speaker 2: a week. And rest day does not mean like workout,
Speaker 2: just less. Seriously, rest day means actually rest. In my case,
Speaker 2: I take a rest day somewhere between you know, zero
Speaker 2: and one day a week, but certainly within a two
Speaker 2: week span, I will take at least one rest day.
Speaker 2: And I do have days where the workouts are pretty light,
Speaker 2: but I sometimes work out twice a day, So in
Speaker 2: any given week, I typically work out between eight and
Speaker 2: ten times.
Speaker 3: What kind of parallel do you see between your success
Speaker 3: and business and exercise? How are the two related?
Speaker 2: I think they're related in that I'm willing to defer
Speaker 2: gratification and I can find pleasure in doing hard things.
Speaker 3: Tell us one more piece. Tell us about your daily
Speaker 3: practice of silent prayer and what that does for you
Speaker 3: and those around you.
Speaker 2: You know, I've engaged in a prayer practice for fourteen years,
Speaker 2: and to be clear, it's not a particularly religious practice.
Speaker 2: Although it is prayer, it's non denominational, and my prayer
Speaker 2: practice takes three or four minutes. It doesn't depend on
Speaker 2: a belief that there's anyone on the other end listening
Speaker 2: to it, although there are days when I feel that
Speaker 2: that might be the case, or also plenty of days
Speaker 2: when I don't. The first part is to express gratitude
Speaker 2: for all of the blessings of my life, both people
Speaker 2: and things. The second is to ask for blessings for
Speaker 2: people I care about and, with a little more difficulty,
Speaker 2: people I resent. Luckily, that's a very short list. Usually
Speaker 2: there's no one on that list, but if there is
Speaker 2: someone on the list, I do pray for that person
Speaker 2: for good things to happen in that person. And then, finally,
Speaker 2: the third part is to set an intention for the day,
Speaker 2: which involves not trying to barrel through life, but rather
Speaker 2: trying to go through life with a bit of grace
Speaker 2: and trying to listen and find beauty in the day.
Speaker 2: That's where my practice looks like many people. I think
Speaker 2: they'll relate to the notion that when I wake up
Speaker 2: first thing in the morning, my head can be full
Speaker 2: of random thoughts or anxiety provoking thoughts, and I find
Speaker 2: that the prayer practice will come and center me and
Speaker 2: set me up for a better day.
Speaker 3: So you talked about your community when you work out,
Speaker 3: Let's talk about friends. How many do you need and
Speaker 3: how important is that to life? This is such a
Speaker 3: personal decision. In my case, it all depends on how
Speaker 3: you define a friend. In terms of truly intimate friends,
Speaker 3: I actually have a lot, but that numbers I don't
Speaker 3: know ten people, twenty people. In terms of people that
Speaker 3: I would say I really care about and know about.
Speaker 2: And connect with. In my case, that's a couple hundred people.
Speaker 2: Bob as examples our friendship, like, we don't see each
Speaker 2: other all that often. We probably get together a few
Speaker 2: times a year, But every time we get together we
Speaker 2: talk about real stuff, not superficial stuff. We actually know
Speaker 2: one another's story, we have a long history. We connect,
Speaker 2: and we leave one another's presence feeling energized and happy
Speaker 2: that we saw one another. We just to say, even
Speaker 2: though we don't see each other all that frequently, I
Speaker 2: consider it a relatively intimate friendship, and I'm blessed that
Speaker 2: I have a relationship like that with many people.
Speaker 3: Yes, I just saw I was scrolling on Instagram and
Speaker 3: saw somebody say, why is it that the people we
Speaker 3: are really intimate with really get us and we really
Speaker 3: care about live a bazillion miles away. You said, we
Speaker 3: see each other a couple of times a year. But
Speaker 3: to me, the mark of the friend is that when
Speaker 3: I see you, it's like we just saw each other yesterday,
Speaker 3: that we just pack up and keep going.
Speaker 2: And then we talk about actually real stuff. I have
Speaker 2: a friend I don't see that often, and when we
Speaker 2: sit down, he'll say, Okay, tell me the bad stuff.
Speaker 2: I know there's a bunch of good stuff, tell me
Speaker 2: the bad stuff, or which is his way of saying,
Speaker 2: I want to connect with you on what really matters.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's great. So you've talked about waking up in
Speaker 3: the morning, all those ideas anxiety in your head. Tell
Speaker 3: me about sleep? Is it important? How much do we need?
Speaker 2: Sleep is really important? And unless you're an actual short sleeper,
Speaker 2: and those people do exist, you probably need seven plus
Speaker 2: hours a night to be refreshed and to be at
Speaker 2: your best. Candidly, I probably get somewhere between six and
Speaker 2: seven and a half hours. No matter how much I try,
Speaker 2: I can't generally fine time for more and still do
Speaker 2: everything else I care about. But if I get much less,
Speaker 2: I really have a rotten day. Short sleepers are people
Speaker 2: who really can be active and refreshed and healthy on
Speaker 2: three and a half four hours of sleep. I'm pretty
Speaker 2: sure carl Icon is a short sleeper. For example. Being
Speaker 2: a short sleeper is very different than someone who just
Speaker 2: is sleep deprived all the time. And that's not a
Speaker 2: good thing, and it takes a terrible toll on your
Speaker 2: physical and mental health.
Speaker 3: You said you get that much sleep. How much time
Speaker 3: in bed are you to get that amount of sleep?
Speaker 2: My wife can confirm my head hits the pillow and
Speaker 2: about fifteen seconds later I'm asleep.
Speaker 3: God, I'm jealous. I could just do a one hour
Speaker 3: tossing and turning in the night. I consider that a
Speaker 3: big win. Let's jump to philanthropy. You are very generous,
Speaker 3: you and your wife. How do you think about philanthropy
Speaker 3: in your life and business and personal and how do
Speaker 3: you decide where are you're going with it? Who gets
Speaker 3: to be the BENEFICIARYA what's kind of you to ask
Speaker 3: very broadly I try and really emphasize try to be
Speaker 3: of service in my life. We have a family foundation
Speaker 3: and our sons are on the board, and we have
Speaker 3: three or four areas of interest, and we try to
Speaker 3: focus most of our giving on those areas of interest.
Speaker 3: I have a friend who's very wealthy and a philanthropist,
Speaker 3: and her view is, look, you know, I like to
Speaker 3: be supportive of my friend's interests.
Speaker 2: So we give about twenty five percent of money we
Speaker 2: give away every year to our friend's interests, and we
Speaker 2: kind of never say no. And seventy five percent, though,
Speaker 2: we try to direct to the areas of interest of
Speaker 2: our interests so that we can make a real impact.
Speaker 2: But the bulk of what we give away we try
Speaker 2: to focus on areas of interest, which is our local
Speaker 2: community in Bedford, which is where we spend a lot
Speaker 2: of time, and special needs education and support because our
Speaker 2: daughter has special needs, and then a couple other areas
Speaker 2: of interest.
Speaker 3: More of math and magic right after this quick break,
Speaker 3: Welcome back to math and magic. Let's hear more from
Speaker 3: my conversation with Strausselnik. Well, let's go back in time
Speaker 3: to put you in context. Tell us about where you
Speaker 3: grew up and paint a picture of that time and
Speaker 3: pick out those few childhood events that you think looking back,
Speaker 3: shaped you the most.
Speaker 2: So I grew up in a striving, middle class family
Speaker 2: in Boston. My father was a lawyer, my mom worked
Speaker 2: part time. They were both highly educated and very ambitious,
Speaker 2: and three siblings. Tragedy struck first. My parents got divorced
Speaker 2: when I was quite young, six, and then my mother
Speaker 2: suddenly passed away when I was ten, and my father
Speaker 2: basically abandoned the family at that point, despite being a
Speaker 2: very fancy lawyer Locally. We went to live with my uncle,
Speaker 2: who became my second set of parents in New Jersey
Speaker 2: when I was ten. I had pretty tragic childhood. I mean,
Speaker 2: there are plenty of other attributes of my childhood, but
Speaker 2: those are the things that really stand out. And I
Speaker 2: think that childhood tragedy can have one of two effects.
Speaker 2: The first is it can make you feel like you're
Speaker 2: a victim and that the world is out to get you,
Speaker 2: and that does not lead to good things later in life.
Speaker 2: The other effect is that it can light a fire
Speaker 2: under you and motivate you. And I had the latter
Speaker 2: happened to me. Not all my siblings did, but I did,
Speaker 2: and I was just of the view that if I
Speaker 2: work hard enough, then nothing bad will ever happen to me. Again,
Speaker 2: of course, that's a fallacy, wasn't true. Plenty of challenging
Speaker 2: things have come my way, but I think I'm more
Speaker 2: than a bit of a perfectionist. I've managed to moderate
Speaker 2: that over the years. And a lot of that came
Speaker 2: from my tragic childhood. I wouldn't wish it on anyone,
Speaker 2: but it was highly motivating. There were other elements too.
Speaker 2: I mean, despite this, my family really believed in me
Speaker 2: and encouraged me. I said I wanted to run a
Speaker 2: movie studio, and no one laughed. And even though like
Speaker 2: my family had no connection to the business whatsoever, but
Speaker 2: my family's willing to support me and my ambitions.
Speaker 3: You know, Strauss, I appreciate you sharing that. That is
Speaker 3: very personal and it is a chilling trauma. That's exactly right,
Speaker 3: and by the way, we see it in other people
Speaker 3: as well, that you know, get two directions when you
Speaker 3: get hit with that, something good came out of it.
Speaker 3: But when did Strauss the entrepreneur emerge? Was that a
Speaker 3: childhood thing or was that later in life? I don't
Speaker 3: think I was a born entrepreneur. You know, I was
Speaker 3: a good employee. I liked being a professional manager. I
Speaker 3: think I was good at it. I understood like chain
Speaker 3: of command. I had respect for my bosses. So I
Speaker 3: was not someone who was like, oh, this is horrible,
Speaker 3: I have to get out of here and do my
Speaker 3: own thing. On the one hand, on the other hand,
Speaker 3: I did want to build something. The truth is, you know,
Speaker 3: by the time I started ZMC, I was not young.
Speaker 3: I was forty three, and I had a really good career.
Speaker 2: I was paid well running a big record business, and
Speaker 2: you know, there were other jobs that would come my way,
Speaker 2: and I decided to take you know, one hundred ccent
Speaker 2: pay cut and start a business that was aiming to
Speaker 2: build a multi billion dollar diversified technology driven media business
Speaker 2: from scratch. But what drove me was not like, oh,
Speaker 2: I need to make a whole lot of dop because
Speaker 2: that was never motivating for me, and I did well
Speaker 2: working for other people. But here's the truth. Like I
Speaker 2: looked at my career and even though I'd done a
Speaker 2: bunch of turnarounds, I thought to myself, listen, how hard
Speaker 2: can it be when someone hands you a business card
Speaker 2: that says president of twentieth century far it's like and
Speaker 2: a balance sheet by the way, and like a safety net,
Speaker 2: and you got Ruper Murdock sitting in the corner of
Speaker 2: It's like, how hard can that be? If you can't
Speaker 2: do well in that circumstance, you got to be pretty lame.
Speaker 2: But I don't know doing something totally from scratch, Like
Speaker 2: totally from scratch, that's challenging, and that'll be a real test.
Speaker 2: And you know, I set out to build a twenty
Speaker 2: billion dollar business from scratch that was, you know, a
Speaker 2: leader in the intersection of technology and entertainment. And today
Speaker 2: we have tweens emc Intake two and they, you know,
Speaker 2: about a fifty five billion dollar enterprise that is a
Speaker 2: leader in the intersection of technology and entertainment. This was
Speaker 2: not a singular exercise, to say the least. It was
Speaker 2: a team exercise. And I have something like twenty thousand
Speaker 2: colleagues across the system who did all the hard work
Speaker 2: and the heavy lifting. But it is also true that
Speaker 2: it would not exist if I had not done it,
Speaker 2: and that was important to me. And I remember having
Speaker 2: the presence of mind because I've always been able to
Speaker 2: think far into the future when I was forty, and
Speaker 2: I thought to myself, I know, this is incredibly risky
Speaker 2: and the odds of failure are incredibly high. But I
Speaker 2: don't want to be at the end of my life
Speaker 2: and look back and say could it, would have? Should have?
Speaker 2: I got to give it a try. So maybe in
Speaker 2: that way there was an element of, you know, entrepreneurial fire.
Speaker 2: But I don't think it is typical entrepreneurial fire because
Speaker 2: I didn't object to working for other people.
Speaker 3: Even on those jobs. When you were working for others,
Speaker 3: I think of you as an entrepreneurial personality that within
Speaker 3: those companies you didn't think like the cog and the wheel,
Speaker 3: that you really did see things differently. And I must
Speaker 3: say I'm gonna tell one story on you. I hope
Speaker 3: you don't mind. Is I was so impressed when you
Speaker 3: were running BMG that you were learning German because it
Speaker 3: was a German company, and I go, wow, that is
Speaker 3: some commitment. And you actually got pretty good at it,
Speaker 3: didn't you.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I surprised people too, because I didn't tell anyone
Speaker 2: because you tard language. No, I didn't tell anyone in
Speaker 2: the company. I was there for about two years before
Speaker 2: I could speak it. And then one day I had
Speaker 2: had offices all over the world and I was going
Speaker 2: to my office in Munich. The plane was late. I
Speaker 2: was in baggage claim. I called my office in Munich
Speaker 2: and in German, I said, this is Strauss and I'm
Speaker 2: running late. I apologize if you don't mind, could you
Speaker 2: move My first meeting, my assistant was like in German,
Speaker 2: was like who is this. That was like, it's yess
Speaker 2: and she was like, you don't speak German. I was like, well,
Speaker 2: actually I do speak German. I spoke proficiently, not fluently.
Speaker 2: There is a difference, but I did speak well enough
Speaker 2: to attend board meetings and actually conduct business in German.
Speaker 2: And I thought it was a sign of respect to
Speaker 2: the organization. But more to the point, you know, I'm
Speaker 2: a good student. I like studying things, and I thought,
Speaker 2: what a great opportunity I'll learn to speak German. Wall
Speaker 2: in here.
Speaker 3: That was one more impressive things you've done in my mind.
Speaker 3: I know you've done a lot of great business things,
Speaker 3: but I was really impressed with that. Let's get out
Speaker 3: the crystal ball for a minute, Ai, I know you
Speaker 3: have some interesting views. How should we think about it
Speaker 3: and its impact.
Speaker 2: The technology that people are calling AI is it is
Speaker 2: a massive step forward in digital technology, but at the
Speaker 2: end of the day, it's still an array of digital
Speaker 2: tools that minimally create productivity, which is what digital tools
Speaker 2: have always done. And I think the productivity opportunities are
Speaker 2: really quite significant. But let's not confuse digital tools with
Speaker 2: the singularity, which in my opinion is utter nonsense. That's
Speaker 2: the merging of human brain power with digital brain power.
Speaker 2: To the extent you can distinguish a human being from
Speaker 2: a machine, the machine will be superior. And that is
Speaker 2: not going to occur because the end of the day,
Speaker 2: machines are machines that work on data, and data sets
Speaker 2: are backward looking, and backward looking data is only going
Speaker 2: to get you so far. Now, there's no doubt that
Speaker 2: backward looking data that is used in a robust way
Speaker 2: can answer a lot of questions. So when you see
Speaker 2: people sort as they have in the last few year, saying, oh,
Speaker 2: it's incredible, like AI programs can ace the l SAT,
Speaker 2: it's like, well, I'm sorry, machines have been beating human
Speaker 2: beings at chess for fifteen years, Like why are you surprised?
Speaker 2: The l SATs are completely based on data. Of course,
Speaker 2: machines that are data driven and good computational engines are
Speaker 2: going to beat the human mind in anything that's based
Speaker 2: on data. But there are a bunch of things that
Speaker 2: machines are highly unlikely ever to do, because data driving
Speaker 2: a predictive model isn't going to answer human questions. Creativity
Speaker 2: applied to the entertainment business, which is a little world
Speaker 2: in which I live, relies upon the unexpected for its
Speaker 2: biggest hits. The biggest hits are, by their nature unexpected.
Speaker 2: So sure, storytelling is informed by Shakespeare data. But great,
Speaker 2: great stories well told reflect human genius that data sets
Speaker 2: simply can't replicate. So in my world of interactive entertainment development,
Speaker 2: will coding be much more efficient because of general of AI?
Speaker 2: Unquestionably it's already happening. But will coving replace human genius?
Speaker 2: Or more pointedly, will someone with you know, chat GPT
Speaker 2: seventy three be able to push a button and make
Speaker 2: a competitor to GTA six. No, And I can say
Speaker 2: that unequivocally equally. Are all things AI going to reduce employment? Well,
Speaker 2: I don't know the history of technology, which is one
Speaker 2: thousand years old, and of the technology we understand to
Speaker 2: be technology one hundred years old has been that technology
Speaker 2: creates productivity. Productivity drives GDP. GDP growth drives employment. And
Speaker 2: take a look at how many people were employed to
Speaker 2: take to interactive eighteen years ago when I took over
Speaker 2: about one thousand people. Today we employ thirteen and a
Speaker 2: half thousand people. Take a look at the tech we
Speaker 2: used then and the tech we use now. There's no comparison,
Speaker 2: Absolutely no comparison. So I'm an optimist about what AI
Speaker 2: can do, and I'm not at all worried about machine
Speaker 2: taking over, becoming evil or condemning us to a life
Speaker 2: of naval gazing.
Speaker 3: It's interesting. We just came out with a study which
Speaker 3: we do every year, we do a massive study of
Speaker 3: the consumer. This year we did it on the human consumer,
Speaker 3: really about how the consumer's thinking about humanity, being human
Speaker 3: and technology. And it's interesting. Seventy percent of the people
Speaker 3: use AI, but ninety percent what they're media created by
Speaker 3: real humans. And it was very clear that the consumer
Speaker 3: is saying, I like it as a tool, I don't
Speaker 3: ever want it masquerading as something it's not. As a
Speaker 3: matter of fact. It's interesting. So from about seventy six
Speaker 3: percent to ninety three percent. The idea that the most
Speaker 3: important thing in my life are human connections. That more
Speaker 3: important than ever. That growth came from twenty sixteen till today.
Speaker 3: So interesting world we're living in. If you could go
Speaker 3: back in time, what advice would you have for your
Speaker 3: twenty one year old self.
Speaker 2: Don't worry so much, It'll be okay in the end.
Speaker 3: Good piece of advice. So we end each episode of
Speaker 3: Matth and Magic with a shout out to the analytical
Speaker 3: side of business. They just see business as numbers and
Speaker 3: it comes together. And then you have the other side
Speaker 3: that are people who just have these incredible creative ideas.
Speaker 3: By the way, not everybody has the combo you do
Speaker 3: of both. Who would you give the shout out to
Speaker 3: on both the sort of analytical side, the number side,
Speaker 3: and on the creative side.
Speaker 2: From the point of view of the entertainment business. Dick Parsons,
Speaker 2: who we both knew well. I think he had an
Speaker 2: extraordinary touch for business and people and data. But there's
Speaker 2: so many other candidates. Really Jeff Ducas or really kind
Speaker 2: of the master in this Steve Ross, and in many
Speaker 2: ways I tried to model my career after his without
Speaker 2: some of the more colorful elements on the creative side.
Speaker 2: Jeffrey Katzenberg. He really has embodied sort of that intersection
Speaker 2: of understanding the media in which he operates and understanding
Speaker 2: storytelling and engaging with creative people bringing out the best
Speaker 2: of them, and being creative himself.
Speaker 3: Of course, Strauss, you've been an amazing friend for I
Speaker 3: guess is more than thirty years. Your story is really
Speaker 3: like no other, and your success is really a testament
Speaker 3: to the leader you are. Thanks for sharing your lessons
Speaker 3: with us today.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me.
Speaker 3: Here are a few things I picked up from my
Speaker 3: conversation with Strauss. One, Creative risk and financial risk are
Speaker 3: two different things, and they don't have to mirror each other.
Speaker 3: Strauss embraces creative risk, but demands financial security. In fact,
Speaker 3: he believes a strong balance sheet is what allows bold
Speaker 3: creative choices. Only when creatives have the space to make mistakes,
Speaker 3: whill you see real innovation.
Speaker 2: Two.
Speaker 3: Recognize talent when you see it. Strauss has thrived in
Speaker 3: the entertainment business, but he's never the one directing, writing,
Speaker 3: or even giving notes. What he does exceptionally well is
Speaker 3: distinguish the people who are most talented, continue to develop
Speaker 3: their skills, and encourage their work. His retention rate says
Speaker 3: it all. Three. Proving yourself can be a personal challenge.
Speaker 3: Sometimes people strive for greatness for status or recognition. Strauss
Speaker 3: was successful from her young age and countless people admired
Speaker 3: his work, but he needed to prove his abilities to
Speaker 3: himself before jumping into an entrepreneurial journey later in life.
Speaker 3: I see it in his commitment to help and wellness too. Ultimately,
Speaker 3: it comes from the place of respecting himself. Four Yet
Speaker 3: more sleep. Lastly, I think we would all do well
Speaker 3: to live by Strauss's example and work to prioritize in
Speaker 3: that department. I'm Bob Pittman. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 1: That's it for today's episode. Thanks so much for listening
Speaker 1: to Math and Magic, a production of iHeart Podcasts. The
Speaker 1: show is created and hosted by Bob Pittman. The Math
Speaker 1: and Magic team is Ali Perry, Jessica Crinchitch, and Dylan Hoyer.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Sidney Rosenbloom for booking and wrangling our
Speaker 1: wonderful talent, which is no small feat. Until next time,