I love CEOs who challenge orthodoxies and dare to utter heretical thoughts. One of the most engaging I’ve encountered lately is Ray Kelvin. Ray who? The man who is Ted Baker. It’s hard to tell what he enjoys more — running his successful high-end clothing business or daring people to disagree with him. But it’s hard to argue with his company’s success.In less than ten years, Kelvin has built one of the most successful global fashion brands. In 1997, when it went public, the business had revenues of $23 million; this year, it will be around $750 million. And Kelvin is still, palpably, having fun. One way he’s done that has been by proving truisms wrong. I spoke with him recently about the eight pillars of conventional business wisdom that he’s toppled on his path to success:
1. Entrepreneurs have to be optimistic. It may help to be a positive thinker, but that’s not what Kelvin was. He named his company Ted Baker so that, when it went into bankruptcy, no one would know it was his. Fear, he said, was a great motivator.
To read the full, original article click on this link: Ted Baker: Eight Business Rules I Broke to Succeed | On Leadership | BNET
Author: Margaret Heffernan
