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“I thought I was nice, I got along with everybody. It turns out my perception was different."

Mark Cuban once believed he was an approachable boss. But one blunt conversation with his cofounder forced him to rethink how he ran his companies.

“People are afraid of you,” Cuban recalled his Broadcast.com business partner Todd Wagner telling him years ago. “We don’t get as much done because people are afraid of you.”

Speaking on the Trailblazer Podcast with Erica Wenger last month, the billionaire entrepreneur and Shark Tank star, who turns 68 today, explained how his leadership approach has evolved over time.

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Transcript
00:00It was learning to read the room, to be nice, you know, because I think growing up as an
00:05entrepreneur in my 20s and early 30s, it was like, go, go, go, go, go. You have to be that
00:12dominant entrepreneur that sets the tone, expects nothing but the best, doesn't suffer fools.
00:18And that held me back. It really, it took somebody, Todd Wagner, one of my friends and
00:22partners who said, you're a d***. At what age was that? This was in my 30s, mid 30s. And he
00:28was like,
00:28you're a jerk, right? People are afraid of you. And we don't get as much done because people are
00:33afraid of you. And I was like, oh, I thought it was nice, right? I got along with everybody. And
00:38turns out my perception was different. And so adapting there and learning to be nice
00:43and kind to people made life a lot easier for me.
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