The most common question I have been asked about my entrepreneurial life is this: “What is the key to building a multi-million dollar company?” The answer is quite simple. There is no single key.
There are critical elements, of course. For example, you need to leverage your passion, understand customer demand, build systems, differentiate from the competition and a million more things.
As painful as it is to say because I am an author, no book can address each and every one of those “million more things.” Luckily there is one thing that can do a remarkable job at at giving you the knowledge and support you need. It’s a mastermind group.
When you put eight to 10 intelligent and motivated brains in the same room, all focused on fixing a specific problem, amazing things happen. But for it to work, you need to pick motivated people who follow these six steps:
1. Establish a clear leader. Just like any organization, there needs to be one person who gets the ball rolling. This leader must be the most motivated of all, and able to “herd cats.” Just like any group, it will take time to get into a rhythm and it depends on a sole leader to make it happen.
2. Meet face-to-face. I am in two mastermind groups. One of my groups meets in person once a month; the other meets weekly by telephone, and then face-to-face twice a year. Masterminds are about building something much deeper than friendships, and you can only do that with face time.
3. Meet at the same day, same time. Make it a habit, like brushing your teeth or changing the oil on your car. This will ensure that the dates for the meetings are reserved in people’s calendars for months or even years in advance, avoiding potential meeting conflicts.
4. Adhere to a specific format that fosters connection and creativity. I suggest a four-hour meeting with the following format:
First 10 minutes is a one-minute check-in for each person, stating how they are feeling emotionally and physically. Then, each person recites an affirmation: “I’m here, and I’m ready. My sole focus is this meeting. I’m disconnecting from everything else.”
Next, spend about 50 minutes doing personal and business “best/worst” update (“This is the best thing going on with my family; this is the worst thing going on with my family,” and so on).
Then spend two hours doing presentations. A section of the meeting where two people (pre-selected in the best/worst update from the prior month), one at a time, spend ten minutes explaining the details of the challenge or opportunity in front of them. After the first person goes, the group shares experiences around the subject for the next fifty minutes. Then the process is repeated for the second person.
Wrap up the final hour by conducting housekeeping (discussing how to improve meetings, planning a retreat or activity, addressing group finances, etc.) and then doing an amplification: Each person shares something positive and affirming about everyone in the group. For example, I might say, “Jim, I just want you to know that I love you, love what you’re doing, and you’re going to be huge. And Sue, I know you’re struggling with the family, but every time I meet with you I’m struck by your warmth.” The goal here is to provide genuine compliments, never a correction: to amplify who they really are and mirror it back to them.
5. Have a big vision for the group. My mastermind group has a vision of creating a billion points of impact on the world. My contribution to that vision is to affect one billion minds through my books, programs and speeches. Our shared vision is about shifting society, not just making money, or achieving status or recognition.
6. If the mastermind group fails, do not give up. Realign it—change the memberships and reset the vision. Some masterminds get off to a rough start. Don’t let those bumps and bruises dissuade you. Just keep at it until you have the perfect members and the perfect agenda.
There is no question, that my own mastermind group has been the guiding force behind the success of all my businesses and now behind my career as an author. There is no question, the greatest benefit has been during my darkest days and most challenging times. Because when everything is working, you know the answers. It’s when nothing is working, that your fellow masterminds will show you which one of the “million more things” you should do.
Mike Michalowicz is the author of The Pumpkin Plan and The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur. He is a nationally recognized speaker on entrepreneurial topics and is the CEO of Provendus Group, a consultancy that helps companies whose growth has plateaued to move forward again.
Here is a true endearing story of an aging couple as told by their own son, Michael Gartner. It is well worth reading. A few good chuckles are guaranteed.
Carl Gartner in 1937. Photo courtesy of the Gartner Family Album
My father never drove a car. Well, that’s not quite right. I should say I never saw him drive a car. He quit driving in 1927, when he was 25 years old, and the last car he drove was a 1926 Whippet.
“In those days,” he told me when he was in his 90s, “to drive a car you had to do things with your hands, and do things with your feet, and look every which way, and I decided you could walk through life and enjoy it or drive through life and miss it.
At which point my mother, a sometimes salty Irishwoman, chimed in: “Oh, baloney!” she said. “He hit a horse.”
“Well,” my father said, “there was that, too.”
So my brother and I grew up in a household without a car. The neighbors all had cars — the Kollingses next door had a green 1941Dodge, the Van Laninghams across the street a grey 1936 Plymouth, the Hopsons two doors down a black 1941
Ford — but we had none.
My father, a newspaperman in Des Moines, would take the streetcar to work and, often as not, walk the 3 miles home. If he took the streetcar home, my mother and brother and I would walk the three blocks to the streetcar stop, meet him and walk home together.
My brother, David, was born in 1935, and I was born in 1938, and sometimes, at dinner, we’d ask how come all the neighbors had cars but we had none. “No one in the family drives,” my mother would explain, and that was that.
But, sometimes, my father would say, “But as soon as one of you boys turns 16, we’ll get one.” It was as if he wasn’t sure which one of us would turn 16 first. But, sure enough, my brother turned 16 before I did, so in 1951 my parents bought a used 1950 Chevrolet from a friend who ran the parts department at a Chevy dealership downtown.
It was a four-door, white model, stick shift, fender skirts, loaded with everything, and, since my parents didn’t drive, it more or less became my brother’s car. Having a car but not being able to drive didn’t bother my father, but it didn’t make sense to my mother. So in 1952, when she was 43 years old, she asked a friend to teach her to drive. She learned in a nearby cemetery, the place where I learned to drive the following year and where, a generation later, I took my two sons to practice driving. The cemetery probably was my father’s idea. “Who can your mother hurt in the cemetery?” I remember him saying more than once.
For the next 45 years or so, until she was 90, my mother was the driver in the family. Neither she nor my father had any sense of direction, but he loaded up on maps — though they seldom left the city limits — and appointed himself navigator. It seemed to work.
Still, they both continued to walk a lot. My mother was a devout Catholic, and my father an equally devout agnostic, an arrangement that didn’t seem to bother either of them through their 75 years of marriage.
(Yes, 75 years, and they were deeply in love the entire time.)
He retired when he was 70, and nearly every morning for the next 20 years or so, he would walk with her the mile to St. Augustine’s Church.
She would walk down and sit in the front pew, and he would wait in the back until he saw which of the parish’s two priests was on duty that morning. If it was the pastor, my father then would go out and take a 2-mile walk, meeting my mother at the end of the service and walking her home. If it was the assistant pastor, he’d take just a 1-mile walk and then head back to the church. He called the priests
“Father Fast” and “Father Slow.”
After he retired, my father almost always accompanied my mother whenever she drove anywhere, even if he had no reason to go along. If she were going to the beauty parlor, he’d sit in the car and read, or go take a stroll or, if it was summer, have her keep the engine running so he could listen to the Cubs game on the radio. In the evening, then, when I’d stop by, he’d explain: “The Cubs lost again. The millionaire on second base made a bad throw to the millionaire on first base, so the multimillionaire on third base scored.”
If she were going to the grocery store, he would go along to carry the bags out – and to make sure she loaded up on ice cream. As I said, he was always the navigator, and once, when he was 95 and she was 88 and still driving, he said to me, “Do you want to know the secret of a long life?”
“I guess so,” I said, knowing it probably would be something bizarre.
“No left turns,” he said.
“What?” I asked.
“No left turns,” he repeated. “Several years ago, your mother and I read an article that said most accidents that old people are in happen when they turn left in front of oncoming traffic.
As you get older, your eyesight worsens, and you can lose your depth perception, it said. So your mother and I decided never again to make a left turn.
“What?” I said again.
“No left turns,” he said. “Think about it.. Three rights are the same as a left, and that’s a lot safer. So we always make three rights.”
“You’re kidding!” I said, and I turned to my mother for support.
“No,” she said, “your father is right. We make three rights. It works.”
But then she added: “Except when your father loses count.”
I was driving at the time, and I almost drove off the road as I started laughing.
“Loses count?” I asked.
“Yes,” my father admitted, “that sometimes happens. But it’s not a problem. You just make seven rights, and you’re okay again.”
I couldn’t resist. “Do you ever go for 11?” I asked.
“No,” he said ” If we miss it at seven, we just come home and call it a bad day. Besides, nothing in life is so important it can’t be put off another day or another week.” My mother was never in an accident, but one evening she handed me her car keys and said she had decided to quit driving. That was in 1999, when she was 90. She lived four more years, until 2003. My father died the next year, at 102.
They both died in the bungalow they had moved into in 1937 and bought a few years later for $3,000. (Sixty years later, my brother and I paid $8,000 to have a shower put in the tiny bathroom – the house had never had one. My father would have died then and there if he knew the shower cost nearly three times what he paid for the house.) He continued to walk daily — he had me get him a treadmill when he was101 because he was afraid he’d fall on the icy sidewalks but wanted to keep exercising — and he was of sound mind and sound body until the moment he died.
One September afternoon in 2004, he and my son went with me when I had to give a talk in a neighboring town, and it was clear to all three of us that he was wearing out, though we had the usual wide-ranging conversation about politics and newspapers and things in the news.
A few weeks earlier, he had told my son, “You know,Mike, the first hundred years are a lot easier than the second hundred.” At one point in our drive that Saturday, he said, “You know, I’m probably not going to live much longer.”
“You’re probably right,” I said.
“Why would you say that?” He countered, somewhat irritated.
“Because you’re 102 years old,” I said..
“Yes,” he said, “you’re right.” He stayed in bed all the next day.
That night, I suggested to my son and daughter that we sit up with him through the night. He appreciated it, he said, though at one point, apparently seeing us look gloomy, he said: “I would like to make an announcement. No one in this room is dead yet.”
An hour or so later, he spoke his last words: “I want you to know,” he said, clearly and lucidly, “that I am in no pain. I am very comfortable. And I have had as happy a life as anyone on this earth could ever have.”
A short time later, he died. I miss him a lot, and I think about him a lot. I’ve wondered now and then how it was that my family and I were so lucky that he lived so long.. I can’t figure out if it was because he walked through life, Or because he quit taking left turns.”
———————————–oooOOOooo—————————————–
Life is too short to wake up with regrets.
So love the people who treat you right.
Believe everything happens for a reason.
If you get a chance, take it & if it changes your
life, let it.
Nobody said life would be easy, they just promised it
would most likely be worth it.”
ENJOY LIFE NOW – IT HAS AN EXPIRATION DATE!
Michael Gartner. His long career in journalism began in the sports department of Des Moines Register at age 15. Eventually, he became page one editor of the Wall Street Journal (1960-1974), editor and president of Des Moines Register (1974-1985), general news executive of the Gannett Company and USA Today, editor of the Louisville Courier-Journal (1986-1987) – during which time he served as president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors – and president of NBC News (1988-1993). He resigned from NBC as a result of controversy over the show Dateline NBC. The show reported on dangers of GM pickup trucks but did not state that it had staged the explosion of a truck for broadcast. Years later Gartner said, “It happened on my watch. I took responsibility for it. I did what I thought you ought to do when you make a mistake. You say ‘we made a mistake and apologize to the viewers.” (Iowa City Press-Citizen, April 23, 2005).
When Nadica Ristivojevich opened her high-end bridal shop, Maria’s Bridal Couture, in 2008 she had no idea a recession was right around the corner. Nor did she know that her city, Detroit, would be one of the most severely affected areas. But even with the odds against her, the store’s revenue doubled from the first year to the second, and business continues to grow today.
Customers often drive several hours to the store because of Ristivojevich’s personal attention and the exclusive designers the store carries. Ristivojevich has spent 20 years working in the bridal industry at another shop with her mother and aunt, but always longed to open her own store. “My passion was always to do the higher price point. I have a luxurious taste and have always drawn to the higher quality fabrics,” Ristivojevich says. So when she saw space available at the Orchard Mall in West Bloomfield, she decided that now was the time to take a chance. Because the mall built out the space for her needs, it reduced the amount of money she had to put up front to get her doors opened.
Focusing on Just the Bride
Ristivojevich quickly realized that she couldn’t compete with big box stores like David’s Bridal and decided not to carry evening gowns, mother’s dresses and bridesmaid dresses. “You can’t do a little bit of everything. When customers come into the store, they are focusing on the bride. So we have made our main focus the bride,” Ristivojevich says. This has reduced inventory costs and also increased the level of customer service. The staff can also concentrate training efforts on bridal wear instead of multiple products, which increases the knowledge level of associates.
Ristivojevich’s efforts have paid off and have attracted the attention of leaders in the wedding industry. When exclusive designer Vera Wang was looking for a store in the area to carry her dresses, the designer’s representatives decided that Maria’s Bridal Couture would be a perfect fit and the shop is currently the only store in Michigan to carry Vera Wang.
Every Bride Is Important
When customers visit the store, they are greeted with a glass of champagne and offered hors d’oeuvres to set the mood. Ristivojevich makes a point of meeting every bride and gives the women her honest opinion on the dresses. She will often meet brides and their family at the shop after hours if they can’t make during business hours. Ristivojevich even opened the store at 9:30 p.m. one night for a bride who was flying in from New York City.
“A wedding dress is a special, one-time purchase. So it needs to be a personable experience,” Ristivojevich says. “My goal is to never have an unhappy bride. There is not a problem that you cannot work out. I strongly believe that.”
Creative Thinking
Instead of resting on her success, Ristivojevich credits her continued growth on her focused effort to continue to learn and try new things each day. “Right now I have a black Vera Wang T-shirt in the window and people are stopping to notice it,” Ristivojevich says. In February, she glued roses petals to a mannequin in the shape of a wedding dress and even put a sign next to it that the dress was available in white and ivory as a joke. “Every day should be a learning day. Do something different from what you did yesterday,” she adds.
But more important than the top-notch customer service, innovative marketing techniques and exclusive designers the store carries, the shop’s success is due largely in to the passion and love that Ristivojevich has for her store. “I can’t see myself doing anything else. It has been 20 years and I still get goosebumps when the bride finds her perfect wedding dress and her and mother begin crying,” Ristivojevich says.
Jennifer Gregory is a journalist with over 17 years professional writing experience. Jennifer blogs via Contently.com.
What happened at Roswell 65 years ago? It may be a conspiracy theorist’s greatest mystery. Now, one former CIA agent says he has information that could solve it.
On July 8, 1947, most reports agree, something landed in Roswell, N.M. At first the government said the object was a “flying disk,” but it quickly changed its story the next day to a “weather balloon.” For a few years, people bought that answer, but eventually some started asking questions. Some people say it was Stalin sending a message to the U.S. as the Cold War kicked off in earnest. Others say Roswell was the first contact between human beings and extraterrestrials. Still others maintain that it really was just a weather balloon. Now ex–CIA agent Chase Brandon says he knows what really happened.
“It was not a damn weather balloon,” Brandon told the Huffington Post. “It was a craft that clearly did not come from this planet.” The 35-year agency veteran was a covert agent involved in international terrorism, counterinsurgency, global narcotics trafficking and weapons smuggling, and spent 10 years as the agency’s first entertainment and publication industries liaison.
Full disclosure before we storm the barricades: Brandon is promoting The Cryptos Conundrum, a new novel that his website describes as a “sci-fi, political conspiracy thriller about CIA’s cover-up of the Roswell UFO crash.”
Sometime near the end of his service, while he was the entertainment liaison, Brandon walked into the CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., and found something he did not expect in a restricted section of old documents called the Historical Intelligence Collection.
One of the boxes had a single word written on it: Roswell. “I took the box down, lifted the lid up, rummaged around inside it, put the box back on the shelf, and said, ‘My God, it really happened!’” Brandon recounted.
The former agent reported seeing some “written material and some photographs” but will not reveal what else he saw. “But it absolutely, for me, was the single validating moment that everything I had believed, and knew that so many other people believed had happened, truly was what occurred,” Brandon concluded.
Although he said he believes he hasn’t violated CIA policy by talking to HuffPo about the discovery, he was clear that he would not say anything more. “I will go to my grave being mindful of the two hats that I wear: my personal one and the one that will forever reside on my head as a former CIA officer,” Brandon said.
The middle of July is fast approaching, but there is still plenty of time left for your teenagers to make the most of their summers. For teens who need ideas, here are 16 to get them started:
1. Be political. With the presidential election just months away, lots of political candidate would be happy for the help.
2. Blog. Differentiate yourself from millions of other teenagers by blogging. You’ll be more successful if you write about something you’re passionate about, whether it’s street art or field hockey. You can get a free blog at WordPress or Blogger.
3. Create a LinkedIn account. It’s never too early to start networking. Once you’ve set up an account, join LinkedIn groups tied to your interests.
4. Learn a new language. There are plenty of free sites online to help people get started on a new language, including Open Culture and LearnALanguage.com.
5. Sleep in. According to a report by the National Sleep Foundation, adolescents and pre-adolescents need 8.5 to 9.25 hours of sleep a night, which they often don’t get during the school year. Just don’t make sleeping in a habit.
7. Intern. It’s too late to land a summer internship, but nothing is stopping teens from looking for a fall internship.
8. Volunteer. An easy way to find opportunities to donate time is at Volunteermatch.org. Even if you’re not feeling it, the cynical reason to help is to pad your resume.
9. Sell stuff. Hold a garage sale. Or sell stuff you, your parents, or siblings don’t want onCraigsList or eBay.
10. Study for the SAT and/or ACT. It’s a shame that students can’t take the SAT or ACT during the summer, when they actually have time, but the off months is a great time to prepare for the tests. (Here is an awesome site to improve you SAT math score: PWN the SAT.)
11. Create how-to videos on YouTube. Maybe your videos will go viral!
12. Try meditation. Meditating is a skill young people could find useful in college. A new study suggests meditation can make them more productive, focused, and less stressed.
13. Make homemade holiday gifts in advance. Your parents would rather have homemade gifts. Really. And it will save you money.
When recently asked for tips on finding time and budget for travel this summer, here’s what members of the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) had to say.
1. Make for a Happy Homecoming
“This summer, I’ve gone to Denver, L.A., Nevada, Orlando and Montreal so far! The key is planning the week of your return in advance. Don’t take any meetings; instead, spend that first morning easing back into your flow. Catch up on your e-mails and assignments. If you have focused work time during the week of your return, you’ll be all caught up and won’t feel burned out.”
“I’m going to St. Lucia on my honeymoon this July, which has been a great motivator to finally set up some automatic sales funnel systems for my company. This way, I’ll have a constant stream of people coming to my site (and hopefully, buying my product) while I’m away. I’m looking forward to kicking back with a tropical drink and knowing that my income hasn’t stalled while I’m in the Caribbean!”
“These days, you can do way more work remotely than you’re probably giving yourself credit for. Travel wherever you want, but simply set aside time each day to get down to work. Leverage tools for video conferencing and project management to make the idea of remote work more of a reality.”
“I try to minimize the amount of trips I take by maximizing my use of a destination when I do travel. For instance, if I’m headed to New York City for a meeting that requires in-person interaction, I try to schedule several non-essential meetings with others. That in-person interaction leads to a stronger relationship and can keep me from needing to travel there again soon.”
“My work takes me to a lot of amazing places where I get to meet even more amazing people, so I’ll usually take an extra day or two once I’m there to enjoy the area on a personal level. It also helps if you have friends in your niche that are also attending the same events or meetings so you have people to hang out with after the deals are done.”
“As an entrepreneur, you will always have a never-ending laundry list of things to accomplish. Don’t wait until the list is finished to take time off, but instead add vacation time to your to-do list. By doing so, you not only will recharge while you are away, but you will also have extra motivation to manage your other time well before you leave.”
“Try to combine your getaway near where you travel for business. Take advantage of being out of the office and extend your business trip into the weekend. This way, you’re only taking one trip away from the office, versus multiple.”
“The biggest thing is planning for it. Everyone gets busy and can make any excuse they want, but if you don’t plan for it, it won’t happen. If you do, you will find the time and the budget. Make it a priority, just like your business.”
“Just plan it. Don’t be so arrogant to believe that your team can’t be successful without you in the room. Delegating never killed anyone (that I know of). Get comfortable with it, or you’ll never take a trip again.”
“If you’re traveling to a different city for a wedding, bachelor party, birthday, funeral or other non-business reason, plan some business meetings while you’re there. Some people say you should never mix business and personal, but let’s face it—we’re entrepreneurs, and our businesses are our lives. Using this scheduling strategy will save the time and expense of having to plan a completely separate trip to accomplish the same ends.”
“I’m taking three types of trips this summer: travel where I work during the day and explore new locations on evenings/weekends, travel where I pare down my schedule to only the most essential remote activities, and travel where I completely unplug. By giving myself the freedom to vary my expectations, I’m able to see more locations and keep up on the business.”
“There is plenty to explore in our own backyards. Take half-days on Fridays to give yourself a head start and to make you feel like you are getting a true break from work. With a little Googling, you can find hidden treasures within a 1-3 hours drive. Not only will you see more, but you will come back with more local knowledge and more money in your bank account (if well-planned).”
“Take advantage of business rewards given on credit cards and you’ll earn free travel in no time. We purchase all our job site materials and run as many expenses through the credit card as possible. These points can then be redeemed for free hotel stays and airplane fares.”
The Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) is an invite-only nonprofit organization of promising young entrepreneurs that has access to tools, mentoring and resources that support each stage of business development. The organization promotes entrepreneurship as a solution to unemployment and under-employment.
Twenty years ago, in July 1, 1992, Columbia Pictures released to the theaters a movie about the all-American Professional Baseball League set against the backdrop of 1943 war-time America when most of the men were far away in Europe and the Pacific.
Promotions and marketing savvy Ira Lowenstein, (played by David Straithaim) convinced the Candy-bar tycoon, Walter Harvey (played by Gary Marshall) that America could use the talents of their women to play baseball in lieu of the boys. After Mr. Harvey bought the idea, he enlisted talent scouts to scour the countryside of America to find enough girls.
At a dairy farm in the backwoods of Oregon, two sisters — Dottie (Geena Davis) and Kit (Lori Petty) — were discovered. Dottie could hit and catch, while Kit could throw a mean fastball. The girls came to Chicago to try out for the team with other prospects that included their soon-to-be-teammates Mae Mordabito (Madonna), Doris Murphy (Rosie O’Donnell), and Marla Hooch (Megan Cavanagh).
Mr. Candy-man needed someone to coach his team and he picked one-time home-run champion Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks), who is now a broken-down alcoholic. After some paltry games at the ballpark with more empty seats than a bunch of hecklers, the girls showed certain chutzpah that Life Magazine took notice. And a few weeks of training, as Dugan sobered up, the team began to show some promise. By the end of the season, the team had improved to the point where they were competing in the World Series. The rest is Hollywood history.
Director Penny Marshall and screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel re-created a movie that certainly transformed this Hollywood piece of history into an iconic gem and a classic Americana. A perfect venue for a multiple character-driven movie.
Here are some of the top critics and what they say about the movie:
“Filled as it is with unforced errors, “A League of Their Own” isn’t a perfect picture, but it is irresistibly ebullient with not one, but nine Babes on base. Aside from several especially awkward attempts to politically correct history, it evokes the moxie of World War II America. Graced by Davis and enlivened by Lovitz and the ensemble cast, it sends us home feeling a little higher, with visions of peanuts and Cracker Jack floating in our heads.” From Rita Kempley, the Washington Post, Full Review
“Awash in sentimentality and manic energy but only occasionally bubbling over with high humor, A League of Their Ownhits about .250 with a few RBI but more than its share of strikeouts.” From Variety, Full Review
“One of the year’s most cheerful, most relaxed, most easily enjoyable comedies. It’s a serious film that’s lighter than air, a very funny movie that manages to score a few points for feminism in passing.” From Vincent Canby, New York Times, Full Review
“Energetic, full of goodwill and good feelings, it never quite attains the graceful nonchalance and self-confidence with which finely tuned athletes — and comedies — move and enchant us.” From Richard Schickel, TIME Magazine, Full Review
“The movie has a real bittersweet charm. The baseball sequences, we’ve seen before. What’s fresh are the personalities of the players, the gradual unfolding of their coach and the way this early chapter of women’s liberation fit into the hidebound traditions of professional baseball. By the end, when the women get together again for their reunion, it’s touching, the way they have to admit that, whaddaya know, they really were pioneers.” From Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times, Full Review
________________________________________________
Trivia About the Movie
By: JEFF MERRON
Maybe there’s no crying in baseball, but there’s lying in baseball — especially in baseball movies.
“A League of Their Own” is a movie about the first season of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, which ran from 1943 to 1954. While the movie doesn’t use real names, director Penny Marshall seemed to be aiming for realism — the movie includes fake newsreel footage and pseudo-documentary “present day” scenes at the beginning and end of the film.
What’s the verdict? Former baseball player Doris Sams said, “I thought it was about 30 percent truth and 70 percent Hollywood.”
In baseball, a .300 batting average is good. In telling a “true” story, .300 is not so hot.
So, which 70 percent is Hollywood fiction? Read on.
In Reel Life: ”Candy bar king” Walter Harvey decides to start a women’s baseball league, fearing that World War II would force a cancellation of the 1943 MLB season.
In Real Life: Chewing gum magnate and Chicago Cubs owner Philip K. Wrigley decided, in 1942, to start a women’s pro softball league, concerned that the 1943 major-league season might be canceled because of World War II.
In Reel Life: During a newsreel clip, the narrator (Harry Shearer, who you may know as Spinal Tap’s Derek Smalls or as the voice of Monty Burns, Smithers, Ned Flanders, Principal Seymour Skinner, Otto Mann, Reverend Timothy Lovejoy, Dr. Julius Hibbert, Kent Brockman, Jasper, Lenny, Eddie, Ranier ‘McBain’ Wolfcastle, Scratchy, Kang, Dr. Marvin Monroe and others in “The Simpsons”) says, “Harvey’s promotional wiz kid, Ira Lowenstein, has been given the task of how to keep baseball going.”
In Real Life: Cubs assistant GM Ken Sells, who became the league’s president, was probably the model for Lowenstein.
In Reel Life: Geena Davis plays Dottie Hinson, who becomes the biggest star in the league.
In Real Life: Davis, a late pick for the role of Dottie, wasn’t much of a ballplayer, but she is an accomplished archer. She took up archery in 1997, and competed in the 1999 Olympic trials. She is also a board member of the Women’s Sports Foundation. At the Foundation’s website, Davis says, “It wasn’t until ‘A League of Their Own’ that I realized I had a natural, but untapped athletic talent inside me.”
In Reel Life: Sisters Kit Keller (Lori Petty) and Dottie Hinson play fast-pitch softball for a Lukash Dairy team in the “Willamette Valley League,” and there’s a pretty good crowd.
In Real Life: Women’s softball was enormously popular in the 1940s, and often drew good crowds. In June 1943, Time magazine estimated there were 40,000 women’s softball teams in the U.S., including popular touring clubs such as Barney Ross’ Adorables and Slapsie Maxie’s Curvaceous Cuties.
In Reel Life: During the softball game, Dottie tells Kit there’s a big hole on the right side, and advises her to pull the ball.
In Real Life: Kit’s a right-handed hitter, so if she pulls the ball, she ain’t hittin’ it where they ain’t, she’s hitting it to the left side.
In Reel Life: Ernie Capadino, a baseball scout (Jon Lovitz), likes what he sees at the softball game, and comes to the dairy to offer Dottie a job. “They’ll pay you $75 a week,” he says. “We only make $30 at the dairy,” says Kit.
In Real Life: The average full-time worker made $1,299 a year in the 1940s, according to one estimate — or about $25 a week. Players in the AAGBBL made between $50 and $125 a week during a three-month, 108-game season. Phyllis “Sugar” Koehn, who played for the Comets, told the Chicago Tribune that she made $60 a week: “Twice the money I made on my job as a secretary at Oscar Mayer.”
In Reel Life: Kit and Dottie take the train east and try out at “Harvey Park,” with its ivy-covered outfield wall.
In Real Life: Even non-baseball fans can recognize that “Harvey Park” is Wrigley Field, where the league’s final tryouts were held. The ivy was there in 1943 — Bill Veeck, in 1937, had planted the 350 Japanese bittersweet plants and 200 Boston ivy plants at the base of the wall. Many of the outfielders are shown making catches near the ivy during tryouts, but, during one player’s dramatic grab, the fence all of the sudden sheds its ivy, turns to wood, and fronts a stand of trees, rather than bleachers. Movie magic!
In Reel Life: The girls look like they can, indeed, play very good baseball.
In Real Life: In 1991, Sports Illustrated reported that shooting on the film started a year behind schedule because “the producers were unable to find enough prospects with credible baseball skills.” Debra Winger was supposed to star as Dottie, and worked out with former Southern Cal coach Rod Dedeaux. (Winger dropped out, rumor had it, when she learned that Madonna would be in the movie.) Among the actresses tutored by St. John’s baseball coach Joe Russo on the East Coast, in preparation for tryouts for the movie, were Madonna, Joan Jett, Demi Moore, Ally Sheedy, Brooke Shields and Uma Thurman.
When Russo first told Madonna to “take your stance,” she asked, “What’s a stance?” But, Russo told SI, Madonna had “great potential.” Russo added that his main job in working with the actresses was “to make sure they don’t throw like girls. A lot of them do, you know.”
In Reel Life: The players seem to be very supportive of each other, with a “we’re all in this together attitude,” even during the tryouts.
In Real Life: Brenda Feigen, who helped establish Ms. Magazine (among many other accomplishments on the front lines of the feminist movement), wrote in her autobiography that Penny Marshall stole the idea for the movie from her. “The world may think that Penny Marshall is thoughtful on women’s issues (but) in reality, she screwed another woman just the way the worst male directors do,” wrote Feigen in “Not One of the Boys: Living Life as a Feminist.”
In Reel Life: It’s explained at tryouts that there will be four teams with 16 players on each team.
In Real Life: There were four teams — the Rockford (Ill.) Peaches, Racine (Wis.) Belles, Kenosha (Wis.) Comets, and South Bend (Ind.) Blue Sox. Each team had 15 players, a manager, and a chaperone.
In Reel Life: During tryouts (and later, during a game), “All The Way” Mae Mordabito (played by Madonna) slides headfirst into third.
In Real Life: ”I never, ever remember anybody sliding headfirst,” said Shirley Burkovich, who played for the Peaches and other teams, in 1992.
In Reel Life: During the tryouts and in games, the players pitch overhand, and play on what look like regulation diamonds with regulation-size hardballs.
In Real Life: Play in 1943 was a weird hybrid of softball and baseball, and the league was initially called the All-American Girls Softball League (early in the first season the name was changed to All American Girl’s Baseball League). The ball was 12 inches in circumference — the same size as a softball — and pitchers threw underhand from 40 feet away. It was 65 feet between bases. Unlike in softball, players could slide and steal bases.
The rules changed throughout the league’s 11-year history. In 1948, pitchers were first allowed to throw the ball — now 10 3/8 inches — overhand, from 50 feet away. By the league’s last season, the ball was 9 inches, the same as a regulation baseball, and pitchers threw 60 feet (not 60 feet, 6 inches) to home plate. The bases in 1954 were 85 feet apart.
In Reel Life: The players protest against their uniforms, which are short dresses.
In Real Life: Many of the players resented the charm and beauty requirements for playing in the league, including the uniforms, which (as accurately depicted in the film) often left their legs bruised and bleeding. The uniforms, which resembled the outfits worn by female figure skaters of the era (with the additions of satin tights, knee-high socks and baseball hats), were designed by Otis Shepard, Wrigley’s art designer.
In Reel Life: When Mae protests that there are no pockets in her uniform for cigarettes, the rules are laid out: No smoking, no drinking, and no men. All “social engagements” must be approved by the team chaperone.
In Real Life: Those were the rules. The average age of the first batch of players was about 20, and most were away from home on their own for the first time. Many of the players were still underage.
“They were strict,” Betty Trezza, who played for the Belles, told Newsday in 1992. “We weren’t allowed to drink, among other things. But you have to understand when I first started I was 18, and I wasn’t one to drink anyway, like a lot of the young girls. I think the wildest thing we ever did was if our manager threw us a party if we did well, he might buy a case of beer. For 15 girls, it doesn’t go too far.”
In Reel Life: Rosie O’Donnell, one of the world’s most famous lesbians, plays tough third baseman Doris Murphy, a former dance hall bouncer. During a scene in which the girls go out to the “Suds Bucket” to dance, O’Donnell cuts in on Mae, practically tackling her (male) partner in the process. After they’re done dancing, the man strokes Doris’ hair and kisses her, but she seems indifferent.
In Real Life: One of Wrigley’s main concerns in promoting the league was to avoid the image of the best barnstorming women’s softball teams — “short-haired, mannishly dressed toughies,” as described by Jack Fincher in a 1989 Smithsonian article. In other words, Wrigley wanted to distance the league from suspicions of lesbianism.
In Reel Life: The girls go to charm school, where they are given lessons on drinking coffee (“Sip. Down. Don’t slurp.”), walking with books on their heads, and sitting.
In Real Life: Charm school was part of spring training during the league’s first three seasons. Players were instructed on the application of makeup, proper manners, and “graceful social deportment at large.” Players were also given “A Guide for All American Girls,” which included, among other information, a list of what should be included in their “beauty kit”:
cleansing cream
lipstick
rouge — medium
cream deodorant
mild astringent
face powder for brunette
hand lotion
hair remover
In Reel Life: Jimmie Dugan (played by Tom Hanks) is a “fall-down drunk” whose career was ended by a knee injury that he got after setting a fire at a hotel and then jumping out the window. Jimmy says he hit 484 home runs for Harvey’s ball club, and at the end of the movie, in the Hall of Fame, there’s a “tribute” sign featuring the fictional Dugan, saying that he hit 58 home runs in 1936. It also says that Dugan played third base and was born in 1906 and died in 1987.
In Real Life: Although the filmmakers insist that all characters, including Dugan, are fictional (weren’t you fooled by Harvey the candy bar man?), Dugan bears a striking similarity to Jimmie Foxx, who managed briefly in the league. Foxx, a Hall of Famer, played in the majors from 1925 to 1945, mostly for the Athletics and Red Sox. Foxx was a first baseman, but played 141 games at third. In his best season, 1932, he hit 58 home runs, drove in 169, and compiled a .364 batting average and .469 on-base percentage. Foxx hit 534 home runs in his career. He was known for his drinking and died in 1967, at the age of 59.
In Reel Life: There are only a few fans at the first game, and, overall, the crowd is a hostile one that makes fun of the players. Witty heckling abounds. For example, one “fan” cries: “Hey, glamour puss, can you throw the ball?”
In Real Life: Most fans knew from the start that the girls could play, and were supportive. Still, the league handbook addressed common misperceptions that the players might have to deal with, and noted, “All of the more vigorous forms of play and exercise have been looked upon with more or less disapproval.” The League felt it necessary to inform the players that there was no evidence, as widely believed, that play of a “strenuous nature” would interfere with childbearing, and no evidence that “rougher sports will destroy ‘femininity.’ “
In Reel Life: Dugan chews out Evelyn, his right fielder, and she starts to cry. Dugan says, “There’s no crying. There’s no crying in baseball. Rogers Hornsby was my manager, and he called me a talking pile of pigs—. I didn’t cry.”
In Real Life: Ballplayers cry all the time. Lou Gehrig cried on the day he was honored at Yankee Stadium. Mike Schmidt cried when he retired. Kirby Puckett and Bill Mazeroski cried on the day they were inducted into the HOF. Mike Hampton cried when he was honored as Houston Astros MVP. Luis Tiant cried after Bucky Dent hit his famous homer. And just about every fan of good television shed a few tears when the movie was made into a series in 1993 — Penny Marshall and Tom Hanks directed episodes of the mercifully short-lived attempt to extend the League “brand” to the small screen.
In Reel Life: All of the games in the movie are played during the day, and a radio announcer, who is being broadcast over the stadium’s PA system, laments Rockford’s scant attendance. Ellen Sue Gotlander, the “former Miss Georgia” who plays shortstop and pitcher for the Peaches, keenly observes, “People better start showing up. If we don’t have fans, we don’t have a league.”
In Real Life: Most AAGPBL games were played at night (including the first night game at Wrigley Field, an all-star game on July 1, 1943). In 1943, the league drew about 210,000 fans, or an average of about 1,000 a game. By 1948, the expanded league’s 10 teams drew about 900,000 million, but by 1954, attendance dropped to only 270,000, dooming the league to extinction.
In Reel Life: Attendance soars as the players start hotdogging: Dottie does a split while catching a pop foul, Mae catches a fly ball in her cap, and Doris, leaning into the stands to catch a ball, also grabs a hot dog in her mouth.
In Real Life: Madonna’s showboat move might have pleased the fans, but it would not have resulted in an out — for a fly ball to be an out the catch must be made in the hand or glove. In fact, the use of the cap is specifically prohibited. In any case, “Stuff like that never went on,” said Dorothy Schroeder, who played all 12 seasons. “We were deadly serious about our game.” But one player, Faye Dancer, was an early version of Ozzie Smith, cartwheeling and backflipping her way to the outfield.
In Reel Life: After the league gains in popularity, the girls start to attract male admirers.
In Real Life: The players called their groupies, who did exist, “Clubhouse Clydes” or “Locker Room Leonards.”
“Wherever we were, guys used to hang outside our hotel, hollering up to us,” Helen Callaghan St. Aubin (mother of former Astro Casey Candaele) said in 1992. “We’d throw our bras down to them.” All-American Girls gone wild, indeed.
In Reel Life: Madonna plays “All the Way” Mae, her nickname a reference to her “loose” ways.
In Real Life: AAGBBL veteran Marge Cryan told the Orange County Register in 1992 that one of her teammates resembled Mae: “She had a beau in every town, and she liked to entertain them in her room. That caused some problems.”
In Reel Life: In a very short scene toward the end of the movie, a black woman on the sidelines picks up an errant ball and throws it hard and straight to Dottie.
In Real Life: Black women were banned from playing in the AAGPBL throughout its 12-year existence, even though Major League Baseball was integrated in 1947. Apparently the “All” in “All-American Girls” was just a figure of speech.
In Reel Life: Betty Spaghetti gets a telegram from the War Department telling her that her husband, George, has been killed. The Western Union delivery man, noting the awkwardness of the moment, says, “The least they can do is send someone official.”
In Real Life: During World War II, the person designated by the soldier to be notified in case of emergency would receive a telegram from the Army Adjutant General, with a short note of regret and basic facts about the death. Often telegrams would arrive weeks after a death had occurred. It wasn’t until the Vietnam War that survivors would receive a personal visit from a military “casualty notifier,” after which they’d receive official notification via telegram.
In Reel Life: Near the end of the movie, Dugan softens up and signs a baseball for a kid, who reads it out loud: “Avoid the clap, Jimmy Dugan.”
In Real Life: Gonorrhea (“the clap”) and other sexually transmitted diseases were a major concern for the military during World War II, and someone like Dugan would have been well aware of the affliction, and its prevalence. According to the American Heritage dictionary, the term probably comes from the Old French term “clapier,” meaning brothel.
In Reel Life: Before a World Series game, Dugan leads a prayer. “Uh, Lord, hallowed be Thy name. May our feet be swift; may our bats be mighty; may our balls … be plentiful. Lord, I’d just like to thank You for that waitress in South Bend. You know who she is — she kept calling Your name. And God, these are good girls, and they work hard. Just help them see it all the way through. OK, that’s it.”
In Real Life: Dugan, like many semi-religious folk, came up with his own variation on the “Our Father” prayer. As paraphrased by St. Francis of Assisi, what’s asked for in the standard prayer are less material things: a better knowledge of God, greater love for neighbors, and so on. The prayer usually ends with the familiar refrain, “And lead us not into temptation: hidden or obvious, sudden or unforeseen. But deliver us from evil: Present, past, or to come. Amen.”
In Reel Life: Racine beats Rockford in the first “Women’s World Series,” which goes seven games.
In Real Life: Racine beat Kenosha to win the league’s first championship in a best-of-five series.
In Reel Life: In the film’s nauseating “coda,” we’re brought back to the present. AAGBBL veterans reunite at Cooperstown for the opening of an exhibit about the league. A man named Bob gives a short speech before a ribbon-cutting ceremony, and says, “It’s taken many years, but you are the first women ever to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.”
In Real Life: The Baseball Hall of Fame recognized the women with a permanent “Women in Baseball” exhibit in 1988. None of the players were “inducted” into the Hall, although some would like to think it was so:
“Some (players) are … granting to themselves a status not officially conferred,” writes Susan E. Johnson in “When Women Played Hardball.” “They routinely refer to themselves as having been ‘inducted into the Hall of Fame.’ This is not so on several counts, and the Players Association attempts to educate players about this, often to little avail.” Perhaps the impact of a major motion picture erroneously proclaiming their induction has had an impact.
Two iconic female performers—Madonna and Lady Gaga—are hitting the road for tours this summer and fall. Madonna is the bestselling female recording artist of all time, and Gaga is close behind. As these two set out to rake in mega-millions of dollars, what can small business owners learn from them? These seven lessons prove invaluable for any business.
Start small. Carefully cultivated, a niche customer base can grow into something big. Both Gaga and Madonna started out performing in gay clubs, garnering the early support from the gay and dance music community. Then they used that foundation as a springboard to mainstream acceptance by reaching out to an influential teenage market.
Takeaway: Don’t abandon your loyal customers as you grow.
Image matters. Neither performer caught on with fans until they found their image. Gaga’s early style was more Jersey Shore than Versace; she dyed her hair blonde after people kept confusing her with singer Amy Winehouse. Madonna’s “boy toy” look set the style for legions of teenage girls, while Gaga’s outré outfits, from lobster hats to meat dresses, make her instantly memorable (and talked about) wherever she goes.
Takeaway: In today’s visual society (Instagram, Pinterest) your image has to stick in customers’ minds.
Reinvent yourself. Madonna gave up those rubber bracelets and belly shirts long ago to become a master of reinvention, with a new hair color, image and look for almost every album and tour. Gaga has yet to catch her here.
Takeaway: Evolving your business keeps your customers interested, attracts new “fans,” keeps you current—and makes news.
Be true to yourself. Reinvention doesn’t mean giving up what matters to your business. Both Gaga and Madonna use sexual imagery, criticize religious intolerance and support potentially controversial causes. While these tactics might turn off some potential fans, staying true to your values will win you more loyal fans in the end.
Takeaway: Don’t shock for shock value alone–it has to come from the heart.
Get social. Having emerged during the age of social media, Gaga has built a huge fan base online—more than 25 million Twitter followers and 51 million Facebook fans. Madonna doesn’t tweet and has “only” 9 million Facebook fans. Why the discrepancy? One look at Madonna’s Facebook page and you can tell someone else is posting for her—while Gaga’s page is unmistakably filled with posts from the Lady herself.
Takeaway: Authenticity matters.
Diversify. Madonna moved into acting and directing early on and has since added a dizzying number of business ventures, including apparel, publishing and even a chain of health clubs. Gaga recently announced the launch of her first fragrance.
Takeaway: Diversification is key to expansion, but make sure you move into areas that make sense for you.
Work hard. Both Madonna and Gaga are known for their hard-driving, perfectionist ways. They hold their teams to the highest standards as well. Both artists do everything required to make their vision come true for their fans and deliver an experience the audience will never forget.
Takeaway: Expect nothing less than the best from yourself and your team. This just might be the most important lesson of all.
The most common question I have been asked about my entrepreneurial life is this: “What is the key to building a multi-million dollar company?” The answer is quite simple. There is no single key.
