INITIATIVE AND LEADERSHIP 323use of the $25,000, which resulted in an established and self-sustaining
business by the end of the first year. The benefit accruing to the college
was the new students secured for its regular commercial and business
course as a result of the money spent in advertising my department, all
advertising having been done under the name of the college.
Today that business college is one of the most successful schools
of its kind, and it stands as a monument of sound evidence with which
to demonstrate the value of allied effort.
COMMENTARY
While not perfectly parallel, the stories of Hill's course and the story of the rise
of Microsoft share the basic principles of this law of success. In both cases the
entrepreneurs didn't have the money to launch their projects themselves. In both
cases they took the initiative to find someone who did, and then made the case for
why it was in that party's interests to finance the project. As Hill has pointed out,
once his course had paid back the seed capital he then owned the business, and
the partner college went on to become the most successful college of its kind.
To continue the example of Microsoft, in 1980 IBM wanted someone to write
the software for a personal computer line they were about to launch that was
far more sophisticated than the Altair. They wanted results in just three months.
Microsoft agreed to do it.
Allen and Gates bought an operating system from another company and
began adapting it for IBM. They called it MS-DOS-for Microsoft Disk Operating
System. Gates, Allen, and their staff met IBM's deadline, and the IBM PC caused
a sensation.
It also inspired an immediate wave of clones, less expensive versions of
the IBM PC. Microsoft's deal with IBM allowed them to license their software to
whomever they pleased. And that's what they did, riding the huge surge in popularity
of home computers. But Microsoft didn't stop there. They created a worldwide sales
force to license their software in other countries and they continually worked to
improve MS-DOS. In four years their sales quadrupled.