JOSEPH MANCUSO The Entrepreneur?s Entrepreneur

The Entrepreneur?s Entrepreneur & Founder of Chief Executive Officers Clubs

Amid the darkness Joseph Mancuso come up with an edifying idea of vigilantly engaging the top-notch CEOs from around the globe for networking under one umbrella and named it CEO Clubs Worldwide. He originated it back in 1977 and shaped into not-for-profit Chief Executive Officers Clubs International. Since 40 years of incessant efforts strived by Mancuso the CEO Clubs International succeeded in making a benchmark of its own kind. CEO Clubs International caters in its duvet powerhouse of CEO?s running businesses with about ?$20,000,000 of average annual sales. The club cloaks over 15,000 current active members in the US and equal number over-seas. Mancuso is a renowned and prodigy orator, to gather the gist of the gen which Mancuso delivers in his workshops and seminar the participants have paid over $300,000,000. CEO Club has not confined its wreath to one border or so, it has weave its web across the globe. Having said that the Clubs have chapters in China, India, Dubai, Greece, Philippines, Australia, Fiji and now in Pakistan. He is often referred to as undisputed king of words, he is a master in the art of playing with words. He has flowed his ink in twenty-six books, and currently ten books are classified as backlist books, which sell about the same quantity every year. In addition, Joe has tailored his literary skills in plentiful magazine articles and booklets; in such a diverse magazines as Harvard Business Review, Playboy, Penthouse, Success, The Journal of Marketing and The Journal of Small Business. His materials about business plan preparation have outsold all other authors combined. Joe holds an Electrical Engineering degree from WPI and an MBA from the Harvard Business School. His Doctorate is from Boston University in Educational Administration. He was the Chairman of the Management Department at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) in Massachusetts before launching CEO Clubs International in 1977.

EVOLVE: Every journey starts from somewhere;?every story has that one moment-an?experience, getting desperate, getting fed
up; what was your inspiration?

Joseph Mancuso: Well I was quite fortunate that at a very young age of 25 years, I was a co-founder of a company which earned lot of ?money that paved my way to reassure my vocation consequently making castle in the air. I did my electrical engineering degree at WPI and returned to Entrepreneurship for the next seven years. I stroked with a benign inkling which convinced me that education is expedient albeit a very slow way of learning. I despotically metamorphosed my view that learning by experience is better than learning of a classroom. That?s why in 1977, I left the
school and started CEO Club so we may learn by experience which is the most rewarding and important type of learning from one another. When I was at the school, I wrote 27 books and seven million copies of those books were sold, so my name was known. Within a span of one year I had a few hundred members of CEO Club. For first 25 years I worked only in USA and today about 15,000 CEOs from all cities of America joined my CEO Club. Till then, I had no overseas plans but in year 1999-2000 I went to China. Moreover, US Government supported me financially to conduct Government
Goodwill Seminars and then I got the opportunity to visit Pakistan, India and Bangladesh.

EVOLVE:What challenges and hindrances?you had to face in your journey?

Joseph Mancuso: CEOs are like calling cats. You can understand it through an example. If you have a cat and a dog, when you call the dog it comes to you and it will be happy to see you but the cat never comes when you call it. You have to catch the cat and CEO is same thing like cat that you have to catch him. For me, in the beginning it was very difficult for me as I spent money and faced some loss but later I used some high profile American names like Donald Trump, Steve Jobs and Mike Bloomberg. They were speakers at my events and these events were attended by CEOs who wanted to
listen and learn from them. You can find the names of 300 high profile speakers on my website. See website
www.ceoclubs.org
www.ceoclubsworldwide.com.
Secondly, I arranged small groups to visit different destinations. I made these trips to almost 30 places including China and Dubai and the CEOs made money (and had fun) out of these trips. Hence the CEO CLUBS mission became ?Making Money, Having Fun all while we are learning?. To me, the more you make money, more happiness you get.

EVOLVE: Do you find any conflicts on your?way while working with people of variouseconomic environments having entirely different?practices? Is there alignment or misalignment?at the different levels?

Joseph Mancuso: Yes, obviously there were. For example in China, big shots do not speak English. That was the biggest issue. I have visited China for 30 times and can speak a bit Chinese myself. Now they know me and trust me. Today, in China 500 million people can speak English while this number is 300 million in USA. China is my number 1 market. We make more money in China than any other country. India is on 2nd number in terms of big economy. I have Greece, Romania, Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Egypt chapters. As far as the ranking of chapters is concerned USA is no.1, while China is no. 2, India no. 3, Korea no. 4 and Japan is on no. 5. I only go with big economies.

EVOLVE: Do you personally believe and?support that economic development should?be led by the private sector and supported
by the public sector?

Joseph Mancuso: In America the government?does not give us any help. This is the reason that Chinese like CEO Club. If there is government?s money then Chinese will not trust us. We want money from private sector and want government to stay away from our business. We do not want government support. In terms of Pakistan, it is interesting that 30 years ago, the public sector was stronger than the private sector. Probably, it will be better to have government support as far as Pakistan is concerned. The problem with government support is that when you have it, you have to make the government happy as per their standards.

CEOs are like calling cats. You can understand it through an example. If you have a cat and a dog, when you call the dog it comes to you and it will be happy to see you but the cat never comes when you call it. You have to catch the cat and CEO is same thing like cat that you have to catch him

EVOLVE: How do you find people to bring into?your organization that truly care about the organization
the way you do?

Joseph Mancuso: Finding the right people for right job. Success story starts with the selection of right team. The hard card for me is to look for the people who think like me and share the same personality. The trouble is that you do not find the right person in your first attempt. You have to browse and explore. For CEO Club the partner must have a strong network with quest of learning and fun with a basic ingredient of honesty.

EVOLVE: Do you believe that is there any secret or?formula for long term success?

Joseph Mancuso: The rule of the thumb is hard work and luck. The harder you work, the luckier you get. I believe that the only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work.

EVOLVE: What makes you happy and what has?been your most satisfying moment in business?

Joseph Mancuso: The moments passed with my family are happy moments for me. Moreover, I prefer hooking up my family on all my trips.

EVOLVE: What was your biggest mistake and how?did you learn from failure?

Joseph Mancuso: Choosing the wrong person for CEO Club South Africa Chapter was the mistake. We wasted 3-4 years with wrong people but this gives learning to further improve the selection criteria.

EVOLVE: Excluding yours, what company or business
do you admire the most?
Joseph Mancuso: Steve Jobs, that?s my hero. I also have written a book on him. Second is Warren Buffet then Mike Bloomberg and Donald Trump are my top favorite.

EVOLVE: Any message for Pakistanis?

Joseph Mancuso: Pakistan is a very special location and a country where business is growing. China, Korea, Japan and United States are fully willing to work due to rising economy of Pakistan. I would love to find the best CEO to head a chapter of our Club in Pakistan.