“The amount of money you earn is the measure of the value that others place on your contribution. To increase the value of the money you are getting out, you must increase the value of the work that you are putting in.”
To tell you the truth, halfway through reading this book, I had to stop and put it down.
The nostalgia of dropping thousands of dollars on a useless post-secondary education that taught obsolete/irrelevant theoretical skills is still fresh in my mind.
When it comes down to it, how did those who did not graduate from a post-secondary institution become multi-millionaires?
The secret, it seems, comes down to seven of the most important skills in self-promotion known to man. Yet many either vilify these skills, don’t invest enough time in them, or do not pursue them at all, and would rather offset them to someone else.
These are seven success skills that fall in the “this is obvious” category, yet are covered using deep, meaningful stories of real entrepreneurs. Stories that place us into a reality of not going through the conveyor belt of post-secondary education, and instead being driven to learn the skills on your very own, full time!
The 7 Success Skills
Straight from the book itself, these success skills are:
- #1: How to make your work meaningful and your meaning work
- #2: How to find great mentors and teachers, connect with powerful and influential people, and build a world-class network
- #3: What every successful person needs to know about marketing, and how to teach yourself
- #4: What every successful person needs to know about sales, and how to teach yourself
- #5: How to invest for success (the art of bootstrapping)
- #6: Build the brand of you
- #7: The entrepreneurial mindset vs. the employee mindset
So these are: find meaning in your work, network and provide value to those above you, learn marketing & sales, self-learn, save and reinvest back into your business, brand yourself, and entrepreneur vs. employee mindset.
What Makes This Book Work
Each chapter is incredibly inspirational because of its collective meaningful stories, a deep convincing argument for pursuit, and finally, there is a strong call to action in every section.
One of the most important points? You don’t need thousands of dollars of debt to achieve a world-class education (with exceptions).
Want to know the secret to getting a millionaire-class marketing education, for free? Subscribe to the email lists of successful direct-marketing multi-millionaire entrepreneurs, and LEARN how they do it!
What about selling? A simple library book called SPIN Selling—which studied 35,000 sales calls with $1 million of funding—drew up one primary conclusion: discuss what, why, and how a product or service will affect the life of a buyer. Then lead them into a sale based only on whether their motivations are correlated with your offer.
No cash? No need. Pick up a book, watch a tutorial video, listen to instructional audio tapes. Learn, learn, learn, on your own. Do you really need to learn useless theory for $500–$1,000/course, when all of the education you need is available at the library, bookstore, or online?
Many of the entrepreneurs in this book were actually in their 30s, 40s, and some 50s before they decided to rework their approach in life and seek self-education instead.
The Networking Mindset
One thing Ellsberg nails is the concept of giving before you ask. The entrepreneurs profiled in this book didn’t cold-call millionaires and beg for mentorship. They found ways to PROVIDE VALUE first—whether that was volunteering, creating something useful, or simply being genuinely helpful without expecting anything in return.
This resonated with me deeply. Every meaningful connection I’ve made in business came from leading with value, not from handing out business cards at networking events like some kind of corporate robot. The people who succeed at building networks aren’t the ones with the best elevator pitch—they’re the ones who actually give a damn about helping others first.
Ellsberg also makes the point that your network isn’t just about WHO you know—it’s about who knows YOU and what you bring to the table. That distinction matters more than most people realize.
Luckily, The Education of Millionaires is one of those “nouveau riche” primers that covers the absolute fundamentals of becoming successful via wealth.
Personal Reflection
Finally, everything I’ve learned in this blog, I have learned on my own. From creating the website, writing, internet marketing, selling, product development, and making money—all have been self-taught. Even the process of finding something you are passionate about, and following through, comes from perpetual self-development.
To say that I believe 100% in the message of this book is an absolute and sincere statement.
So your call to action? Go to the library and pick this up. As I said in the beginning, I was a bit unnerved at the simplicity of the message, yet at how powerful the results actually are. Teach yourself, and apply.
Food for Thought
If you are not reading at least 20 books per year, related to your niche or in self-development, then I want you to start today!
Look, you don’t need a book telling you that being self-driven and a self-learner are the ingredients to success in life. You really don’t. This book will not push you to do anything. You may get an inspirational high from reading it, but UNLESS you yourself take that CALL TO ACTION, then don’t even bother.
I worry that our thinking about education has gotten to be 100 percent outsourced. People just follow the tracked programs other people tell them to do, without questioning it at all. I worry that we’ve forgotten how to think for ourselves about education, and we need to recover that. My number one candidate for a bubble in the United States today is higher education. It is believed incredibly intensely. To question it is to put yourself outside the circle of respectable belief.
— The Education of Millionaires
Thanks for reading.
— Leonidas
