Have you ever wondered what were these seemingly easy successful entrepreneurs doing before their businesses took off and made them a household name?
Not everybody inherits a family fortune or is born with a silver spoon in their mouth.
Advertisement
Many successful entrepreneurs like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos started their successful journey from a very humble background. They worked odd day jobs to make their dream come true of coming to the center stage one day.
From flipping hamburgers at McDonald’s to sweeping sweltering factory boiler rooms, even these billionaires have put their blood, sweat and tears to make their dreams a reality.
7 Surprising Past Jobs of Successful Entrepreneurs
Here are surprising past jobs of these 7 successful entrepreneurs that are astonishing as well as motivating.
1. Elon Musk —- Boiler Room Cleaner to FOUNDER OF TESLA & SPACEX
Net Worth- 180 billion USD (2021)
Elon Musk, the richest man on the planet has created a buzz around him.
He is the man because of whom you will be able to sit in electric vehicles. Musk is quoted acknowledging about his “terrible upbringing” with a lot of adversities.
Musk took on his hardest gig yet: cleaning out the boiler room of a lumber mill. For $18 an hour, Musk said in the biography that he had to “put on this hazmat suit and then shimmy through this little tunnel that you can barely fit in. Then, you have to shovel, and you take the sand and goop and other residue, which is still steaming hot, and you have to shovel it through the same hole you came in through.”
Jeff Bezos is the man behind your incredible online shopping experience on Amazon.
In his early days, he was just like any other boy who worked on his grandfather’s ranch in Texas. There he learned all the virtues and hardships of physical work. He was a right little farmhand who did odd chores around the ranch, vaccinated and castrated cattle.
He also spent one summer during his school days working at McDonald’s. Later, he developed an interest in computers and technology, and his scientific talent and tech proficiency were quite visible.
It’s a wake-up call for all the ambitious people out there roaming the outer limits of our society.
3. Reed Hastings —- High School Math Teacher to Co-FOUNDER of NETFLIX
Net Worth- 5 billion USD (2020)
Do you also equate watching a movie or TV series with Netflix or let’s say while talking about OTT platforms the first name that comes to your mind is Netflix?
The mastermind behind on-demand video streaming platform is Co-founder Reed Hastings. He has made watching a movie or TV show easier for us, it’s just a click away. It is now that he is reaping the benefits of the brilliant idea.
During his earlier days, he also struggled a lot. He was a member of the Peace Corps and through them went to Swaziland where he ended up teaching maths to high school students. Through the experiences he had there, he got the courage to start his own venture and become an entrepreneur.
4. Howard Schultz —- Bartender to CEO of STARBUCKS
Net Worth- 4.300 billion USD (2020)
“It’s a brew-tiful day to have a Starbucks drink.”
Does it happen to you as well that whenever you think of coffee you immediately associate it with Starbucks. Or if you are a coffee lover and whenever you have a headache your forever go-to is Starbucks.
Then Howard Schultz is the man because of whom you are able to relish Starbucks ‘ coffee.
He had won a Football Scholarship to college, but he didn’t want to continue playing it. So instead, he paid his way through bartending gigs and even selling his blood.
Later he held a job at Xerox before moving on. It was only by the age of 29 that Schultz encountered Starbucks, a chain of 3 coffee shops, mainly selling ground coffee for home-usage.
5. Do Won Chang —-Janitor to FOUNDER OF FOREVER 21
Net Worth- 800 million USD (2019)
Chang migrated from Korea to America and held 3 jobs in his initial years. He worked in a coffee shop in the morning, a gas station in the afternoon, and as a janitor at night.
These were in addition to the array of other odd jobs he held — dishwashing, delivery, anything physically demanding.
Then, he noticed that most people from the garment industry drive luxury cars.
And that’s when Chang and his wife decided to open the first store in Los Angeles named Fashion 21. Later on, they changed the name from Fashion 21 to Forever 21. At present, he is a proud owner of 480 retail stores in over 50 countries.
6. Jack Ma —- Tourist Guide To FOUNDER OF ALIBABA
Net Worth- 62.10 billion USD (2021)
Before Alibaba was born, a few decades back, there was a time when Ma, a conscientious little boy, would ride his bicycle around his hometown of Hangzhou, guiding tourists to different spots in the city, in exchange for being tutored in English.
It was during his stint as a tour guide that Ma was christened ‘Jack’ by a tourist he befriended because his original name in Chinese was too difficult to pronounce.
7. Jimmy Wales –— University Teacher To CO-FOUNDER OF WIKIPEDIA
Net Worth- 10 million USD (2016)
Whenever you are in doubt, you always ‘Wiki it’, without thinking a second, right? Wikipedia is the biggest non-profit online encyclopedia that exists today, and we have Jimmy Wales to thank for it.
But before the creation of this open content site, there was a time when Wales was preparing for his Ph.D. and teaching graduate students in the meantime. Eventually, he discontinued his Ph.D. along with teaching and started a job in finance.
The journey of all these entrepreneurs too had many trials and tribulations, but reaching the finishing line is what has outshined all of their previous struggles and made them what they are today.