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Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to next generation of leaders: Listen and get...

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source link: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/former-microsoft-ceo-steve-ballmer-to-next-generation-of-leaders-listen-and-get-after-it-215553697.html
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Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to next generation of leaders: Listen and get after it

Brian Sozzi
·Executive Editor
Fri, December 15, 2023, 6:55 AM GMT+9·4 min read

You don't become the CEO of software giant Microsoft (MSFT), owner of the NBA's LA Clippers, and one of the most well-known leaders from the upper echelons of corporate America by sitting on your rear end.

In a nutshell, that is the leadership story of Steven "Steve" Ballmer.

"My father was an immigrant from Switzerland. I don't even know if he finished high school. He never went to college. And early on he started talking to me about going to a good school, but he had an expression that really resonated. It'll sound both silly and prescient," recalled Ballmer, the USAFacts founder, inside a Washington, D.C., office in a new episode of Yahoo Finance's Lead This Way.

While somewhat holding back from serving up a dose of his trademark superhuman energy — which has been seen everywhere from the sidelines of LA Clippers games to Microsoft product unveilings in the 1990s — Ballmer said leaders have to decide if they are all in on something or all out.

"If you are going to do a job, do a job. And if you're not going to do a job, don't do a job. And, you know, it's kind of like if you're going to get into something, get after it. I'll use the word hardcore," Ballmer, 67, added, pointing to his father's early leadership advice.

Steve Ballmer on Lead This Way.
Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on Yahoo Finance's Lead This Way.

Clearly, Ballmer has been getting after life for decades.

He was employee No. 30 at Microsoft, where he started as Bill Gates's assistant in 1980. By 2000, he was named the CEO at the height of the dot-com bubble.

His rallying cries at Microsoft product launches became legendary. Ditto his behind-the-scenes hustle and nearly unmatched love for the company.

It was that combination of heart and hustle that saw a host of innovations from Microsoft come to market under Ballmer. The Xbox gaming platform launched in 2001. In 2011, Ballmer helped pull together the $8.5 billion acquisition of online communication company Skype — years before remote work became a thing.

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