>> Hi, I'm Lewis Howes,  New York Times  best-selling author and entrepreneur.
And welcome to "The School of Greatness," where we interview the most influential minds and leaders in the world to inspire you to live your best life today.
And in this episode, we sit down with Daymond John, successful entrepreneur, author, speaker, and one of the most popular TV-show personalities.
Today he teaches us the keys to success and how you can negotiate for what you want in order to achieve a greater life.
I'm so glad you're here today, so let's dive in and let the class begin.
♪ ♪ You went through some health stuff the last couple years.
>> Yeah, and what I didn't know at the time was stage II cancer.
>> Yeah.
>> The doctor knew what it was.
It was the size of a golf ball, but thank God it was the slowest-growing cancer, which is thyroid cancer, but if you don't treat it, it can go to your lymph nodes and then move to your brain.
And when they sent that rock that was in my throat, when they sent it away to get tested, it was about two weeks until I would get the actual test, so I had to really negotiate with myself -- and I went to -- I'm not gonna call it a dark place, but basic reality is that I said to myself, "Am I prepared to die?"
And I said, you know, "Listen, I lived a life of 10 men and women, right?"
My oldest girl is beautiful.
They're older now -- 27- and 22-year-old.
They're great contributors to society.
My ex-wife raised them really well.
My mother -- Let me be selfish.
"I don't want to see her die.
Right?
So maybe if I die before her by something that was not in my power, I got a young daughter.
She's 3 years old.
Guess what.
She won't even remember me."
So I said, "Let me think about unraveling the businesses that I have, spending more time with my kids, and really accepting that whether 2, 5, or 10 years, I won't be on the rock no more, right?"
>> Mm-hmm.
>> But then the other negotiation was, "No, no mother should bury her son.
My two oldest girls, I want to still be around to protect them and maybe I want to have grandkids one day.
My littlest baby, she needs to have the best father who loves her the most that can be there for her."
And so one week out of the two weeks waiting for the diagnosis to come back had passed, but after I decided and I negotiated with myself what's my "why," why am I doing this, what am I willing to put in to fight this thing, I forgot I even had it.
>> Really?
>> Yeah.
The one other week that I was -- When the doctor finally called me and he told me that it was cancerous, but he said, "Let me come and check your lymph nodes and everything else," I had forgot that I even had ca-- I forgot that I was even waiting for the call.
>> How'd you forget it?
>> I was so focused on resetting my goals and adjusting them.
My goals have always been very aggressive.
Resetting them, adjusting them, telling the ones that I love how much I love them, and understanding that, you know, they loved me and they needed me, and I just started looking at all the best things in my life, the people that I get to motivate, the fact that a little brown boy who's dyslexic from Queens with no money, no nothing, came up in the world, and hopefully I can empower the next little brown boy, little brown girl or anybody of any color, culture, or sexual preference to be not the next Daymond John -- be the next Steve Jobs, Warren Buffett, Oprah Winfrey, or President Barack Obama.
If I can do that, then maybe that's what my life was, you know -- that's what God put me on this Earth for.
So it was a power shift.
It was a mental power shift that I had to do myself, and I've always done that over the course of many years of my life, but I didn't realize that I was -- there was a method to what I was doing.
And so when I met a couple of people that happened in a very short period of time and they were telling me, "Man, I can't get nowhere in life" or "I don't have money, I have this and that," and I realized the only difference between me, them, or any of us is what we negotiate through life.
>> Mm.
>> Right?
If we're not born with a silver spoon in, how many are born with a silver spoon in their mouth?
What, 5%, 2% in the world?
>> Very few.
>> 2% of the world.
So the rest of us have gotten to a level of success or broken the cycle in our families or even just become a better person by purely negotiating with themselves and then with others.
>> How do we negotiate with our mind to achieve something we've never achieved?
>> Yeah, so, the first thing to achieve is why do you want to achieve it?
>> Mm-hmm.
>> Like, what is your outcome?
Many of us walk into the room, even into the room where we're talking to ourselves, and they're not honest about the outcome.
What is the outcome?
Why are you going through the motion?
Is it because society has told you that that's what it should be or is that your parents always wanted that from you or is it that you have been neglected in some way and you're trying to please a bunch of people that you can't stand or is it that you want to change the world?
Is it that you know that you being healthier is gonna be able to be around in your family's life much longer or you're gonna be able to stop some social injustices?
Like, what is your "why," first of all?
>> That's the first step -- figuring out why you want that thing.
>> That's the first step.
I always use this example, but people always say, "Well, I want to be a millionaire."
Well, what are you gonna do when you get a million dollars?
>> Right.
>> What are you gonna do with the money?
Some people go, "I'm just gonna keep making money."
Well, alright, okay, you're gonna be a millionaire.
So, if over 65% of the lotto winners are broke three years after winning lotto, same thing with athletes -- >> And football players, yeah.
>> And football players three years out of the league, they didn't know their "why."
The football player knew his "why" of "I want to get that ball or run that play.
I want to become part of a championship team."
>> "Because I love it or because it makes me fulfilled or it's fun."
>> "I love going to the gym.
I'm there for competition."
You know better than I do because obviously you're an athlete.
But if you don't know your "why" for a million dollars, well, when you get the money, are you gonna buy a Bugatti?
>> Mm-hmm.
>> You gonna buy 10 cars?
>> And then what?
>> Yeah.
But then you just have the Bugatti, right?
So now what else you need, right?
Are you gonna buy 10 cars?
Are you going to move to Bali and live off $30,000 a year for 10 years, carve canoes, save the turtles, invest in some stocks because stocks are gonna average out 12% every year and you're gonna turn $600,000 into whatever the case?
And then, when you come back -- like, what are you gonna do?
Yeah, right.
Are you gonna buy investment properties and keep doubling down?
Many people go through life without their "why."
>> What's your "why" right now?
>> So, my "why" is, as I said before, first of all, you know, it's to take care of my family and my wife and my youngest daughter 'cause my oldest daughters, when they were born, I was poor, and all I knew was "I got to go out and make as much money as I can to get these girls in an area where they're more protected, where they can have a good education, and have medical in case something happens to them" and to break the cycle in my family of people who were just average people.
My mother helped break that cycle by being one of the first to go to college.
And me, I'm gonna break that cycle.
But then I said to myself, "But the little girl, now that I have the resources available, it's more how much love can I give her" because I never had experienced wanting to come home purely for love.
I was just so focused on trying to make money because if I wasn't successful like most parents, I'll sleep in a refrigerator box on the street if I have to to make sure those girls had just one place to live.
So that's one of my "whys."
Also, you know, I've been on a show for 11 years that has changed the way that people have understood or they get to educate themselves on being entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs.
I'm invested in various companies.
I'm these people's -- you know, they allowed me to invest in their dreams, so who am I to give up?
I have much more to do.
>> I've interviewed a lot of people, and there's one side of the spectrum where the successful entrepreneurs say, "You know what, Lewis?
The key to growing your business is going all-in on one focus."
That's the key, right?
That's what some say.
>> Yeah.
>> There's others, like yourself, who have invested in every business in the world, it seems like, and seen lots of them grow and been successful in that way.
Do you feel like -- Is that just, like, your creative nature where it's like you want to invest -- this is part of your path right now where you want to invest in lots of brands because you did so much in one thing for so long?
>> So, when I invest in brands and companies, I invest in them because I'm allowing them to -- they're allowing me to be part of their dream, but I'm also learning from them, which is, in return, allowing me to go back to my special skill set and improve it.
So, I'll give you an example.
>> So you're learning from the people you invest in a lot?
>> I'm constantly learning, every single day.
The only Shark that doesn't want clothes is somebody who has 10 clothing companies and 8 are dead.
My reason for being on "Tank," beside investing in other people, is to diversify my portfolio.
So when I talk to a retailer, I go, "Well, I'm already taking up real estate in the clothing area.
I want real estate in electronics area.
I want real estate in lotion," duh-duh-duh.
The last thing I want is socks.
Also, I have -- I don't know -- 20,000 units of socks that I can't sell.
>> [ Laughs ] >> You know, when I can't sell socks, I just send people over to people's houses.
They steal one, and then you have to buy a pair 'cause you lost it.
But they manage to make me understand that today's generation wants to give every time they purchase instead of at the end of the year.
>> They want impact?
>> They want impact.
And they don't want to buy from people who are just making money.
They want to know, "What did you do for somebody else?"
So that's one thing I learned that I apply to all my businesses because you couldn't do that before social media.
You could, but -- >> You couldn't get the word out that much, yeah.
>> Plus you would have to advertise other people's hardships.
>> Yeah.
>> Right?
You wouldn't have self-generated content of people saying thank you, right?
So I learned that.
I also learned that, because the consumer purchased and was part of a movement, they talk about it at the dinner table, at the water cooler, and that's your advertisers.
You don't need the traditional form of advertising because people want to brag when they're doing something well.
>> Right.
>> And then, last but not least, they were showing me how to sell directly to my consumer and not being at the mercy of a retailer who still doesn't know what they're doing.
>> Mm.
>> So they shifted the power in the room to get me to do a deal.
>> So you weren't interested.
>> I wasn't interested.
>> Everyone else was.
>> No, not everybody else was interested, but I was the last Shark to be interested because I'm too jaded by the fashion industry.
Lo and behold, I do the deal, and that's what a power shift is -- being able to know your target, know what's beneficial for that person, know where you're willing to draw the line, and really know how to relate to that person and communicate with them.
I think that a lot of people out there are misinformed.
People that came up to me and started saying, "I can't take control of my life," or I've heard people say or act like somebody else is supposed to issue them power or somebody took power away from them.
And I realized that people always thought negotiation -- first of all, you're negotiating every minute of your life.
You know?
You're negotiating to get into the bathroom before your husband or wife or getting your child on the school bus.
>> Take yourself to the gym, whatever, eat something healthy.
>> Yeah, you're negotiating, right?
And I realized that people always thought negotiation is purely transactional when you get to the table, I'm sitting across from you, right?
And it's not.
It's about building influence.
>> Mm-hmm.
>> Then it's transactional, and the transaction needs to be what's in it for the person across the table, not what's in it for you.
And then, more importantly, it's developing that relationship and letting it grow over the course of time and doing 10, 20, 30, 40 other deals or having 10, 20, 30, 40 other people telling other people how great you are to do other deals.
And people always thought that it was like that.
>> The influence, yeah.
But something you talked about was a story on how, when you were getting started out, you started developing 6X T-shirts with your logo on the back.
I thought that was brilliant because it's the biggest real estate in the club.
>> Yeah.
>> It's free.
>> So what happened was -- >> It's amazing.
>> I guess that's a good point.
So, the story goes that I didn't have a lot of money for shirts.
I grew up in Hollis, Queens, and everybody's from Hollis, Queens.
So what do I have to do?
I had to build influence, and how did I do that?
Well, I had 50 shirts that I could buy, so I bought 50 5X and 6X shirts.
I realized that big guys never had fashionable clothes to wear 'cause all they had was, like, big black shirt or big white shirt, or they'd have to pay a massive amount of money to get it custom-made.
>> Mm-hmm.
>> I bought 50 of these shirts.
I handed them to all the big guys I knew or I would see.
Those big guys ended up being the guys in front of the red rope at a club, the guys who are the bodyguards for people, the guys who are just big billboards and joyous, right?
And they would wear the FUBU stuff 10 times a month because they finally felt fashionable.
>> Wow.
>> What would happen at that point is, after the rappers saw it on these guys for about a year, the rappers would go, "Yo, what's up, man?
Where's mine?"
I'd be like, "I couldn't get to you.
You're too big of a star.
I ain't trying to bother."
"No, no, no, I'll wear it" because then they would ask the big guy who normally is like the bodyguard and they don't have nothing to say to them.
>> "Hey, where'd you get that?"
>> "Where's that little dude at?"
And the big guy would feel good.
"I'll see if I can get you one."
>> "I know a guy."
>> Yeah.
"I'll see if I can get you one."
And that is how I started building influence internally, you know, with my customer.
>> That's smart, yeah.
When I read that, I was like, "You're more creative than you think."
>> No, I get it, but I generally narrow myself down to I'm a numbers person, and end of the day, it was numbers to me.
It was like, "They'll wear it 10 times every 1 time somebody else would wear it.
There's not many of them, and there's a selected number of group around a selected number of people."
I was more about the numbers.
>> When I read that story, I was like, "Okay, who are all the assistants of the most iconic people that I want to know, that I want to interview and what can I send them that would make them be reminded of me?
And every time I want to call or say, 'Hey, is Oprah ready for the interview' or whatever."
I think you were doing research from, like, all the top universities that said that you should lead with the offer first when you're making a negotiation, where I've always heard that you want to wait for someone to make the offer.
>> That is a very common -- >> Wouldn't you think that?
It's like you never want to show your cards.
>> They say that the one who says the number first is the one that loses and things of that nature.
I actually like the negotiation part of laying it on the table.
"Here's where I'm at with this.
Here's what I seek."
>> "Here's what I want."
>> "Here's what I want.
And here's what value that I can bring to you."
And I think it just takes the -- it takes the question out of the room.
>> But what if you could've gotten more?
>> Well, then you could've gotten them more, but what if you say something and someone goes, "Well, we're not even in that ballpark"?
>> Right.
>> You can always up-sell.
You can always say, "Here's where I would like to be, and here's what I'm willing to give."
They'll be like, "Ah, well, we want more than that."
I'll be like, "Okay, but I gave you where I was at, but it cost me more."
>> Right.
>> It cost me more time or energy or product or inventory or whatever the case is, or relationships, you know?
>> Yeah.
>> What do they say?
There's only three ways to deal with a customer?
Acquire a new one, up-sell the current one, or make one buy more frequently.
There's only three ways.
>> Recurring.
>> Yeah.
>> That's the best way right now.
>> Exactly.
>> What's the best negotiation you feel like you did, not where you gained the most but where both parties won the most?
Not where you're like, "I got more."
>> When I negotiated my deal with Bruce and Norman Weisfeld over at Samsung.
I negotiated out of ignorance, but I got the best deal at first.
I was a young kid.
I was 19 or 20.
They interviewed me.
They heard about FUBU.
They were interviewing various other people 'cause they were thinking about getting into -- they were already in the outerwear space, but they wanted to get into the denim ready-to-wear space.
They interviewed a couple people.
Once I got interviewed, they said, "We like you.
We think we may do something with you."
I call the guys for six months.
They never picked up the phone.
This is before cellphones were out.
I felt insulted and rightfully so but also they were looking at other opportunities.
It's not their job to answer my call again after that.
But I think they should've said, "Hey, man, we're not interested."
I go to the trade show, the MAGIC trade show in Vegas.
They're sitting at a table, and one of the big buyers from, like, a store was like, "Is that the FUBU guys?"
And he said, "You better get those guys!"
>> Power shift.
>> Right.
Now, all of a sudden, my phone's on fire the next day by these guys.
I'm like, "Remember me?
You didn't want to talk to me before."
>> "You know what I'm saying?"
That's exactly how you talked to.
>> I was like, "Yo, baby boy."
So a normal, like, designer deal, I'll call it, in fashion is generally like, "If I'm gonna put up all the money and all the resources, we're gonna split this thing 25% to you or 30% to you and 70% to me because I may have old inventory I got to get rid of.
You don't have any personal guarantees at hand.
I got to deal with all this."
>> You're taking a risk.
>> "I'm taking a lot of risk, but you're making clean money."
But because they pissed me off so much, I said, "Listen.
If I come in tomorrow, we better sign a deal and it better be a real distribution, 50/50, even-split deal for the distribution.
You guys will have all the distribution, financing, this and that, and then I'll go ahead."
And out of ignorance, that became the deal.
We've been partners for, you know, 25 years, and we've made massive amount of money, but we always felt that we could see eye to eye.
Yeah, that was the best deal that I've ever received, which helped.
Now I had a powerhouse behind me that can manufacture and distribute my clothes, and I created a global brand with all my partners.
>> That's pretty inspiring.
>> Yeah.
>> What do you think is the greatest thing holding you back from the next level of Daymond, of achieving your dreams, of achieving your success, results, fulfillment?
What's holding you back?
>> I think time because I know that I can do anything and accomplish anything I want.
But when will I start a more aggressive part of that journey?
You know?
So it's like -- it's kind of like, alright, I'm gonna start working out next month.
You know what I mean?
I know I'm going to be in shape, but I'm gonna start next month, and then I'll be like, "Ah, one more month, one more month."
Don't get me wrong.
I'm still knocking out a lot of other goals.
>> Mm-hmm.
But then a year goes by and you're like, "Oh, I said I was gonna do this."
>> Right, and then I go.
Right?
But it's the time of preparation to get me ready because once I go, like, when I forgot about the cancer, once my mind has shifted, I'm done.
There's nothing -- nothing -- that can stop me.
>> Wow.
>> So I look at it like that.
That's the biggest thing holding me back because it's kind of like you're resting up before you run a marathon, and there's so many different marathons in our lives.
There's the marathon of health, the marathon of spirituality... >> Relationships.
>> ...relationships, of "am I doing enough to stop some of these atrocities out in the world because I'm a public person?"
So a lot of those things are, you know -- that's really it.
It's the time.
>> If you could imagine the greatest version of yourself walking towards you, imagine Daymond, perfect version of you that's literally walking up towards you, what would that -- what would he look like?
What would his energy be?
When you're looking at yourself, greatest version?
>> His energy would be -- He would be skinner.
>> [ Laughs ] >> His energy would be great.
He would be...
He would be kind but informative but also stern and tell you when you're -- you know, when, if you ask, be very real with you about advice.
You know, I think I'm living the person that I want to be right now, you know.
I'm very happy with who I am, yeah.
>> Just got to start working out a little more is the thing.
>> Start working out a little bit more, yeah, of course.
>> It'll be great.
>> But I'm getting old, so what happens if I blew my shoulder?
I got to go and get some stem cells because that's the problem, right?
And it creates a vicious cycle.
>> It takes time and you got to heal and you got to recover.
>> Exactly.
>> I hear you, man.
Well, a couple final questions for you.
This is called the Three Truths.
>> Yeah.
>> So imagine it's your last day on Earth many, many years from now.
>> Yeah.
>> You're 500 years old.
You're as old as you want to be, but then eventually you got to go.
>> Right.
>> And you've accomplished everything.
You've seen your kids grow up to do amazing things.
You've done amazing things.
You've written every book you want to write.
The businesses have been successful, but you got to take all the content you've created with you to the next place.
But you get to leave behind three things you know to be true from all the lessons you've learned that you would share with the rest of us here on Earth, and this would be the only three things that we have to remember you by, are these three lessons for our life, what I like to call your three truths.
What would you say are yours?
>> That I would leave with other people that they have to constantly educate, keep educating themselves.
>> Mm-hmm.
>> And that education means finance, health, spirituality.
>> Mm-hmm.
Keep learning.
>> Keep learning.
>> Yeah.
>> Right?
Number two is that they have to steal away time for themselves at any given moment with themselves and with their family because you never know when you're gonna leave or somebody else is gonna leave you.
>> Mm.
>> And number three would probably be just really learn as much as you can to forgive and to love.
>> Mm.
>> I think those would be the three.
>> Why forgive?
>> Because people are growing all the time, and you may be -- you may be in a situation where you have to forgive somebody who did something but they didn't know what they were doing to you or whatever the case is and/or you want to be forgiven as well, right?
And how can you have love if you can't forgive, right?
And so whether it's with your family or whether with your friends or something else like that, the harboring the hate and things of that nature will just eat you alive, I think.
>> What was the thing that was the hardest for you to forgive in your life?
>> My father left when I was 10 years old.
I never would see or speak to him again.
And he came back in my life -- well, he's around -- about three years ago.
>> Wow.
You didn't speak to him until then?
>> Right, 'cause my sisters, who didn't know I was alive, found me, so they're 27 years old.
>> Holy cow.
>> And she found out that I -- I knew that they were alive, but they didn't know I was alive, and now, she's -- now, I love her to death, and I have a new form of love in my life.
I never knew I was -- I was an only child.
I never knew the love of a sister and a brother, right?
>> You were an only child, and now you have a sister and a brother?
>> Now I got two sisters.
>> This was three years ago?
>> Yeah.
>> You met them?
>> Yeah, we hang out all the time.
>> So for almost 40 years, you didn't -- >> No.
>> What?
>> Yeah.
I forgave my father a long time ago by going, "I wouldn't be the man that I would be if he was --" >> Without that, yeah.
>> Yeah, if I didn't have to do that.
>> But that wasn't like true forgiveness fully, was it?
>> It was in a sense.
I mean, even now, I don't speak to him.
I told him -- I said there was really nothing for us to really talk about.
Like, "You knew where I was all that time.
But I'm also happy that you are -- you raised these two women to be great women, and maybe when you got divorced from my mother, it was just a different time in the world where you were growing up."
I mean, it's just what had happened, right?
My mother also has lived a really great life, you know, so she wasn't suffering, per se.
I mean, of course we suffered economically.
But it was really about just not harboring something, because if I see him, I don't have any ill will.
>> You'll say hi.
>> Yeah, I don't want to have any ill will.
>> You don't need to hang out with him.
>> I don't need to hang out with him, yeah.
I think that that forgiveness was something that everybody should get to understand, yeah.
>> When do you feel like you were able to finally forgive and let go of that kind of anger or frustration towards him?
How old were you?
>> Towards him?
Well, that happened once I became -- Nah, no.
I forgave him probably about -- probably about when I was 25.
I didn't have anything at the moment.
Still no money or nothing, but I realized that I still had all this opportunity in my life, and that's just what it was.
People come, people go, you know what I mean?
I held nothing against him in that case.
I could've found -- I could've hired a detective and found him for the last 20 years very easily.
>> But you chose not to.
>> I chose not to.
I mean, he made a conscious decision to do that.
Whatever led him to that decision was up to him.
You know, whatever the case is, whatever circumstance you're in if you're watching right now, that's a circumstance.
It is what it is, right?
So now you got to move forward, and now you have to, first of all, negotiate with yourself and understand why are you worth something and why are you special, because every one of us are, and then how are you gonna share that with other people and make them go, "I want you in my life because we're gonna make some money, we're gonna have some fun, or we're going to grow a great family together."
>> Make an impact, yeah.
>> Yeah, that's what it is.
>> I love this, man.
That's a great story.
>> Yeah.
You know what?
I never told anybody publicly.
>> Yeah, that's a powerful story.
Thank you for sharing.
Final question -- What's your definition of greatness?
>> Ooh.
The definition of greatness is I think knowing that you had challenged yourself and you've gotten to wherever you are in life and you left nothing on the field and that you accepted who you are.
I'm not here to give you a moral code.
I just want you to be the best or the worst, unfortunately, that you want to be because you're the only one who has a blueprint for yourself and you're the only one who's gonna have to look yourself in the face when your time comes.
>> My man, Daymond John.
Thanks, brother.
Appreciate you, man.
>> Thank you.
>> Thank you.
We hope you enjoyed this episode and found it valuable for your life.
Make sure to stay tuned for more from "The School of Greatness" coming soon on public television.
Again, I'm Lewis Howes, and if no one has told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter.
And now, it's time to go out there and do something great.
If you'd like to continue on the journey of greatness with me, please check out my website, lewishowes.com, where you'll find over 1,000 episodes of "The School of Greatness" show, as well as tools and resources to support you in living your best life.
>> The online course "Find Your Greatness" is available for $19.
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