Profile of Success: Donny Deutsch

You’ve probably seen Donny Deutsch on his talk show on CNBC, ‘The Big Idea’.

With a brash, blunt, daring style, he built his fledgling ad agency into a $2.7-billion juggernaut, known for “hip” TV ads for companies like Old Navy and Monster.com. While you may or may not be a fan of some of the advertising his agency creates, you have to be an admirer of his self-promotion, and of his new book Often Wrong, Never In Doubt. The ad business is a very tough, very competitive business, and building a huge and successful agency from scratch is no easy task. What may be most instructive about Deutsch is his attitude.

From the book:
“The key to success is not purely who’s the smartest, who’s the best, but also who can say with conviction ‘I deserve it…..why not me?’ You can’t just say it. You’ve got to own it. In order to pitch $10-million accounts, you’ve got to say ‘We should be pitching’. Who’s going to get that $10-million account? Why not me?”

Why not YOU?

— Chris