Persistence: The Bridge from Average to Exceptional

“Wow, I’ve never seen that before in my almost thirty years at MIT,” said Rafael Reif, the president of the University, to Stephen Schwarzman as they walked off the stage.

“What’s that?” Schwarzman asked.

“A standing ovation,” replied Reif.

They had just finished discussing the role of computing in the future. With a $300 million gift from Schwarzman, MIT planned to build that future through the Stephen A. Schwarzman College of Computing. While this was a special day, Schwarzman’s visits to MIT hadn’t always been as welcoming.

Three decades earlier, in 1987, Schwarzman found himself on the wrong side of a locked door on the MIT campus. He arrived at their endowment office on a Friday afternoon for a 3 o’clock meeting to find everyone gone for the weekend. He was hoping for a multi-million dollar commitment from MIT’s endowment toward his $1 billion fund - the first fund he was raising at his brand new company, The Blackstone Group.

Thirty years later, by 2018, Schwarzman had grown The Blackstone Group to $500 billion in assets under management. His net worth neared $18 billion. And instead of asking MIT for money, he was giving them $300 million to start the Schwarzman College of Computing. 

The power of persistence over three decades led Schwarzman from being ignored by MIT in 1987 to being their guest of honor in 2018. While persistence at Blackstone made Schwarzman his fortune, he built the habit of tenacity from the time he was a young man.

Early persistence

During his senior year of high school, Schwarzman was waitlisted by his first choice for college. Thinking he could change their mind, he called the dean of admissions at Harvard. The dean was shocked Schwarzman got through to him, and young Stephen put his persuasion skills to practice. He explained how he was accepted to Yale but wanted to go to Harvard.

The dean said they weren’t taking anyone from the waitlist.

Schwarzman said that was a mistake because he was going to be a huge success and his future alumni status would be an asset for Harvard.

The dean told him he would have a lovely experience at Yale.

Schwarzman said he might, but he was calling because he wanted to go to Harvard.

The dean said he couldn’t help.

So Schwarzman retreated to Yale, where he continued practicing persistence. 

College persistence

During his sophomore year, he learned about Skull and Bones, the secret society whose alumni included presidents, Supreme Court justices, and founders of Fortune 500 companies. For the next two years, he persisted in actions to excite the student body and improve his chances of becoming a Bonesman.

Early in his senior year – when Yale only admitted men – Schwarzman decided to dismantle the rules against women spending the night in dorm rooms. Rather than assaulting the administration with argument, he took an abstract approach. He assembled questionnaires addressing all conceivable administration objections. Then he recruited eleven people to pass them out at every dining hall during mealtimes. His response rates neared 100%.

Instead of taking the results to university leadership, he gave them to a friend who ran the Yale Daily News. The friend published the results, along with Schwarzman’s name, on the front page of the paper. The administration repealed the rules, and Schwarzman was tapped by Skull and Bones. This time, persistence had paid off.

Professional persistence

Shortly after graduating in 1969, Schwarzman received a job offer from Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, a Wall Street investment bank. When Bill Donaldson called to offer the job and a $10,000 starting salary, Schwarzman was thrilled. More audacious than most recent graduates, Schwarzman accepted the job on one condition: a salary of $10,500. When Donaldson asked why, Schwarzman responded,

“I need $10,500 because I heard there’s another person graduating from Yale who’s making $10,000, and I want to be the highest-paid person in my class.”

Shocked, Donaldson refused. Schwarzman declined the position. Donaldson asked again, but Schwarzman persisted, explaining how the difference in pay didn’t mean anything to the company, but it meant a lot to him, and he wasn’t willing to take the job unless it was for $10,500.

Two days later, Donaldson called back to offer him the job – at his desired salary.

Army persistence 

Only six months after starting at DLJ, Schwarzman left for Army Reserve training in Fort Polk, Louisiana. During training, Schwarzman’s company never had enough food. Thinking back to the day he arrived at Fort Polk, he remembered a colonel telling the new recruits to see him if they noticed anything wrong. Schwarzman decided it was time for a conversation with the colonel.

When he arrived at the colonel’s office, Schwarzman met a clerk who asked what he wanted. When he told the clerk, the clerk responded, “Get the fuck out of here.”

Schwarzman refused, so the clerk called a lieutenant who gave the same order. Again, Schwarzman refused. The lieutenant called a captain. The routine continued. Before long, he was sitting across the desk from the colonel who listened to Schwarzman’s concerns about food shortages with disbelief. Then the colonel sent him back to his company with instructions to keep his mouth shut.

Within a few days, all the officers in the company were gone. After looking into the situation, the colonel discovered the officers were stealing the company’s food and selling it. The colonel called Schwarzman back to his office and thanked the young soldier for ignoring the hierarchy to make his point.

Sometimes persistence on its own isn’t enough. Sometimes you need exceptional character. Sometimes you need bravery. Trudging forward through a storm is tougher when people say you shouldn’t - or that you can’t. If your morals are strong - as Schwarzman found - persistence will be easier.

Persistence pays

After Army Reserves training, Schwarzman attended Harvard Business School. From there, he landed a job at Lehman Brothers where he spent a dozen years working his way to the global head of mergers and acquisitions. In 1985, he left Lehman Brothers to start his own firm – The Blackstone Group – where persistence over 35 years built the world’s largest alternative asset manager and made Schwarzman among the richest men in the world.

Persistence was the key ingredient in the Schwarzman recipe for success. The most poetic ending to Schwarzman’s story of persistence was his full circle journey with MIT. He grew from the man who couldn’t get a meeting in 1987 to the man whose name will live forever on the façade of an MIT program.  

Stephen Schwarzman is an exceptional example of persistence over time, as he started young and built tenacity of mind and action throughout his life. While persistence works in the short term, its most impressive accomplishments are realized in the long term. Building the habit early - as Schwarzman did - can position a person for success like few other qualities. 

If you persist in finishing a difficult book or in grinding through a 12 week workout plan you’ll learn new facts and build new muscles. You’ll feel good and look better. But until you persist in reading dozens of books, you won’t be able to connect broad themes. Until you string together years of consistent workouts, you won’t build a solid foundation of lasting muscle. 

Persistence is a habit you must build in the short term - like Schwarzman did at Yale, DLJ, and Army training. Persistence is also a lifestyle you must sustain in the long term to realize its compounding benefits. Only when you persist over days, weeks, months, years, and decades will your full potential appear - like a magician pulling a rabbit from a hat. It’s as simple as building the habit today and seeing it through, one day at a time, for the rest of your life.