Poker is often viewed merely as an event of luck, but ask a poker professional and they’re likely to tell you a lot about luck. The best game players use skill and strategy as they weigh the chances of gaining victory in their respective games and make logical decisions about the outcome. There has also been a growing trend of entrepreneurs claiming they learn a lot during a spectacular game of poker. The three honourees on this list have played poker to define the way that their companies run its operations. In the examples below we will discuss how playing poker will help you become more successful entrepreneurs.
Guy Laliberté, owner of Cirque de Soleil
There’s a risk involved in creating a circus, but Guy Laliberté stayed with it… it paid off. Quite a bit of fun. Cirque de Soleil is now performing in 450 cities around each continent except Antarctica and Laliberté is estimated at $13.7 million making him the eleventh richest Canadian. Despite not directing a huge crowd, Laliberté is a very good poker player. He has been a player for GSN on High stakes poker (Season 4) and on poker after dark and enjoys poker games with high stakes mainly.
Tony Hsieh – CEO of Zappos
Hsieh founded LinkExchange, a website advertising platform which Microsoft sold for an amazing $265 million in 1998. He went on and started Zappos, a shoe and clothes online retailer which was bought in 2008 for $1.1bn. Possibly the time spent in Las Vegas is the reason for this entrepreneur’s obsession with gambling. Since 2009 he was involved in extensive redevelopment of Downtown and the Downtown Project – the Mecca for the local entrepreneurs.
Bob Safai – Madison Partners
Bob Safai is currently Managing Director and Chairman of Madison Partners. The company specializes in boutique properties in the area. However, when compared with other people, Safatai loves nothing more than High stakes poker and appeared in High stakes poker after dark.
How does poker relate to business?
The business word has been the world’s biggest poker game ever since its inception. All-in decisions are exciting as they are the biggest risk – losing them all. Intelligent players take the risk associated with the gamble, just the same as smart entrepreneurs take risks associated to their reward.
