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Because to Cuban, capitalism means living the life you want to live.
By nearly anyone’s standard (except maybe Bezos, or Buffett, or Musk), Mark Cuban is incredibly wealthy. He’s a self-made billionaire: worked as a bartender, worked in sales, started and sold businesses, invests in startups… think “capitalist,” and Cuban might come to mind.
And Cuban would likely agree, but not for the reason you might think.
As Cuban said on Adam Grant’s podcast, Re:Thinking:
People don’t fully understand the definition of capitalism.
Capitalism isn’t just about trying to make as much money as you can. Capitalism is the opportunity to get the outcomes that you want, that give you personal reward. It could be making as much money as possible. Having the greatest amount of impact in one way or another. You get to make that choice.
That’s what makes capitalism the best system, but sometimes people get caught up on the money.
No matter how “greedy” you might be, you can’t make money unless you first solve a problem or meet a need. Money is always a byproduct.
Jeff Bezos met a need: consumers wanted wide selection, low prices, fast delivery. Achieve those things — meet a genuine, widely shared customer need — and eventually, the money followed.
Vuori founder Joe Kudla solved a problem. While women’s brands had long made products that could transition from (exercise) studio to street, nothing like that existed for men. So he created clothing men, and now women, can wear to the gym, to a café, to the grocery store. Only then did the money — including a $400 million investment from Softbank that values the company at $4 billion — follow.
Dharmesh Shah realized that traditional marketing — interrupting customers with ads — was not only annoying, it was increasingly ineffective. So he and co-founder Brian Halligan found a better way to “sell to humans“: Create content that provides value and builds a relationship with potential customers. First HubSpot solved a problem; only then (HubSpot’s market cap is currently nearly $13 billion) did the money follow.
And then there’s my friend Ian. He started a construction business that was by every objective measure a huge success. But he wasn’t happy, because success changed the nature of his job. He had to write proposals. He had to review estimates and contracts. He had to coordinate supply chains. He had to supervise people, who supervised people, who supervised people.
Those weren’t outcomes he wanted, so he decided not to replace employees who left for other jobs or to start their own businesses. He matched the number of new projects he took on with his company’s slowly decreasing capacity. Within a few years, he was down to two crews and could “only” handle two concurrent builds.
People assumed his business was failing, yet his business is thriving, because Ian is thriving.
Sometimes he gets to spend the entire day working on job sites. Some days he has to break away for a few hours to meet potential customers, write proposals, line up materials, and coordinate with other trades. (He enjoys that aspect of the job; he just doesn’t want to do it all of the time.) He gets to spend time personally training new employees and developing longer-term employees.
And — and this is really important to him — he gets to drive by certain houses and think, “I helped build that.”
To countless entrepreneurs like Kudlah, Shah, and Ian, capitalism isn’t about making as much money as they can. Money is nice, but money wasn’t the sole motivation.
First, they decided what they wanted their businesses to deliver. What needs they would meet or problems they would solve. Meeting those needs, and solving those problems, was the initial outcome they sought.
If the next goal is to make a lot of money? Great. They get to make that choice. If they’re lucky, maybe they can do both.
“Capitalism is the opportunity to get the outcomes that you want, that give you personal reward.”
The best thing about Cuban’s definition of capitalism? You get to choose the outcome. You get to choose what need you will meet, what problem you will solve, what kind of business you create.
And best of all, you get to choose how you will work — and live.
This post originally appeared at inc.com.
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