DYSLEXIA FOR
SUCCESS
“I SEE MY CONDITION AS A GIFT,
NOT A DISABILITY. IT HAS HELPED
ME LEARN THE ART OF DELEGATION,
FOCUS MY SKILLS, AND WORK WITH
INCREDIBLE PEOPLE.”
BY RICHARD FELONI
Richard Branson, the
billionaire businessman
considers dyslexia one
of his greatest strengths
CREDIT:
BUSINESS INSIDER AUSTRALIA
APR 10, 2015
hen he was in school, many of Virgin
chairman Richard Branson’s teachers
considered him stupid and lazy.
W
of powerful businesspeople were born dyslexic and
partially credit overcoming its challenges to their
success.
His mind was quite active, but he had a difficult
time focusing, which in retrospect he attributes
to not having his dyslexia accommodated, he told
the Washington Post in 2012.
Branson recently told Bloomberg West’s Cory
Johnson that his dyslexia has helped him keep
communication efficient, and showed him the
importance of delegation. Branson explained:
But as he grew older and began building his
empire of businesses, he learned about the
mechanics of his learning disability and adapted
his management style to it. This actually made
him a better manager, he wrote in his 2012 book
“Like a Virgin,” and it became what he considers
his “greatest strength.”
“I need things to be simple for myself. Therefore
Virgin, I think, when we launch a financial service
company or a bank, we do not use jargon. Everything
is very clear-cut, very simple. I think people have an
affinity to the Virgin brand because we don’t ta lk
above them or talk down to them”
Dyslexia is a cognitive rather than intellectual
condition that causes difficulties with reading
comprehension. Scientists estimate that dyslexia
affects anywhere from 3% to 10% of the global
population, but as Malcolm Gladwell points out in
“David and Goliath,” a seemingly larger percentage
If you have a learning disability, you become a
very good delegator. Because you know what your
weaknesses are and you know what your strengths
are, and you make sure that you find great people to
step in and deal with your weaknesses.
And actually, whether you are dyslexic or not, I think
delegation is such an important thing for a good
leader to be good at doing. Too many leaders want
to cling onto everything themselves and do everything
themselves and never let go. Therefore, they never
grow a group of companies like Virgin.
He credits dyslexia with another of his signature
management techniques: the habit of always taking
notes. He writes in his 2014 book “The Virgin Way”
that he learned as a child that if he ever had a chance
at remembering anything, he’d need to jot it down. To
this day, he says he carries a notebook everywhere.
The handwritten note habit has come in handy in
management, negotiation, and even legal situations —
he’s submitted his notebooks as evidence in lawsuits,
he says.
It’s one of the “most powerful tools” in his “bag of
business tricks,” Branson writes.