After serving as Microsoft CEO for 25 years (from the year 1975-2000), Bill Gates?decided to step down so that he could spend more time on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. However, he continued to serve on the?Microsoft board, a role that he played until stepping down in the year 2020, again, to dedicate more time to philanthropy.
But what kept the Microsoft co-founder going, especially after leaving his full-time role as Microsoft CEO since the year 2000? Well, recently, the billionaire opened up on the one habit that has been helping him continue with a career after Microsoft too.
¡°I had a long period from about age 18 to 40 where I was very monomaniacal ... Microsoft was everything,¡± 68-year-old Gates recently told comedian Trevor Noah on the ¡°What Now? With Trevor Noah¡± podcast. ¡°I was lucky enough that as other people took over Microsoft, I got to go and read and learn about all the health challenges, why children die.¡±
"I refuse to stop reading a book in the middle, even if I don't like it", the billionaire had once said.
The billionaire Microsoft co-founder has long been known as a voracious reader. The habit planted the seeds of his career transition three years before it occurred: In 1997, Gates and his then-wife, Melinda French Gates, read an article about children across the globe dying of diseases that were easily cured in the United States, as per CNBC.
The story stuck with him when he stepped down as Microsoft¡¯s CEO in 2000. With even more time to read, he researched ongoing global health crises and decided to make the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation his primary focus, he said.
His ability to research thoroughly and synthesize information effectively ¡ª honed by a lifetime of reading ¡ª helped get him up to speed on health inequities, identify areas where his money could help and illuminate potential solutions, the billionaire added.?
¡°Reading fuels a sense of curiosity about the world, which I think helped drive me forward in my career and in the work that I do now with my foundation,¡± Gates told Time in 2017.
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Bill Gates is not the only public figure who loves reading. Plenty of prominent billionaires are avid readers. "Those who want to be successful need to be reading every day," billionaire investor Mark Cuban?once told comedian Bill Maher¡¯s ¡°Club Random¡± podcast, as per CNBC.
¡°Somebody 40 and over, even 30 and over, if you¡¯re not reading, you¡¯re f---ed ... because you¡¯re not expanding your mind,¡± Cuban said, adding that he tells his kids: ¡°Somebody who doesn¡¯t read lives one life, somebody who reads an unlimited number of lives.¡±
Warren Buffett,?too, reads a lot, even at the age of 93. He?is a self-confessed reading addict, a habit he developed early in life.?He reportedly spends about 80% of his typical day reading?¡ª scouring newspapers, magazines, annual reports, industry publications, and a broad array of books.
Also Read:?Bill Gates?Shares The Best Advice He Has Received From Warren Buffett
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