The Best One Yet
✊ “The Leaders Pod” — Our 3 Best Stories on Legendary Business Leaders
Fri, 23 May 2025
Heading into Memorial Day weekend, we whipped up the top pop-biz stories about legendary business leaders from the last year:#1. Dolly Parton launched a new album, a food brand, & 78th birthday… So we jumped into her $600M Dollywood conglomerate.#2. Bill Gates’ former assistant is now wealthier than him… It’s a lesson on risk, reward, and makin’ money.#3. Jony Ive designed the iPhone… and he just unveiled his next big (secret) thing.Share this episode with your buddy with your buddy who loves some inspo… or listen to it twice and then take on that next big thing.And if you crave more business storytelling from us? Check out our weekly deepdive show: “The Best Idea Yet” — The untold origin stories of the products you’re obsessed with: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinks—-----------------------------------------------------Subscribe to our new (2nd) show… The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. It’s The Best Idea Yet.GET ON THE POD: Submit a shoutout or fact: https://tboypod.com/shoutouts FOR MORE NICK & JACK: Newsletter: https://tboypod.com/newsletter Connect with Nick: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolas-martell/ Connect with Jack: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-crivici-kramer/ SOCIALS:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tboypod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@tboypodYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@tboypod Anything else: https://tboypod.com/ Subscribe to our new (2nd) show… The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. It’s The Best Idea Yet.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Chapter 1: What are the top stories about legendary business leaders?
This is Nick. This is Jack. And today's leaders pod is the best one yet. Our top three business leader stories of the past year. Yetis, if you're listening to this pod, I am on a flight to France and Jack is swimming down in the Mad River freezing his butt off. For Memorial Day weekend, we curated three stories from last year.
on epic business leader profiles because these people changed how we think. Yeah, they really did. So after you finish this episode, send it to a buddy who'd be inspired by one of these business legends and then go enjoy a margarita moment by the grill. You earned it. Friday's the real Friday. Jack, what's on today's show? For our first story, we're going back to January 26th, 2024.
Country singer Dolly Parton just celebrated a new birthday, a new food brand, and a new album. Not too shabby. So we're looking at the billion-dollar business of Dolly Parton's Dollywood. For our second story, we're going back to July 8th. Bill Gates, for a long time, was the richest person in the world. But his former assistant at Microsoft is now richer than Bill Gates.
And it's a lesson for all of us in risk, reward, and money. And our third and final story is from September 24th. Johnny Ive is the greatest industrial designer of our time. He designed the iPhone. And after five years in secrecy, Johnny Ive just unveiled his next. Next big thing. But yetis, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories. Fantastic mix of stories, Jack.
Elon Musk, Warren Buffett, Sam Altman. Okay, we looked at the data. Those are the three most common business names in news. Last year, the Wall Street Journal wrote an article about Elon every single day. We covered Warren Buffett six different times. And Sam Altman is in so many places, he's probably sitting next to you right now.
Whoa, Sam, what are you doing there?
But you also come to us, this pod, for stories no one else is whipping up. So there are three other names in business that we think you should know. Three business icons who don't get front page news treatment. Honestly, if we could grab brunch with three people in business right now, this, Jack, this is the group. We'd order eggs Benedict. We'd get sauce on the side.
And we would take notes the end. entire meal. So grab a pen, grab a paper, and take a seat at the table. Besties, these are our three top business leader stories from last year.
15 years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in the dorm. They had an idea to cause a cultural storm. It's the best one yet, but the best is the norm. Jack Nick.
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Chapter 2: What is Dolly Parton's impact on business and entertainment?
Do I have to wear a bolo if I do a check? A bolo? Sorry. Somebody hasn't been to the Grand Ole Opry. No, I haven't. It's on my list. Oh, Dolly Parton didn't just write a memoir. She also has a line of fiction books. This is amazing. She wrote a thriller series along with James Patterson based on the stories from one of her albums. Dolly Parton even runs a dog apparel company called Doggy Parton.
Because every beagle needs a blonde wig. But yet he's add all this up and this business empire is worth over half a billion dollars. And we're not even talking about the charity part, Jack. Dolly Parton is like the Princess Diana of our time. She is philanthropic and loved by everyone for it. Her charity just got $100 million in funding from Jeff Bezos of Amazon.
In November of 2020, early pandemic, when we invented the mRNA COVID vaccine, the New England Journal of Medicine thanked Dolly Parton's COVID-19 research fund, which she established at Vanderbilt University. Oh, and by the way, she's also the godmother of Miley Cyrus. Party that in the USA. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddy Dolly Parton, Inc.? Humor transcends all.
Yeti's the biggest business takeaway that Jack and I have gotten from Dolly Parton. It's how she reaches such a wide audience. Dolly Parton manages to reach a range of fans who are culturally quite opposites. Because Dolly Parton, she's a red state, patriotic, deep south, working class icon. But she's also a top ally of the LGBTQ community.
And a key reason why she's so relatable to everyone, it's because she's funny. She uses humor. Oftentimes, Dolly sounds more like a comedian than a singer or a businesswoman. Yeah, like she makes fun of her own plastic surgery. Like she once told Oprah, it takes a lot of money to look this cheap. She once said, I'm the first woman to burn my bra.
It took the fire department four days to put it out.
Jack, that's like a feminist thing to say, but like also not a feminist thing to say.
One thing we've learned in life is that humor can transcend cultural lines like politics, race, and income. And Dolly Parton's billion dollar Dollywood empire proves it. For our second story, we're going back to July 8th, 2024. Wild story about Bill Gates and his assistant. Bill Gates is no longer the richest person at Microsoft. His former assistant is.
The way that Steve Ballmer surpassed Bill Gates is a lesson on risk and reward. Yes, it is. But in order for us to tell this story, Jack, can we travel back to 1980, please? A startup of techie nerds in Seattle put out a job posting. Assistant founder. Assistant to the founder. Ah, good point, Jack. Getty's Bill Gates, the future richest man on earth. He needed a personal assistant ASAP.
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