From Homeless to Multimillionaire

　　从无家可归者到亿万富翁    By Carmine Gallo

　　2006年由威尔斯密斯主演的《当幸福来敲门》(The Pursuit of Happiness), 获得很好的评价，它讲述了一个已为人父的男人带着两岁大的儿子经过不断的努力从底层走向金字塔顶端的奋斗史，下文即是商业周刊专栏作家对电影的真正男主角采访所写的感悟，向你讲述故事背后的故事。

　　It's not every day you get the chance to pick the brain of a man whose real-life rags-to-riches story was turned into a Hollywood movie starring one of America's top actors. But the other day I had the opportunity to spend time with Chris Gardner, subject of the 2006 movie The Pursuit of Happiness, in which Gardner was played by Will Smith.

　　每天也许你可以读到许多由贫到富的故事，但并不是每一天您都有机会看到现实的由贫到富的故事拍成好莱坞巨星主演的电影。前几天我很荣幸有机会采访了克里斯加德纳(Chris Gardner)，他是2006年由威尔斯密斯(Will Smith)主演的电影《当幸福来敲门》的主人翁。

　　While attending an unpaid internship program at Dean Witter Reynolds in 1981, Gardner spent a year on the streets with his two-year-old son. They took refuge at night in a church shelter or the bathroom of a BART subway station in Oakland, Calif. Nobody at work knew　Gardner eventually won a position as a stockbroker at Dean Witter. Two years later he left for Bear Stearns (BSC), where he became a top earner. In 1987, he founded his own brokerage firm, Gardner Rich,in Chicago. Today, Gardner is a multimillionaire, a motivational speaker, a philanthropist, and an international businessman who is about to launch a private equity fund that will invest solely in South Africa. His partner in the fund? Nelson Mandela. Not bad for a guy who, six years before founding his own brokerage firm, was "fighting, scratching, and crawling my way out of the gutter with a baby on my back."

　　1981加德纳进入股票经纪公司Dean Witter Reynolds的无薪实习计划，他带着两岁大的儿子在街头流浪了一年。他们晚上住在教堂的避难所或是加利福利亚海湾地区地铁的奥克兰车站。没有人会想到加德纳最终获得Dean Witter的股票经纪人的职位。两年之后他离开了去了贝尔斯登(Bear Stearns )，在那他成为最赚钱的经纪人。1987年他在芝加哥成立自己的股票经纪公司，Gardner Rich。　今天加德纳是一位亿万富翁，富有激情的演讲家，慈善家，同时也是国际的实业家，他将成立只用于投资南非的私人股本基金。纳尔逊曼德拉会不会是他的合伙人呢?在加德纳成立他的股票经纪公司之前，他带着儿子在走出贫民窟的路上不断奋斗，永不放弃。

　　"Passion is Everything”　　“激情最重要”

　　Gardner is a magnificent speaker and has an engaging personality -- qualities all business professionals would crave. But what's behind his success? What is the one thing -- the one secret -- that helped him change his life? "It's passion," he told me. "Passion is everything. In fact, you've got to be borderline fanatical about what you do." Gardner says he was fortunate to find something he truly loved, something where he couldn't wait for the sun to rise so he could do it again. His advice to entrepreneurs and those seeking a career change? "Be bold enough to find the one thing that you are passionate about. It might not be what you were trained to do. But be bold enough to do the one thing. Nobody needs to dig it but you."

　　加德纳是个出色的演讲家并且具有所有实业家渴望拥有的迷人的个人魅力。但是什么造就了他的成功?是什么让他改变了他的生活?“激情”加德纳说他很幸运找到了他真正喜欢做的事情，这些不会因为每天的重复而令他厌烦。他对企业家及寻求改变职业的人的建议是“要勇于去发现能让你产生激情的事情。这些事不一定是你曾经受培训过所学到的。但要勇气坚持把这件事做下去。，只有你有必要对此深入研究。

　　Gardner wanted to be "world-class at something." For him, that something was being a stockbroker. For you, finding something you are passionate about will make the difference in how engaging you become as a communicator and as a leader. If you love what you do, you'll eagerly share the story behind it with boundless enthusiasm.

　　加德纳想要把某件事做到国际水平。对他而言，这件事就是股票经纪人。对于你而言，要发现能让你产生激情的事情，这样才能你更出色，使之成为沟通者及领导者。如果你喜欢你做的事，你会带着无限的激情分享这个故事背后的故事。

　　Passion is not teachable. As a communications coach, I can help clients craft and deliver a powerful story, but I can't create passion. But it's passion that separates the electrifying presenters from the average ones. I'm absolutely convinced of it. As a former television journalist, I've interviewed thousands of spokespeople and personally coached hundreds of others in my current profession. Donald Trump once said: "Without passion, you have no energy -- and without energy, you have nothing." Your listeners want to be in the presence of someone with energy, a person who greets people with a smile and an abundance of enthusiasm. Passion is not something you necessarily verbalize, but it shows. When Gardner walked into Dean Witter after having slept in a subway station the night before, he only wanted to leave one impression on his co-workers. "All they needed to know is that I would light it up day after day. Passion is not something you have to talk about. People feel it. They see it just as clearly as the color of your eyes, baby."

　　激情不可教的。作为采访人，作为专栏作家，我能帮助被访者创作并传递一个有影响的故事。但我不能创作激情。但真实激情使之超越普通人成为有魅力的主持人。对此，我完全相信。以前作为电视主持人，我采访了上千位发言人，如今作为专栏作家，也撰写了上百个名人的故事。唐纳德特朗普(Donald Trump)曾说过：没有激情，你就没有能量——没有了能量，你就什么都没有。” 你的聆听者想看到的是有激情的人，他能带着微笑与充裕的热情与大家问候。激情不一定口头上说的，而要展示出来。当加德纳在地铁站过夜，早晨进入Dean Witter时，他只想给同事留下一个印象。“要让他们知道我每天都是充满激情的。激情不需要你把它说出来。大家能感受到的。他们看到一清二楚。”

　　Coffee and Commitment  咖啡与承诺

　　I have spent the last several years interviewing inspiring leaders, and I can say without hesitation that passion is the No. 1 quality that sets them apart. In many ways, my talk with Gardner reminds me of a conversation I once had with Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz. Like Gardner, Schultz used the word "passion" throughout our entire conversation. But remarkably, the word "coffee" was rarely spoken. You see, for Schultz, coffee is not his passion. Instead, Schultz says, he is passionate about creating a workplace that "treats people with dignity and respect;" a workplace environment that his father never had the opportunity to experience. The coffee product offers the means to help Schultz fulfill his passion. In much the same way, stock trading and commissions offered Gardner the means to fulfill his passion, which was to give his son something he never had -- a father.

　　在过去几年里，我采访了几位富有激情的领导者，我可以毫不犹豫地地说，激情是让他们表现出色的第一品格。在许多方面，我和加德纳的谈话让我想起曾经与星巴克主席霍华德舒尔茨的对话。和加德纳一样，舒尔茨将“激情”贯穿在整个谈话中。但令人出乎意料的是“咖啡”一词却很少提到。你可以看出，对舒尔茨而言，咖啡并不是他的激情所在。相反，舒尔茨说，他的激情在于创作一个“庄严及尊重地对待人们”的工作环境，此环境是他的父亲曾为能实现的。咖啡为舒尔茨提供了完成此愿望的机会。与其相似，股票交易及经纪也为加德纳提供了完成他的愿望的机会，他给了儿子自己曾未拥有的东西—父爱。

　　Passion is the foundation of effective communication. Dig deep to discover your core purpose, your true passion. Once you connect to it, use it as fuel to build a rapport with your audience -- recruiters, managers, employees, etc. Your presentations, pitches, speeches, and all forms of business communication will be more engaging than ever. Nearly everyone has room to increase what I call the "passion quotient" -- the level of passion you exhibit as a speaker. The higher your passion quotient, the more likely you are to connect with people. Chris Gardner's passion fueled his determination in the face of overwhelming odds and obstacles. Take the time to imagine where harnessing your passion can take you.

　　激情是有效交流的基础。要用心去深究，寻找出你的核心目标，你真正的激情所在。一旦你发现它了，燃烧你的热情与你的观众——招聘人员，经理，雇主等建立良好的关系。你的表演，演说及所有的商务沟通的形式会更加有魅力。几乎每一个人都有机会增加“激情份额”——作为演讲者所拥有激情的程度。激情份额越高，你越有魅力去吸引观众。克里斯加德纳的激情使他在面临各种不可能及障碍时继续坚定他的决心。花些时间想想你的激情在哪吧。