david: this is my kitchen table and also my filing system. over much of the past three decades i've been an investor. the highest calling of mankind i've often thought was private

equity. then i started interviewing. i watch her interview so i know how to do interviews. i've learned from doing my interviews how leaders make it to the top. >> i asked how much he wanted, he said 250, i did it negotiate. david: i have something i'd like to sell. you don't feel inadequate now because being only the second wealthiest man in the world, is that right? one of the most successful business executives in the world over the past 10 years has been bill mcdermott. he took s.a.p. to record heights and is doing the same with service now. i had a chance to sit down with ill mcdermott in his offices in new york and had him describe to me how he came from modest routes to the top of the corporate world and how he inspires his troops, inspires his customers and loves his job. in october of 2019, you surprise the business world by stepping down as the ceo of sap, a very large company whose value had

more than doubled during your co-ceo and ceo position. you took a position with a smaller, less known company, service now. usually when people leave a job they go to a bigger company, why did you go to a smaller company? bill i saw the future and where was going. i had a great run at s.a.p. and it was a pleasure taking it from 39 billion to 163 an inspiring lots of people and customers. it was a wonderful experience. after 17 years i was ready to do something different. when i saw service now in the marketplace, i knew what it was. and i knew what it could do and i knew, with my background, i was a pretty good full troll fit for what service now needed to scale. david: what does service now do? tell me in simple english language what they actually do. bill that's a very good question, david. it basically drives productivity

and work. so think about tech today. every ceo you talk to is going to tell you i have to digitize to survive. 40% of ceos say, today, if i don't digitize my operations, my company will no longer be viable in less than a decade. so we where the i.t. backbone for companies all over the world. how do they manage their assets, run their operations, secure their operations, all things digital having to do with i.t.. that's where we started. as you know, the employee experience, hybrid work, all of these concepts became so important. how do i hire people, how do i onboard them, train them, provide them services on a mobile device? we do it. david: about two and a half years ago when you took over your position as ceo, you are ceo of service now, during that time the technology world had challenges. there had been layoffs and other

things but you have doubled the value of service now during this time. revenues are more than double. operating earnings are up about eight times and you have doubled the number of employee base. what was your secret sauce when everybody was going this way, you are going this way? bill i give all the credit to the original founder, fred leddy. he built the platform. lots of people came into the company and expanded on that platform. but the original idea was to give people technology that truly enabled them to do things they can never have done before. so it's really a product centric engineering company at its sole. what i tried to bring to the company, its continued to expand that, continue to build innovation into that platform. but at the same time, build a truly global software market will -- leader where everybody understood the brands, the hungry and humble nature of how we focus on the customers.

a customer is everything. ultimately, the value that we deliver. david: somebody watching this, should they say i should buy this guys stock because he could do it in the next couple of years or plateau, you cannot go at the rate you are going, i assume. bill i think we are just getting warmed up. very few software companies ever make it to a billion. even less make it to 5 billion. even less make it to 10. we will be the fastest enterprise software company to have ever gotten to a billion five in 10 organically. in fact, it has never been done before. the world we see is so bright because we are like 5% penetrated in the enterprises, even that use our services now. so, there are many that don't. i believe like net new brands, net new locals that are not -- logos that are not doing business with us should say, i

have to get in touch with that guy. the ones that are already doing business with us should say, he's talking about a completely different approach to digitizing my company. are we looking at them closely enough? if i've achieved that, then we are going places. david: people who run technology companies have a technology background. they are engineers. you have an mba from northwestern but you are not an engineer. does the technology jargon go past you or can you understand what the engineers are saying when they come up with a new product? bill: i have been around it for a while. while it is true i am not a coder, it is also true that i understand where the idea can fit into a customer's world. i will give you an example. with ai the expectation of ai is going to be the iphone moment. when the consumer begins using ai in the consumer world, they are going to expect the business leaders are bringing ai in to make their world better in the

office environment. that is why this is the iphone moment for the enterprise. there is no doubt. so i know we have to be the market leader in ai which is why we started working on it. and the first acquisition i did was element ai, a company in montra©al, canada. we did that in 2020. we were working on it all 2019 as soon as i came in, but then 2020 we actually executed that. the reason for that was they had a gigantic group of researchers, data scientists and engineers exclusively working on nexgen ai and large language models. that is how can we teamed up with jensen and nvidia and started building them on the now platform. we saw what it could be. now that it is in the platform we see the commercial sensation it will be for us but more importantly we see the productivity and the cost savings and revenue growth our customers will get from it. david: is ai going to reduce the

amount of jobs people have now? bill: i do not believe so. i think if you look at the market today, we have a 17 year situation where it was 17 years ago when the job market was this type, where the openings outpaced the opportunity for candidates to jump in those jobs because the candidates are not there. we really are capitalizing on technology to fill that void. for example, i talked to a ceo yesterday of a major financial services company who was interested in ai. he said i cannot get enough people to do what i need to have done. i said how many engineers do you have? he said 7000. what you need to do is ai enable them. now you can text a code, text to workflow automation or even text to new application development. we can make your engineers 50%

more productive than they are today. david: you have done a good job but why don't you do something more important like running a private equity firm with digital transformation? you could do very well financially. ever thought about that? if not, think about it. i will be happy to figure out a way to get you in the private equity world. bill: to work with you would be an honor so we must think about different ways i could help you. ♪

david: let's talk about your past. it was not preordained that you would be ceo of s.a.p. or the ceo of service now and at the top of the technology world. where did you grow up? bill: i grew up in amityville, long island. i was born in flushing, new york. grew up in amityville, long island. it's that long island grit. david: when you were growing up, were your parents professional workers? were they blue-collar workers? what did they do? bill: i come from a working-class family. my dad worked for con edison. he was a troubleshooter meaning

you called him a spider. he went into the manholes and basically worked on those high-voltage lines to keep the electric on in new york city. a very dangerous job and he was great at it. david: is that a safe job? bill: no, it was not. very dangerous in fact. i admired my father. the image that stayed in my mind, he worked the midnight shift most of the time, midnight to 8:00. i could just see him in the driveway chiseling the ice off of his windshield knowing he was going into new york to get into those manholes like the spider inside of those cables. and that was to put food on the table and give us a very nice life. and i had a great life. david: but you always did some working. from what time did you begin working for money? bill: i think the first time was around 10 or 11 when i was delivering papers door-to-door in long island. matter of fact, i remember that the paper was long island press. do not even think they are in business anymore. but my mom cosigned for me

because you had to buy the papers. then you got the money back when you collected it. so she put up the money for me, got me started. and i'll never forget what it took to be successful as a paperboy. the same things it takes to be successful today. i had to know my customer. i had to know how you wanted it. is it in your door? do you want it wrapped in plastic? do you get upset if i throw it? you know, there are all kinds of techniques. but why did i do it? because i wanted to be happy and i wanted them to give me a good tip. david: you wrote a book about your life and you talk about the fact that sometimes people did not pay you and you had to go and ask them to pay for two or three weeks. was that hard to do? bill: it was. because, you know, when i went there and i asked them for 10 bucks, and, you know, that's a lot of money for a paper, but i'm like, yeah, but you are in three weeks in the rears. the technique was not only to get the $10 but hopefully get $12 so i would get a nice tip as well. and i kept very good records. it was not too automated.

it was a little book with checkmarks and i was just showing them the facts. and if i show them the facts and you are just heart-to-heart with people they will respect you. david: later, as a teenager, you bought a delicatessen. how old were you when you bought a delicatessen? bill: i think we were about 16, 16 turning 17, something like that. david: where did you get the money to buy a delicatessen? bill: i did not have any. i was working three jobs. i was working at an italian restaurant, vip type italian restaurant, a supermarket, pound of amityville. always three jobs. whatever i could fit in. it was chaotic. one day i saw a help wanted sign in this deli and i traded in all those hours to go to the deli because the owner said i can give you all the hours you need. but i took my bowtie from the restaurant, my white shirt, my tuxedo pants, and upgraded the delicatessen to how we would serve customers. as a kid.

because i knew it worked at the restaurant. i was like, why wouldn't it work here? that led to a very good relationship because when he wanted to sell he could not have any buyers. because nobody wanted to buy it. it was son mark industries. the sunoco gas station owned the land and they would only give you a one-year lease. he wanted $25,000. everyone said why would i give you $25,000? they could take the lease away in an instant. i said, look. after no one else came to him, i will give you $5,000. he said $7,000 with interest. pay me back in a year. if you do not make the payment i automatically repossess the business. i said great. i still had the machine -- bill: where did you get that money? david: i didn't. it was a loan. from him. if i did not pay him i would not have the business. but all the people that brought the beer, the cigarettes, the potato chips, all the vendors basically said we will front you the first delivery on the arm. i said i do not want anything

for free. i will always owe you the money. the day i sell or close you get your money back. meanwhile, you know how i got the money back? that was the early days of video games. i put asteroids and pac-man, some dinosaur game, my brother built them all. i learned this at the mall. i saw kids plunking quarters into these machines one after another. i said i will build a game room on the side of the store. we did that and i made more money splitting the quarters with the guy that actually owned the machines than i did slicing meat and making sandwiches. david: what did your parents say? you were supposed to be going to high school. did they say how about going to high school? bill: i am so blessed because my mom was the best. and people that i knew that were great friends of mine, they actually worked in a store when i was in school holding the place up and when i came out of school i got right behind the counter and worked until midnight. david: you graduated high school. did you go to college? bill: i did. i went to dowling college in oakdale, long island, because i

could do all my classes tuesday and thursday and be in store all the other days. david: when you graduated were you still owning the delicatessen? bill: yes, i was. at that time i made a decision. i got a job at xerox, which was a dream job. at that time i sold it. then we invested that money in a great beach house for my parents in myrtle beach, south carolina. david: your job at xerox was to be a salesman? you were selling what was a complicated product at the time. bill: at that time, it was copiers and electronic typewriters and printers and fax machines and all that. david: you did that for 17 years. bill: i was at xerox for 17 years. i sold door-to-door for a couple years and then got promoted and ultimately became a division president and corporate officer in my mid-30's at xerox. david: so one time maybe you thought at the beginning you could aspire to be the ceo of xerox. but you had an offer to leave. and why did you take the offer? bill: i did it because i stopped learning.

at that time it was like, what else am i going to do? all i really want is the ceo job. there are steps left before i will get it. i started to think, it's not the right reason to stay. so gartner group offered me a job to be the president there. i was very excited about that. i felt that i.t., advice, and really meeting all the technology leaders of the world and advising them would get me sharpened up for anything. david: you took that job but you did not stay there that long. bill: i didn't. i missed the big technology stage. global news, 24 hours a day, on air and on bloomberg quicktake, powered by 2700 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries. this is bloomberg. ♪ that is kind of what i really

wanted to do. that is what i wanted to do, so so i went to siebel systems to run worldwide sales and operations for them in california. i learned the software industry at siebel. david: after that you took a position as the head of s.a.p. americas. s.a.p. was a software company but what was its innovation that made s.a.p. such a strong company even at the beginning? bill: they call it erp, to break down erp, running financial systems for the biggest companies in the world, connecting that based on the industry, the supply chains. managing human resources, put that into one bucket and call it erp. and when i got hired by sap, they were a very fine company but in the americas they had missed 24 out of 25 quarters, so it was really the operation that was bringing down the whole company. so they had to fix that because they had five ceos in six years of sap america. david: you became the co-ceo of the entire company at one point and after five years of that he became the sole ceo. bill: yes. i became the co-ceo in 2010.

the sole ceo in 2014. and what i can tell you is it actually a very nice design. a lot of people knocked the co-ceo model, but in our case, i had a great partner, a great friend of mine still to this day. we had a great orientation around our partnership. we talked every day. jim was kind of like mr. inside in terms of representing development, especially in germany where we have very large engineering, and i was the guy on the front lines moving the number and working with the worldwide operations. david: as you were working at sap, you are the ceo, things are going well, the company is in good shape. what motivated you really to do something else? i mean, most people at the top, when things are going well, they kind of stay at the top. bill: i think i get the 17 year itch. you know? david: 17 years at xerox, 17 years at s.a.p. bill: exactly. i think after 17 years, i feel like i need to do something else. those were two of my greatest experiences. and i need a change.

and i really did want to take service now because i saw what it could be and i did want to make it the best. and i felt like my skill set and where they were and what they needed was a good match. david: so you will be here until 2036, in other words? bill: i don't know, especially with you and private equity in my future. [laughter] david: so you are obviously a very good salesman. what is the secret to being a good salesman? bill: you can get anything you want in this life if you help enough other people get what they want. ♪

david: why has technology been >> so you're obviously a very good salesman, what is this good to being a good salesman? bill you can get anything you want in this life as long as you help other people get what they want. i care about what you need.

i can compose solutions things to the great team that i am fortunate to work with that matter. if i say something to you, if i make a promise to you, no matter what, you will get that promise kept. i would never break my word. i think that's what it's all about. david: in your business career, what has been the best advice you ever perceived? the best advice i ever received is just, in the long run, play the long game. most people grossly overestimate what they can do in the short run and grossly underestimate what they can do in the long run. i have always tried to take a long view and not be so focused on just the here and now. today, i will have a very complete day in new york city. i will beat some of -- meet some of the biggest ceo guys in the world. as i make those trips i'm constantly thinking, what do we have to look like five years -- five years from now or 10 years

from now to keep up with having ideas that they don't even know they need to know about, but we need to know where we need to take them. we have to invent the future we want. we cannot wait for somebody else to do it and try to copy them, it's already too late. constantly trying to see around those corners, longview. david: what's the worst business advice you ever got? bill: goal for the money. any career choice, any deal that you do, it's not about the money. the money is nice to have, but it's much better to do things that are sustainable. so when you take a job, do it because you are loving on that culture and you believe it's a match with your personal dna and who you really are. when you are doing a commercial agreement, yeah, the transaction is nice and you want to win it and you want to accomplish things, but that relationship is

so much more important because that is sustainable and it's long-term. david: you are in addition cystic growth the company and maybe do something later on after you're happy with what you've done here. any aspiration to go in government or public service? phil: i would love to. i do think that there is a place to give back and to serve, and i think public service -- public service needs executives that have experience, especially global experience, where they have actually physically been to all these places around the world and have a sense of culture and a dynamism of humans, no matter where they are located and how to really do the right thing, not just the convenient thing. so it would be an honor to some -- some day do that up the road, but i wouldn't rule it out. david: in 2013 you are walking down the steps of your brother's and you fell down and glass fell into uriah or went into your

eye, can you describe what happened and how you dealt with that with your eye? bill it was a rough night because i had a giant water glass, very thick, slipped on the stairs and met a concrete foundation and glass, in my face. the glass actually went through my eye and cut it in half. dealing with that was a pretty traumatic experience, to say the least. but, i'm so blessed to be here and i think i have a greater appreciation for everything. i've also learned that vision is not just about what you see, but it's how you make other people feel and how you feel by making other people feel good. david: i read about you had 11 surgeries to save your eye and ultimately they could not save it. bill that's correct, i lost that battle but i think i one a great award. david: it's an incredible story.

you started with virtually nothing and built up a great reputation in so many different areas. i wish i bought your stock when you first came here. bill it's not too late, david. ♪ so, what are you thinking? i'm thinking... (speaking to self) about our honeymoon. what about africa? safari? hot air balloon ride? swim with elephants? wait, can we afford a safari? great question. like everything, it takes a little planning. or, put the money towards a down-payment... ...on a ranch ...in montana ...with horses let's take a look at those scenarios. j.p. morgan wealth management has advisors in chase branches and tools, like wealth plan to keep you on track. when you're planning for it all... the answer is j.p. morgan wealth management.

her uncle's unhappy. the answer is i'm sensing an underlying issue. it's t-mobile. it started when we tried to get him under a new plan. but they they unexpectedly unraveled their “price lock” guarantee. which has made him, a bit... unruly. you called yourself the “un-carrier”. you sing about “price lock” on those commercials. “the price lock, the price lock...” so, if you could change the price, change the name! it's not a lock, i know a lock. so how can we undo the damage? we could all unsubscribe and switch to xfinity. their connection is unreal. and we could all un-experience this whole session. okay, that's uncalled for. hi, i'm jason and i've lost 202 pounds on golo. so the first time i ever seen a golo advertisement, i said, "yeah, whatever. there's no way this works like this." and threw it to the side. a couple weeks later, i seen it again

after getting not so pleasant news from my physician. i was 424 pounds, and my doctor was recommending weight loss surgery. to avoid the surgery, i had to make a change. so i decided to go with golo and it's changed my life. when i first started golo and taking release, my cravings, they went away. and i was so surprised. you feel that your body is working and functioning the way it should be and you feel energized. golo has improved my life in so many ways. i'm able to stand and actually make dinner. i'm able to clean my house. i'm able to do just simple tasks that a lot of people call simple, but when you're extremely heavy they're not so simple. golo is real and when you take release and follow the plan, it works.

>> i don't want my daughters wasting time thinking about how much they weigh, what they look like and i think their fashion has done a terrible job of reinforcing an unrealistic beauty idea. francine: the entrepreneur driving a beauty empire while trying to redefine the world of fashion. sh