That view, which I must admit, sounded oddish at the time it raptured my ear drum, has since mushroomed in value and found a special place in the deepest recesses of my psyche.
Principally because of the weight of its truth! When one’s moment of influence is in the rear-view mirror, if legacy building never featured in his personal brand philosophy, it is possible to only remember the noise he makes post his hour of consequence and little of anything of his contribution to society.
If your IQ is somewhat compromised, you would beam with smiles as you quickly countered my brother’s view by recounting the names of many dead people you remember, including those who have been dead for several decades.
However, for astute individuals, who appreciate that the words ‘name’ and ‘a good name’ will never be synonymous, their central nervous system must be hard at work. Like an aggressive bee trapped between a gauze and a windowpane, the word legacy must be violently buzzing and bouncing on the walls of their cranial cavity.
And for a good reason! After all, it is their legacy, not their name, that will transcend their lifespan. Purely because their legacy is not tied to their life course, but to the long-term effect and viability of their decisions.
The building of a positive legacy has no room for the myopia associated with short-termism. A great legacy model cannot be wrapped in the parochial self-centredness associated with a governance infrastructure that is abutted by a tight network of questionable patronage, asset grabbing and systematic pilfering. Neither can it be built upon a superstructure of graft, state and regulatory capture.
Legacy kicks out the selfish attitude anchored on the hedonistic view, “Let’s amass as much as we can, for tomorrow we will be dead.” Unfortunately, the spirit of unslakable acquisitiveness is prevalent in certain corporate and social leadership spheres.
A shrewd legacy builder consistently refuses to limit his influence to his last breath. He appreciates the potential to be outlived by his present-day actions. Far from being a selfish character, whose interest is only focused on acquiring wealth for himself and his heirs even if it means pursuing unorthodox and underhanded activities, his concern is on how people would benefit from the seed that he grows while alive.
This motivates him to provide an enabling environment for the sprouting of that seed by surrounding himself with like-minded individuals who would take the baton from him, run their course, and in turn hand it over to other legacy-minded individuals. A short-term view of one’s influence in life is anti-progressive. The wealth of many frittered away post their death.
Mainly because these individuals hoarded knowledge and placed an inordinate emphasis on their name and their individual ability to generate wealth while downplaying the importance of developing a sustainable path of value generation that could withstand the test of time. Unless they are beneficiaries of a sudden flash of a brilliant brainwave, at some point, ignorant heirs are forced to appreciate that life is not all sunshine and rainbows.
Bequeathed with an unstable infrastructure of intergenerational wealth, they tend to have one option, to dissipate it and raze it to the ground at a speed second only to that of light. This speaks to the value of leveraging knowledge and sharing it with one’s contemporaries for the benefit of posterity. The desire to lead a meaningful life guided by a purpose-filled vision and an uncompromising quest for sustained contentment equip many with the zeal to build a legacy. Rightly concerned about their life’s trajectory, these individuals would periodically assess their commitment to an enduring legacy.
They frequently reinvent themselves, thus enhancing the value of their legacy. Mindful of the lasting value of these three powerful statements highlighted in one hallowed book, “Everyone will be forgotten,” “It is not glorious to seek one’s glory,” and, “Let someone else praise you...and not your own lips,” they proactively focus on what they seek to achieve and through creativity, excellence and perseverance, they prioritise the building of a legacy, not in unconvincing brushstrokes of ambiguity, but in a compellingly noticeable way that will silently speak positively about them post their demise. In short, like my brother, they don’t want to be forgotten.
Reflect on a German visionary and horologist named Hans Wilsdorf. Not many people have heard of this innovative champion in the world of high-end chronography. But many have heard of globally recognised prestigious chronographs that bear the Rolex golden pentad-pointed coronet insignia, thanks to Wilsdorf’s compelling attention to detail and an uncompromising quest for chronometric precision. If you lay claim to being a horological cognoscente, you would know that despite its robustness, reliability, and luxurious feel and look, Rolex is not part of the triumvirate Haute Horlogerie.
This is the preserve of the less known but highly vaunted triad of ultra-luxurious Swiss brands of Vacheron Constantin, Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet. While the most expensive Patek Philippe will set you back P381 million, the most expensive Rolex is worth a relatively paltry P5.6 million. To put things in perspective, in simplistic terms that fail to consider the time value of money, other financial obligations and personal needs, it would take you over 300 years to afford the most expensive Patek Philippe timepiece assuming you earned P100,000 per month after tax, whereas it would only take you five years to procure the Rolex.
This price variance doesn’t take anything from the rich legacy built by Hans Wilsdorf, the cofounder of Rolex, a company hailed for churning out watches that are acclaimed to maintain their functionality and precision in the harshest of environments, from the depths of the Pacific Ocean to the peak of the Himalayas, as well as from the equatorial regions to the iciest of polar environments. When he died, some 62-odd years ago, Wilsdorf bequeathed all his shares to the Wilsdorf Foundation, a tax-exempted charity.
Despite all his vision, hard work and philanthropy, has Wilsdorf been forgotten? At the time when German products were shunned owing to German’s Nazi-linked pariah status, Wilsdorf set out to build a brand that would not be associated with anything German, but with all things exotic and luxurious. In time, his personal brand gradually ebbed, giving way to the rise and rise of the Rolex corporate brand.
Out of ignorance, many would not associate Rolex with Wilsdorf. The former continues to grow by leaps and bounds and has earned global recognition that beats the collective Haute Horlogerie trinity by far. To his credit, Wilsdorf is a true testament to the validity of the aphorism, “Do not be beholden to your name, but be beholden to your legacy.” Wilsdorf is not forgotten.
He maintains influence through the deeds of the foundation that bears his name. Wilsdorf’s legacy lives on through the Rolex brand, and through the foundation that has found relevance in quietly funding infrastructural developments and actively supporting charities throughout the world. Deliberately priced out of range for ordinary joes, Rolex watches continue to be worn with a badge of pride by anyone who can afford them, from the silkiest silk-stocking Sheikhs of the oil-rich but well-diversified economies of the Persian Gulf to the wanna-be wealthy CEOs of non-revenue-generating state-owned enterprises of our diamond-rich but beneficiation-destitute country.
The chilling emotion that has been niggling away at my brother for a decade is that he doesn't want to be forgotten. Yet he is a finite being. One hundred percent affected by the truism shared by Janne Teller, a Danish writer, “From the moment we are born, we begin to die.” To loosen his Gordian knot, he had better start defining, bolstering and preserving a lasting legacy. Mindful of the caution found in the hallowed book, “A good reputation is better than costly perfume, and the day you die is better than the day you are born,” my brother had better roll his sleeves, soar way above the fray into the legacy-encrusted firmament, and actively exploit his position for the greater benefit of future generations. After all, heart-on-the-sleeve emotionalism has always been an egregious substitute for sound strategy.
