Liz Mohn - Key Moments: Experiences in a Dedicated Life

Copyright 2012 by Liz Mohn

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Crown Business, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

www.crownpublishing.com

CROWN BUSINESS is a trademark and CROWN and the Rising Sun colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Mohn, Liz.
[Schlsselmomente. English]
Key moments / Liz Mohn. 1st ed.
p. cm.
1. Mohn, Liz. 2. Bertelsmann Stiftung (Gtersloh, Germany) 3. Women philanthropistsGermanyBiography. 4. BusinesswomenGermanyBiography. 5. Women industralistsGermanyBiography. 6. Human servicesGermany. 7. CharitiesGermany. I. Title.
HV28.M66A35 2012
361.74092dc23
[B] 2012010422

eISBN: 978-0-7704-3603-2

Jacket photograph by Karl Lagerfeld

v3.1

I dedicate this book in love and immense gratitude
to my husband, Reinhard Mohn,
with whom I spent more than fifty years.
A great entrepreneur and founder. A visionary philosopher.
For me he was an infinitely affectionate partner.
By his example and with his convictions,
my life was shaped by him: Humanity wins!

I learned a great many things during the conversations I had with my husband, Reinhard Mohn. I consider it a great gift that for more than fifty years we lived together in an ongoing exchange of ideas, and that I am now able to continue his work at Bertelsmann and the Bertelsmann Foundation. I am deeply grateful to my husband for his belief in me.

My life did not always proceed in a linear fashion. In more than forty years of professional experience, I have experienced highs and lows, overcome great obstacles, and learned from my mistakes. Many times I stood before enormous challenges and had to find new ways around them. Small, spontaneous initiatives grew into large human networks, and efforts that began on the local level became international projects. Like clockwork, I have been asked again and again: How do you do it?

My answer is in this book.

Since childhood I have been extremely curious. But like many women of my generation, it wasnt until later in life that I could put my abilities to the test and find out which talents I was really born with. I have remained curious, always wanting to learn. I recognized that common sense alone is not enough to face difficult situations or prevent mistakesjust as our instincts are not enough to go on when making major decisions. We must draw from both reason and intuition.

With this book I not only want to pass on my experiences; I want to give readers the courage to take their lives into their hands and follow their own path. Dont give up, even if things get tough, and dont let setbacks get you down.

Last, I want to pass along the most important thing Ive learned: Believe in yourselfand you can do anything!

Liz Mohn

Ive met countless numbers of people over the past decades, and Ive always been curious about how they acquired their skills, talents, and abilities, and how they recognized these qualities, especially attributes that were not immediately apparent. My greatest passion has always been to work with others. Whether Im hiring new employees at Bertelsmann or meeting young people all over the globe, one thing fascinates me: What makes a person unique? How does someone attain inner strength? Why do some of us not only accept lifes challenges but use them for personal growth? And last but not least: What does it take for someone to become a leader? And by leader, I dont mean just someone with a high position within a company. Being a leader means leading by examplewhether working in an honorary position or managing projects in social, cultural, or other fields.

Of course, having expert knowledge is a must. To be at the top of your profession, you need to have an excellent education as well as substantial professional knowhow. But thats not all. I have met many extraordinarily Contrary to what we in the West have been taught for generations, feelings or intuition do not stand in opposition to intelligence. Rather, they are a type of intelligence.

Until just a few years ago, it was frowned upon for women of my generation to discuss the impact of their feelings on their decision making. If you showed your emotions, you were considered intellectually weak. And if, furthermore, it was a woman who drew on her intuition, her friends and family would humor her, but her colleagues would certainly not take her seriously. For a long time, concepts like emotional intelligence and intuitive judgment were considered feminine or female-oriented. Any old-school, traditional manager would have just laughed at them.

This has now all changed, with a special impact on the women of my generation. Today we know that qualities like intuition contribute to making a great leader. If we trust our feelings, we can grow as human beings. We can be open to new possibilities, take unexplored paths, develop new ideas, and launch new projects. We can bring individuals together who otherwise would have never met, and tap into unknowable potential. Believing in the power of your own intuition makes way for endless opportunities. I have seen innumerable examples of it.

Of course, intuition isnt everything. Our emotional knowledge still needs an intellectual framework, including professional expertise and analytical thinkingjust as intellect without intuition has its limits. Together, however, intellect and intuition are unbeatable. The more I learned to trust my feelings, the more courageous I became. Suddenly I was going forward with projects that I hadnt dared dream of before. These are the opportunities that I want to talk about here, the key to many of my projects and initiatives. At first, I often just had the sense that something needed to be done, and so I would reach for the phone. An idea was born, and then others followed. A spontaneous initiative grew into a network, which many people then joined. An intuitive decision unleashed great creative forcewhat began small grew big. And yet in todays schools, students creative potential is still not nurtured nearly as much as rational and academic learning.

Anyone who wants to make changes in our society needs to step off the well-trodden path. We must dare to try new things. We must question and rethink that which is familiar, to make sure were really on the right track. We must be allowed to make mistakes. And we must become curious again, to want to learn our whole lives long.

The world into which I was born was not a safe one. My life began on the eve of Germanys declaration of war on the Soviet Union. The adults were fraught with worry. Today we know that a mothers fear, along with the anxiety and hardship she experiences during the first weeks of her childs life, can have a profound impact on that persons subconscious. As adults, we carry our mothers worries with us, perhaps for all our lives. But early life lessons are also what made the women of my generation strong. We learned that life is not a cakewalk, and that survival not only demands great strength but can even make you stronger.

The changes in society that we children of the war have witnessed are immense, especially we women, who had to fight hard for our chance at an education and a career, and for a voice in society. For the women of my generation, none of the above were givens. Today, whenever I give a lecture and see so many well-educated young women in the audience, I am overcome with joy. And vice versa: these young women are often astonished at the scope of my duties and my many interests. How do you do it all? they ask. What gave you such strength and courage? What made you the woman you are today?