Introduction – About Richard Branson & Virgin Group

Sir Richard Branson was born in18th July in the year 1950 in England. He is married and has two

children. At 16 years, Branson moved to launch a student magazine in London after dropping his

studies. He founded the virgin company at his late teen. His success in the sale of mail order records

gave him an opportunity to launch Virgin Records. At 23years, he released the first record of Mike

Oldfield, which was a great success in England. He introduced bands such as the culture club and

the sex pistols and his business venture became a big success. In 1984, he formed and launched

his virgin Atlantic airways and later in 1999 launched virgin mobile. After failing in the bid of the

national lottery in 2000, he started the virgin express an airline of European shorthaul. Richard

Branson’s empire today offers different ranges of services and products, which include tours and

travel, shopping, leisure and pleasure, media and telecommunication, financial, and money, health

services and social and environmental services among others.

Virgin is a leading “branded venture capital” organization and is one of the world's most recognized

and respected brands, which was founded by the business tycoon Richard Branson. Virgin Group is

classed as a Private Limited Company by Companies House. Virgin Group date of incorporation is

listed as 1985 , however, business and trading activities originally started in 1970 . Virgin Group has

gone on to grow very successful businesses in core sectors ranging from music to transportation,

travel, financial services, media, drinks, books, gaming and fitness etc. Virgin has created more than

300 branded companies worldwide, employing approximately 50,000 people, in 30 countries. Global

branded revenues in 2009 exceeded £11.5 billion

Sir Richard Branson is now a wealthy and a highly respected CEO of Virgin Group that

encompasses various businesses with over 55000 employees globally. He is responsible for over

200companies worldwide. Branson was knighted in 1999 for his “Entrepreneurship Services” and

ranked numbers 85 in the 2002 list of 100 greatest Britons’. Branson appeared in the Time Magazine

in the years 2007, among the top 100ranked world’s most influential people. The same year in

December the secretary of the United Nations presented him, an award of world citizenship for

environmental support and humanitarian.

Branson is famous for his success in the business field with his unique characteristics, which are an

attribute to his success. Branson management style and leadership skills were learnt in his day-to-

day duties and interaction with people. His philosophy is looking for the best since it is achievable.

He does things in his own way and in his own style with the aim of doing the right things.

Additionally, he believes that getting the right and willing people to do things that you need done is

leadership. Richard Branson does not hold any degree in management or certificate in that direction

but stands among influential manager. He does not follow any strategy in his day-to-day operation

but rather uses a “to do” list. He has various self developed management styles and skills that have

led to his success.

The Virgin Group is structure is quite interestingly complex, although numbers of people recognise

the Virgin Group to be a single business entity but this may not be the case. In actuality, each of the

Virgin brand companies operates as a separate business entity. Although, Richard Branson holds

full ownership and control of the Virgin Brand, the commercial setup of the companies using the

Virgin name is varied and complex . Even though each of the 300 companies operates as a single

entity, Branson completely owns the majority of them either individually or hrough family trusts and

is holding majority stakes in the others. However, occasionally, Richard Branson simply licenses the

Virgin brand to a company that has purchased a division from him such as Virgin Mobile USA &

Australia, Virgin Radio and Virgin Music. However, what connects the companies is use of the Virgin

trademark, Branson’s roles as chairman and shareholder and his management role as the face of

virgin in publicity, public and government relations. He also has responsibility for appointing senior

executives.

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Management Style

Due to the success and efficiency of Virgin Group, the media frequently cover the leadership and

management strategies of Virgin Group. Sir Richard Branson is renowned for his vibrant yet

competitive leadership style. According to Mullins and Daft, leadership is essentially a relationship

through which one person influences the behaviour or actions of other people, those people

intentionally wish for major changes, and the changes mirror purposes shared by followers and

leaders. In the case of the Virgin Group, this means that the style of Sir Richard Branson’s

leadership cannot be separated from the activities of Virgin Group and the effective teambuilding

within the organisation. This supported by Grant and Jackson who states that a major contributor to

the Virgin Group’s success is the inventive leadership style of Richard Branson.

These management styles include:

Loving and caring about people, which make people feel important. Richard Branson utilized his

knowledge in knowing the importance of proper management. Branson believed that a good

manager must be a person that cares about people for him to succeed. He loves his employees and

gives them total respect. His argument is that a person given respect, loved, and taken care of will

always portray his best. Branson knows that people have a need to feel wanted. Therefore, he puts

his priority on his employees and customers come second followed by the shareholders. He fulfills

the needs of his employees, and they eventually reciprocate by being efficient and effective, leading

to his success in businessranson, 2007). He loves people so much especially his employees with

whom he even shared his success with at some point. This is clear as seen after he got a

compensation award of $500,000, which he won in the lawsuit; he divided it among his employees.

Sir Richard Branson knows what to prioritize for his success. He puts family as his first priority and

the most important unit of his career and life. He argues that the family is the molding unit and

everyone needs to have that time. He spends time with his family and gives them love and the

attention that they need. To him that is the best way to instill responsibility in his children. His

company is one big family on the other side. He extends his love to his global employees. In doing

this, he is able to instill the responsiveness and commitment to his employees working all over the

globe. His global business is one big happy family that is successful.

Branson adopts failure as a style in his management, because he knows it is part of life and people

should not fear to fail since it is a way of learning. Those people afraid of failure never succeed in

creating anything in life. Branson is very successful because he was able to utilize his failure for

success. He had tried to be the man to fly in a balloon for eight times without success but kept on

pushing ahead. Finally, Branson was able to make it as the first man to cross the Atlantic and

pacific. He also made an unsuccessful attempt in crossing the Atlantic Ocean with his children in

2008. According to Sir Branson, failure is a thing that managers should adopt and utilize as a style of

management embraced for his success. Failure is a teacher in life, therefore when one fails he

should stand, dust himself up and start over again. Failing to stand up after a failure in something is

what makes someone a looser in that field.

Sir Branson is a manager who believes in innovation and risk taking as a style of management.

According to him, he could never be a manager if he feared venturing into new grounds. He focuses

on the results in the long term and if he has to take high risk to get the result for him then that is

worthwhile. The interest of Branson is to set himself huge in life. He ventures in what others perceive

as unachievable challenges by trying to be high above them aiming at living life in its fullness.

Branson’s argument is that for one to be big enough he has to compete with what exceeds him.

Branson believes that for a manager to be successful he must embrace the style of living an

adventurous life with all the fun. In living life as an adventure, he is able to enjoy what he does which

makes it more fun. He argues that a manager should not seat and watch his employees undertake

their duties he should join them or involve himself in other issues that require his attention more.

This to Branson makes one enjoy what he is doing and having fun at the same time. He is a

manager who likes to join others in exploring what he is capable of doing. He loves to have fun in

everything that he does that he believes in going even beyond the limits. As part Branson personal

adventure, when he 36 years he kept a world record as the fastest in crossing the Atlantic Ocean. At

37 and 41 years, he made another record of crossing the Atlantic Ocean with a hot air balloon that

was the largest.

Branson is a democratic manager and his democratic style of management is portrayed in the way

he listens to people in what they have to say to get the feedback. According to Branson, feedback

from those people he interacts with is a core value in his management. He carries a notebook

whenever he goes to note the opinions of people around him. According to Branson, every individual

has an idea to pass forth and the ideas may be good and of importance. Branson believes in taking

what is best from those people that associate with him. Branson understands that every person his

unique and can give something good if given the chance. As the CEO, Branson knows that negative

statement about people is demoralizing and kills their spirit and morale, which drops their production.

This is a style that he learnt from his mother who is still like a mentor to him. He loves spending time

with people and loves every person whether an executive or the floor cleaners. He does not

discriminate anybody in his corporation.

Sir Branson understands the importance of humbleness in the business world, which he adopts as

his style in management. He is able to interact with his employees on the ground and trusts them

well to the extent of delegating duties to them without any problems. He trust his employees that he

gives them his ideas for them to implement as if it were their own ideas and steps back to avoid

interference. Branson on the other side believes that sacking employees is not a strategy in

eliminating a problem or challenge in the organization. His focus is in training and solving the

problems that the employees have that help in solving the challenges in the organization. Branson

associate with common people, but make sure that he is always ahead of them in what he does.

Making a difference in what you do and in the world is another style that Sir Richard Branson adopts

for his success. His desire to make a difference in life makes him different from many managers. On

the other side, Branson faces most of the challengers that most of the managers face but focuses on

doing things differently from others. His Virgin business has a different philosophy whereby it

focuses on different segments and does it business differently and against normal way. Branson

also has focus on the way he trains his employees to tackle challenges from business or social life

which makes him different from most of the managers. His main aim is to blend social sector and the

business world since they depend largely on each other for progress.

Branson does not believe in saying no to any opportunity no matter its difficulties. He is never afraid

of thinking outside the box and says exactly what he feels is right and what he wants is what he

does. To him yes is the most definite way forward. Saying yes and stepping in to do it rightfully is

what gives Branson fun. It is like his philosophy for him to say yes to all opportunity and setting forth

to do it in the best way. Setting out to do the best is what matters to him since the best never fails.

Saying no is opening doors for failure and it is not fun.

Branson is criticized for his irregular board meetings, lack of business headquarters, and his illiterate

in computer knowledge. Criticism does not put him down since he is a man with a big dream. He

knows what he really wants in life. His big dream keeps him focused to the results. Branson plans

his time properly all in focus of his dream. He is able to program his time to cater for his family life

and business without suppressing one with the aim of getting the big dream accomplished.

Additionally, Branson believes that a great manager is a man that can follow his own heart. Since

when he was 16 years, he has followed his passion, which has made him so far very successful. He

is a man who has no interest for business but is very interested in inventing ideas and working on

things that will make him proud. He is a manager who believes in creating things that are different

and loveable by other people. Making money according to Branson should not be the major issue in

a business. This is because once you make people proud of your services and products them you

make all the money you need.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Sir Richard Branson is a real manager that the entrepreneur and business world need

to have. He is a man stands on what he want and set to do it. Criticism and lack of computer

knowledge do not weigh him down or make him lose his big dream. He believes in loving, listening,

and helping people achieve what they never thought they could achieve. He is a manager is

loveable and knows when to make technical disappearance to avoid getting on the way of people.

Branson is a manager that has a lot to teach to managers globally. Failure to him is of great

importance since it opens doors for more innovations. He believes that every problem in life has a

solution no matter the magnitude. Branson also believes that humor is an important style and a skill

that makes life and work enjoyable. An example was when; he had to bare his assets for the Virgin

Mobile launch wearing a cell phone for covering his privacy. When he was question about that event,

he humorously said that the phone was big enough. Therefore, managers should learn and adopt

Branson’s unique management styles.