Former Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady believes startup founders must fail to succeed.
“Whether you’re young, middle-aged or old, it’s not like we have the most confidence in everything we do; that’s impossible,” Brady said. “It’s not whether you succeed or fail. It’s what did you learn from the success? What did you learn from the failure?”
It was one of the many pieces of advice the recently retired football player imparted to a packed room at the Miami-based eMerge Americas conference, which he keynoted.
Felice Gorordo and Melissa Medina, the CEO and president of eMerge, respectively, sat with Brady for a 30-minute question-and-answer session on Thursday.
Brady, widely dubbed the ‘GOAT,’ an acronym for ‘greatest of all time,’ announced his retirement from the Bucs in February. He has since turned his focus to his wellness brand, TB12, founded in 2013. He’s broken into the NFT space, launching Autograph in 2021. And he has started investing in startups nationwide, including Washington, D.C.-based Class.
He did not mention any plans to invest in the burgeoning Sunshine State startup scene or discuss his recent legal embattlement after investing in now-failed Miami crypto startup FTX. Instead, his talk centered mainly on his football career and the life lessons he’s learned in his over 30-year career.
We’ve included some of the key takeaways below.
On keeping going during tough times
Startup founders are all too familiar with failure, but Brady believes it could be the key to success in the long run.
“If I look at my life and see what you so would see as failure — that’s when I learned the most because we’re open and vulnerable and receptive to the fact we don’t know everything. Don’t feel like you should be great at everything — which is hard for young kids; you see it on social media and think that’s the way they’re born.
I worked every day to be the best I could be — not to be the best, but the best I could be. You get to choose the thing you get to be the best at. Pick something you really enjoy doing, work really hard at it, and I promise you’ll get good at it.”
On breaking into the entrepreneurial field
“I wanted to create my own brand, be my own boss, and not answer to someone else. In my football career, I wasn’t the boss. I’m 45 now, and for the next 45, I want to continue to do great things.
I do realize business is very hard, very competitive. Every day you have to get up and figure out how to be better today for your consumer, boss or the person next to you. That’s what I think about now; I still take a similar athlete-team-oriented mindset with the endeavors I’m doing because that’s been the secret to my success.”
On success seeming easy
“Things didn’t necessarily come easy to me. You could look at it two ways. ‘That sucks; you weren’t the best.’ But what did [failing] allow me to do? It allows me to develop a work ethic.
I had to look in the mirror and say, ‘Did I give my best today?’ I had to work harder than everyone else. I had to be more determined and driven than the other guys more talented than me. There’s not going to be any straight road to success; it will be paved with some adversity. No one wakes up at the top of the mountain.”
On advice to entrepreneurs
“Most startups fail; it doesn’t matter if your mindset is to win and achieve. You believe you’re going to be successful and find the right team of people to maximize the potential. If you’re an entrepreneur, God bless you. It’s a difficult thing but absolutely the most rewarding. And if you try and it finally goes that way [of success], you have a great appreciation for the journey set you on and the people you went on it with.”
