Entrepreneur
February 23, 1965
Inducted in the Class of 2000
Notable accomplishments:
- Founded Dell Technologies (1984)
- Instituted large-scale custom-build mail-order PC sales
Quotes:
“You have to erase risk and you have to raise experimentation and incubating new ideas and testing things. You have to be explicit about the desire to go after these new opportunities, with the knowledge that they’re not all going to work.” Time magazine, October 31, 2021
“You have to have a business model that comprehends the rate of change in technology and customer preferences for products and services. You’ve got to have an organization that can deliver around customer expectations. Those are fairly easy compared to the final part, which is really executing on the first two. A lot of companies have had products and strategies which sound like they make sense, but the people weren’t been able to pull it off. You really have to put together a model that can be executed.” 1995 interview with Inc. Magazine
Suggested reading:
“Direct from Dell: Strategies That Revolutionized an Industry” by Michael Dell with Catherine Fredman (1999)
“Michael Dell: From Child Entrepreneur to Computer Magnate” by Shaina Carmel Indovino (2012)
“Play Nice But Win: A CEO’s Journey from Founder to Leader” by Michael Dell with James Kaplan (2021)
Learn more:
Official biography at Dell Technologies