There are far too many mentions of our favorite billionaire to post them all individually, so we summarize the better mentions in our "briefly branson" posts. Today’s collection: (1) grounded Queen of Sky writes to Virgin King; (2) entrepreneurs succeed without university degrees; and two more business writers citing Sir Richard.  

(1) BBC News has the story of a US flight attendant "fighting for her job after she was suspended over postings on her blog." On the blog, "Queen of Sky" Ellen Simonetti says several people have told her to send her resume to Branson, which she plans to do this week. The fact that so many people immediately thought that Branson would dig this is exactly why we built a site dedicated to him, not Trump.   Ellen mentions not having a UK work visa, but remember, Branson is launching Virgin America soon and would probably love the PR of "righting Delta’s wrong." (Branson has already said Virgin America will beat Delta/American by taking better care of its people.) On the other hand, companies are generally reluctant about hiring employees in the middle of lawsuits against former employers, so we’ll see what happens.

(2) re:invention blog includes Richard in a list of entrepreneurs without a degree.

What’s fascinating? The number of entrepreneurs without a degree. The National Federation of Independent Business reports that only 60% of all entrepreneurs (men and women combined) have at least some college education. Only a tenth of this group (12.6%) has graduate or professional school degrees. A full 40% have but a high school degree or less. Some notable inventors and entrepreneurs who bailed on college or high school? Bill Gates (who hoisted blue-peter from Harvard during junior year), Michael Dell (who took flight from Texas), Ted Turner (expelled from Brown for having a girl in his room), Barry Diller (who sprang from UCLA), Chef Wolfgang Puck, Robert Redford, Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Nathan Pritikin (Pritikin diet), Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Ray Kroc, Carl Lindler, David Murdock, Vidal Sassoon, Richard Branson, Jim Clark (founder of Netscape), Kemmons Wilson (founder of Holiday Inn), Jimmy Dean, the Wright brothers…

(3) Business writers love to cite Branson’s strategies as evidence that their own techniques work. Got an email today about another such program, which I know nothing about. If you’ve read it, let me know if it’s any good.

In The Power of Outrageous Marketing, Joe Vitale reveals 10 secrets for fame and wealth used by the world’s most outrageous marketers! These include P.T. Barnum, Richard Branson, Madonna, Donald Trump, Houdini, J. Paul Getty, Mark Twain, Muhammad Ali, the Swedish Bikini Team, and several more!

(4) The renowned Tom Peters (who also spoke at the 2002 WCBLC conference where I briefly met Branson) mentions Richard as an example of a "metaphysician" rather than "administrator."

My bile seems to be running particularly thick these days concerning MBAs—the degree seems increasingly out of touch with modern business needs as I see them. So I have decided, tongue slightly in cheek, to propose some substitutes for the MBA—the PP presentation is meant to be entertaining, while also deadly serious. For example my "new-substitute degrees" include: the (real) MFA … Master of Fine Arts. (My estimable friend Dan Pink writes of the post-industrial, "right-brain economy": "The MFA is the new MBA.") Then comes the MMM1: Master of Metaphysical Management, an idea stolen from Danish marketing guru Jesper Kunde, who says that in an economy dominated by ephemeral products we are in need of metaphysicians more than "administrators"—e.g., Starbucks’ Howard Schultz and Virgin’s Richard Branson.

That’s it from the "briefly branson" desk today… Happy Halloween!