Success! How I Did It

When Chef Jose Andres arrived in the United States 26 years ago, few Americans had heard of tapas. Since then, Americans have warmed up to Spanish small plates and Andrés has gone on to lead 26 restaurants and win two Michelin stars. He even claims to have created the best Philly cheesesteak. This past April, Andrés was invited to speak at the Masters golf tournament in Augusta by Intersport for a summit on leadership. On this edition of "Success! How I Did It," Andrés talks about his life, how he manages his kitchen, and why he pulled out of the Trump International Hotel.

Tony Robbins has used his commanding presence to build a career as the world's most famous life and business coach, helping people like President Bill Clinton, Oprah Winfrey, and the Golden State Warriors. He recently hosted the winners of the Shopify Build a Bigger Business competition at his Fiji resort, Namale, where he also sat down with Business Insider senior strategy reporter Richard Feloni. They talked about how his childhood experiences made him want to help other people, and how he was able to scale that interest into a multibillion-dollar empire. We've turned that interview into a special episode of “Success How I Did It.”

Joanna Coles is the Chief Content Officer at Hearst, and was the Editor-in-Chief of Cosmo and Marie Claire before that. She's also the executive producer of a hit show on Freeform and a member of Snap's board. Coles told Business Insider's US Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell how she had to throw someone out of a cab to get a job, her negotiation strategy, and the power of a good network on this episode of "Success! How I Did It."

John Brennan is the former director of the CIA, a position he held until this past January. Now he’s attempting to retire for the second time. In April, Brennan was invited to speak at The Masters golf tournament in Augusta by Intersport for a summit on leadership. Business Insider’s US Editor in chief, Alyson Shontell interviewed him there about everything from how he joined the agency to president Trump, to what it was like in the situation room when Osama Bin Laden was killed. We've turned that interview into a special episode of “Success How I Did It.”

Ben Lerer spent his 20s co-founding Thrillist, a local recommendation site for “civilized bros.” He's now the CEO of digital holding company Group Nine, which is a merger of four brands: Thrillist, The Dodo, video news network NowThis, and Discovery’s science site, Seeker. The process was messy and difficult. But they got it done, and Discovery invested about $100 million in Group Nine. Lerer told Business Insider's Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell how he went from a self-described “decently spoiled kid” to a digital media mogul on this episode of “Success! How I Did It.”

In this Master Class episode of "Success! How I Did It," Fortune 500 CEOs and top executives reveal what it takes to reach the top, and how to set yourself up for eventual business world domination in your 20s and 30s. Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, PayPal CEO Dan Schulman and others share the career advice that was invaluable to them on their journies.

Dan Schulman is the CEO of PayPal. But his career began at AT&T, where he was paid an annual salary of about $14,000 a year. He rose through the ranks to run its core consumer business, then went on to run three public companies including Priceline, American Express, and Virgin Mobile. Schulman told Business Insider's Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell how he built his career, and how practicing Krav Maga martial arts helped him find success on this podcast interview for "Success! How I Did It."

John Sculley is the former CEO of Pepsi and Apple. He was brought on to be Steve Jobs’ adult supervision, and to teach him marketing. But the job was tough, and working with Apple’s brilliant founder was, too. During one particularly tense moment, Scully actually made Jobs cry. Since leaving Apple, Sculley has become an investor in many companies, and he’s currently working on a health startup that he thinks could grow to become bigger than Apple. Sculley told Business Insider’s US Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell about that experience and more for this episode of “Success! How I Did It.”

Jason Calacanis founded Silicon Alley Reporter, Weblogs Inc, Mahalo, and Inside.com. He made an early bet on Uber that paid off, and he’s now an investor and has his own syndicate. But he had a hard time getting there, including a huge fall from grace when the dotcom bubble burst. Back then, he was worth negative $10,000. Now, he's clawed his way back and generated $100 million. Calacanis told Business Insider’s US Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell about that experience and more for this episode of “Success! How I Did It.”

Steve Ballmer spent more than 30 years at Microsoft where he rose to become CEO. But his decade at the helm was full of challenges, ranging from the rise of Google to learning how to manage around Microsoft's cofounder, Bill Gates. Ballmer became a billionaire at Microsoft and after he retired in 2014, he bought the LA Clippers. Ballmer talks about his career and his enviable retirement on this episode of Business Insider's podcast, "Success! How I Did It" with US Editor-in-Chief, Alyson Shontell.

Aaron Levie is co-founder and CEO of Box, a cloud-based file sharing service. He took Box public when he was 29, and now it has a $2.5 billion market cap. But it took a lot of work to get there, including sleepless nights on yoga mats in the office, and the decision to turn down a $600 million acquisition offer from Citrix that his board wanted him to accept. Levie told Business Insider’s US Editor-in-Chief, Alyson Shontell, about those experiences and more for this episode of “Success! How I Did It.”

Vlad Tenev is co-founder and co-CEO of Robinhood, a mobile app that let's you trade stocks free of charge. It's only a few years old and millennials are all over it – the average age of the app’s two million users is 30 years old. The latest fundraising round valued the app at about $1.3 billion, with backers like Snoop Dogg and Marc Andreessen. But it took a lot for Robinhood to get where it is today, which he explains in this episode of "Success! How I Did It" with Business Insider US Editor-in-Chief, Alyson Shontell.

Payal Kadakia is the founder of ClassPass, a fitness class booking company that can be found in 39 cities around the world. ClassPass has generated more than 30 million class reservations since 2013 and its new valuation is about $470 million. Kadakia recently stepped down from her role as CEO, a decision she explained in this episode of “Success! How I Did It” with Business Insider Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell.

Drew Houston is the founder and CEO of Dropbox. In this episode, Houston discusses the creation of Dropbox on a bus, meeting Steve Jobs, and the advice he would give to young entrepreneurs.

Jonah Peretti is the founder and CEO of BuzzFeed, a digital media empire that started as an Instant Messenger bot. The bot spotted trending links across the web and sent them to groups of friends. Peretti grew that into a $1.5 billion media company that's on the verge of going public, and he's turned down giant acquisition offers along the way. Before BuzzFeed, Peretti cofounded The Huffington Post with Andrew Brietbart and others. In this episode, Business Insider's US Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell asks him about both experiences, media industry trends, startup advice, and timely news, like the Trump-Russia dossier that BuzzFeed was first to publish. We also got the story behind a lewd Ivanka Trump tweet Jonah wrote that went viral.