"Billy Joe" Red McCombs is the self made billionaire founder of Clear Channel Communications, McCombs Enterprises and former owner of The Minnesota Vikings and listed as #281 on the FORBES Richest Americans list.  From Red, who I have had the pleasure and honor of working with for many years now- I have learned a TON about business.  He took me under his wing as a mentee when one of his best friends, and my former mentor, the late George Kozmetksy passed away (Dr. K also mentored Michael Dell).

Everytime I get to spend time with Red- its a gift.  He loves chocolate cookies but no longer east sweets since overcoming alcoholism many years back.  Those days, and that event of almost dying changed him forever.  He had built a massive empire at that point but was drinking all the time and the shock of the recovery and the realization that his family is #1- is what modified his approach to always remember "family First".  These days- his daughter martha runs most of his empire and Red- works with his teams to oversee his global business operations- all from his office in San Antonio.  His experience is a great reminder to me not to let my "skis get out in front of me" (lesson learned from Ken Losch who I work with at Advanced Green Innovations).  Bottom line- stay focused on the business and tasks (i.e. important stuff) at hand.

In this video I was about to leave and remembered that I had almost left without getting a video.  We had just finished a meeting about strategy on the green energy company I am working on and he had just introduced me to one of his friends who runs one of the largest truck companies in the US.  That deal alone could be worth $10's-M's.  So this is how we wrapped up our meeting- this video and him sending me off with some home-made Christmas fudge :) xoxo