I wasn’t surprised when Harvey Mackay’s assistant, Greg Bailey, called on Monday to let me know my interview with Mackay needed to be at 9 p.m. Mackay, 77, keeps long hours including in the coming weeks when he will stop in at least 25 cities to promote his latest book, Use Your Head to Get Your Foot in the Door: Job Search Secrets No One Else Will Tell You.
I’ve known Mackay, the Minneapolis businessman who has written five New York Times bestselling business books, since the late 1960s. He’s been practicing multi-tasking and working 24-7 before both terms were well known jargon.
About 30 years ago it was a coup for a business group to visit the closed society of Fidel Castro’s communist Cuba. Mackay led a Greater Minneapolis Chamber of Commerce group to Cuba and vowed not to sleep while there so he could take in as much as possible.
“That’s true,” Mackay remembered this week. “I hate to sleep and I don’t like to go to sleep because I am afraid I will miss something.”
When Mackay was a student at the University of Minnesota he consulted with experts who told him his longevity wouldn’t be jeopardized by sleeping about five hours a night. “I’ve been going from 1 to 6 a.m. almost all my life,” he said.
Minimizing sleep has been part of a success formula allowing Mackay to build and run his $100 million Minneapolis envelope company, sell 10 million copies of his business books (including Swim With the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive), write a weekly syndicated column published in 52 newspapers, and travel the world promoting the books and giving speeches. Along the way he and wife Carol Ann have raised a family while living in Minneapolis and Phoenix.
Mackay’s father, Jack, was a journalist and bureau chief for the Associated Press in the Twin Cities. He was also a mentor to his son and among his life lessons was this message: “Help others.”
Young Mackay was told to devote 25 percent of his time to volunteerism and he’s been doing that since he was 21. Over the years Mackay has focused on helping others with career development, and not just through books, speeches and consulting. He estimates that in the last 45-plus years he’s had over 400 personal consulting sessions with people who have come through his “front door” looking for help with their careers.
Mackay’s books have been translated into 40 languages and distributed in 80 countries. He’s had countless people thank him for his advice in-person, with letters and in other ways. “What keeps me going is…real simple. When you know that you’re able to help a lot of people all over the world, it’s very satisfying,” Mackay said.