Suze Orman’s Cents and Sensibility
I vowed a long time ago not to argue with people about Madonna. But there I was, at a pop art exhibit, ripping into the wine and calamari with gusto, when an unknown actress and I got into it over the Great Mother. “Yes, she is brilliant, a genius,” she sneered. “I’ve got to admire anyone with such a glaring lack of talent, who made it there on self-promotion alone.”
You know what? No one ever made it on talent alone. There are millions of talented people who no one has ever heard of. On top of talent, you need either luck or pluck, and usually both. Madonna has candidly confessed that her voice is not extraordinary. But she IS an extraordinary talent in dancing, choreography, masterminding sets, video stories, outrageous ideas, and running a multibillion-dollar business by the seat of her panties. How is it that a woman’s marketing genius, her staggering business acumen, is dismissed as lack of talent?
Financial guru Suze Orman is often criticized in the same way. It’s not her financial advice, critics say, that made her, but her marketing flare. Those old boys’ clubs can’t accept that there’s nothing wrong with being smart, pretty, AND popular. Ten years ago, Forbes grumbled that Suze used too many self-promotion tactics, including charitable participation. “A plug for charitable giving earns her huge amounts of free publicity,” lamented William P. Barrett in a story he called “Sizzling Suze.” “Too bad Orman didn’t include a chapter [in her new book] on “How to promote yourself without spending money on promotion.”
And just how is that NOT good business sense? Doesn’t it count when we get rich playing by our own rules? Why pay more? Why is it only okay to get rich by stepping on people, instead of helping them? Today, sister Suze is named by Time Magazine as one of the most influential people in the world. She is the author of numerous bestselling books like The Courage to Be Rich: Creating a Life of Material and Spiritual Abundance
Now how in the world did this blonde bombshell, take-out chicken counter girl, rise from rags to riches? Well, it wasn’t by sleeping with the finance executives to get to the top. Two years ago in New York Times Magazine, Suze raised more than a few eyebrows by saying, “I have never been with a man in my whole life. I’m still a 55-year-old virgin.” Seems to me like sisters are doing it for themselves… with a little help from their friends. “K.T. is my life partner,” Suze said. “K.T. stands for Kathy Travis. We’re going on seven years.”
Though Suze has occasionally spoken up in favor of equal rights to marriage- it’s personal and financial sense for the two bodacious millionaires- she’s never been all that in-your-face about her private life. But dropping her cherry bomb led the promo princess to more free publicity, as right wing complainers argue vigorously over the virgin/lesbian conundrum. And Suze’s books for women- and everyone else- keep flying off the shelves.
That Suze Orman is a brand is irrefutable, but some of us say it’s smart, and certainly the multimillionaire is laughing all the way to the bank, as the saying goes. But laughing at whom?
No one. Suze’s ‘people first’ philosophy is quite genuine, and her warm wit and wisdom help millions to sort out their sticky financial problems. Suze’s common sense and cheerful pop psychology are not Earth shattering, revolutionary ideas- her gift is to transmit then in a manner that empowers us to action. Suze doesn’t ignore the masses of us who can’t understand intricate investment diversification, who are crushed under the weight of student loans, or who can’t be ‘owning not renting’ anytime soon. With cheerful and practical books like The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous & Broke
Those who have years of business experience criticize Suze for selling common cents, for betting on low-risk, long-term investment options, and for recycling tried and true advice that everybody knows. Forbes called her advice ‘mundane.’ Bully for you, bullies- as for the rest of us, we’ve got to start somewhere.
Suze started out herself with nothing. She was not born into money or onto Wall Street. She was born into the notorious South Side of Chicago ghetto to working-class Russian-Jewish immigrants. She worked menial jobs, such as selling BBQ chicken, throughout her university degree in social work. While social work was a world away from her future of finance, it no doubt gave her tremendous insight into reality and into the needs of people.
After graduating, Suze and a few friends packed up and headed west, but grandiose dreams turned into rather average ones, and Suze spent seven years working in a bakery as a waitress. She had great ideas on how to expand the business, and wanted to open her own restaurant, but had no way of paying for it. Suze’s enthusiasm and bright imagination were so winning, however, that one of her customers took a chance and gave her a $50 thousand loan. Mindful of the popular investing advice of the times, she rushed out to invest the entire sum at Merrill Lynch and went broke in four months flat.
And that’s how it all began. Young, fabulous, and broke but not defeated, Suze decided to learn everything she could about investing in order to be able to pay back the loan. She was hired entry level at Merrill Lynch, and quickly became a skilled stockbroker. Traditional feminine ‘drawbacks’ such as emotional empathy and good listening skills turned quickly into expert guidance strategies that really suited her clients needs. “My clients made out like bandits,” Orman told Publishers Weekly Magazine, “and I was propelled pretty quickly to become one of the top brokers.”
Suze left Merrill Lynch to become a vice-president of investments at Prudential Bache Securities and resigned in 1987 to start her own firm. This turned into something of a disaster- stolen files, thousands of dollars lost, difficult court proceedings, and a suspension of her California investment adviser license. Instead of wallowing, Little Miss Sunshine asked what she could learn from the catastrophe. She believed that without losing her openness and warmth, she had to be more careful to let others earn her trust instead of giving it away, and be more aware of liars.
What’s a girl to do after it all falls apart? Well, write a book, of course. Drawing from her experience advising clients and giving seminars on retirement, her first book, You’ve Earned It, Don’t Lose It : Mistakes You Can’t Afford to Make When You Retire
Suze approached an agent who wasn’t all that interested in finance titles, but found Suze herself to be wonderful. Amanda Urban said that Suze had an “authentic voice, and that’s because she completely cares about what she is doing. She really wants to help people with money.” In no time, Urban landed her a near-million dollar advance for book two. A rapid whirlwind of TV appearances, radio shows, and media followed. Suze’s audiences found her tremendously helpful and appealing and wanted more, so Suze gave them more: her smart brand of blonde is now among the biggest in the world.
There’s no real ‘secret’ to Suze’s success: the prize goes to the pluckiest, the ones who don’t keel over in defeat after every obstacle. Sometimes, it’s not stepping on everybody’s toes that propels you to the top- but truly caring for your audience means they’ll take you there. At every turn, Suze is described with great love. Her first publisher, Esther Margolis, said, “She was a financial consultant but she was a caring person.” Her publicist admires the marketing virtuoso: “She has an amazing instinct for … the way people are thinking and feeling.” Even her doorman loves her- she freely hugs him each day. “She is a beautiful lady, a very special, very kind woman,” he says. And her New York publicist, Richard Aulette, said it’s no act. “I’ve worked with a lot of celebrities over the years, and she’s very real. You won’t see her jumping into limousines.” And her friend Linda Gottlieb told the San Francisco Chronicle, “Spiritual gurus are out of touch with the practical life, and financial gurus don’t address people’s emotions and spiritual needs. Suze does both.”
And because big sister Suze’s natural charisma keeps advice from sounding bossy, we can all benefit from her practical know-how. Just being herself, she has showed us the way. Suze personifies the greatest of all finance truisms: do what you love, the money will follow.
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Lorette C. Luzajic is a Toronto writer and artist, the girl behind thegirlcanwrite.net. A journalism grad, she has published hundreds of poems, and her reviews, profiles, columns, and features have appeared everywhere from Adbusters to Dog Fancy. Her favourite thing in the world is getting to know interesting people, so she started a project called Fascinating People: gossip for smart people at www.fascinatingpeople.wordpress.com. She writes Fascinating Writers for Bookslut.com. She is also The Spice Girl at Gremolata.com, a foodie’s paradise. Lorette’s first book was The Astronaut’s Wife: Poems of Eros and Thanatos. Her second, Weird Monologues for a Rainy Life, is also available, and her third, Dendrite Pandemonium will be released later this year. Lorette lives in her library with her cats.
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