Former Cisco CEO John Chambers on building a billion dollar company and creating jobs of the future

Innovate or die is more than a trite phrase. John Chambers has made it his life's work. For a decade, Chambers ran internet hardware giant Cisco, making big acquisitions that drove the company to yearly revenue of nearly $50 billion.

Now, he's the CEO of the firm JC2 Ventures, where he finds companies looking to take on the giants. He also advises Indian Prime Minister Modi and French President Macron on how to help startups flourish in their countries. He's here to explain how to relentlessly build companies, whether big or small.

Hello, I'm Andy Serwer. Welcome to "Influencers," and welcome to our guest John Chambers, who is hosting us here at his home in Silicon Valley. John, this is a great place. Thanks for having us in.

JOHN CHAMBERS: Andy, it's fun to be doing this again together. We've done it a number of times over the last 20 years.

ANDY SERWER: That's right. It has been a while. Now, John, you are no longer the chief executive of Cisco. That was a good long run. 20 years?

JOHN CHAMBERS: 20 years.

ANDY SERWER: You now are running a venture fund called JC2. Tell us about that and how is it different from being the CEO of Cisco?

JOHN CHAMBERS: Well, it's different in almost every way. During this next chapter in my life, I'm focusing on startups, job creation, inclusion by geography and around the world-- everything from French high tech ambassador for Macron to an advisor to Prime Minister Modi in India. And I'm focused about how do we create the jobs for the future? And 18 companies I invest in, and I'm literally they're almost like my family and I coach them. And my pride there is when the CEO is really successful on it.

So think of me more as a strategic partner with a social purpose to create jobs and inclusive jobs, much like we did at Cisco. We created 10,000 millionaires, as you remember, among our employees. And with these startups, I want to see that type of the American dream come true for more and more people than we are today.

ANDY SERWER: So how exactly is that different though, I mean, in terms of what you're doing and the skill set?

JOHN CHAMBERS: Well, number one, there were 75,000 people helping me do my job. Today, it's three of us-- Shannon, my son, and me. And we're going to see if we can build a billion dollar company with less than 10 people.

But it really is much more of a strategic advisor, partner, mentor, coach, investor, board member to them. And I talk to my average CEO probably two to three times a week. I help them figure out how do they build culture, how do they do go to market approaches.

So many of the startups-- Cisco, for example-- went public went it was 70 million in sales from 400 people. Today, you see companies going public at $50 billion, and the majority of their growth may already be over, and tens of thousands of people.

So I like the growth stage. I like companies being able to help scale. I like walking the CEO and teaching them through their first crisis because as Jack Welch taught me many years ago, your company will never be great until you've had a near-death experience and you, as a leader, have learned to lead it through that.

Much like your kids, for your viewers, it's nice when your kids score a soccer goal or gets a good grade in school, but it's more important how they handle their first real setback. And if you could, as a parent, you would give that to them so that they can learn how to get through it.

So I'm kind of coaching these companies and I take tremendous pride in them. I get to pick only those companies that I really want to work with, so it's an honor.

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