Dealmaker Strategy: The Man Who Would Be King

By

If there was an official movie for this site it would have to be classic The Man Who Would Be King.

I’ve been a film buff for as long as I can remember, so I can’t refrain from recommending films of relevance to us. So this week, I want to recommend an old classic as a great inspirational film for all prospective tycoons to watch.

The Man Who Would Be King

I can almost hear you asking, “The Man Who Would Be King? How is this a business film?” If you don’t think that this is a movie about entrepreneurship, you’re dead wrong, my friend. This may well be the ultimate entrepreneurial movie.

Ex-British soldiers Daniel Dravot (Sean Connery) and Peachy Carnehan (Michael Caine) have big dreams after retiring from her majesty’s service. They want to take over one of the Central Asian kingdoms northwest of India and make themselves its rulers. However, they find themselves in typical entrepreneurial circumstances with next to nothing in terms of a startup budget. So in classic entrepreneurial fashion, the limited financial resources they do have are invested in assets which will bring them the biggest bang for the buck–literally: 16 Martini-Henry repeating rifles.

They then use these rifles to both impress and intimidate the thuggish ruler of a small autonomous tribe on the outskirts of their target country of Kafiristan. This first alliance then becomes the “platform company” from which they launch an M&A campaign to acquire control of additional tribes. Can you say “industry roll-up”? In quick time, they acquire enough of these “assets” to take over the entire kingdom. This is when their real problems begin due to hubris on the part of Daniel who wants to become a permanent monarch. In contrast, Peachy just wants to get out of Dodge with the loot before the bubble bursts—which it does very quickly.

Memento mori, Daniel.

The lessons here are that:

– you need to take risks if you are going to attempt to achieve anything great.

– you need a good strategy.

– don’t allow early successes to go to your head as nothing lasts forever.

There’s a funny clip here from early on in the film that reveals the spirit of the two men. “Detriments” you call us?!

This is definitely one of my all-time favorite adventures films. Great story. And what can you say about a cast consisting of Connery, Caine, and Plummer? It doesn’t get any better than that. Let’s hope Hollowood doesn’t do a remake with Ashton Timberlake and Justin Kutcher.