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Great minds and great ideas will find their way to success, even after facing difficulties. Such a great person with a great mind is the American businessman and the highest paid CEO of SAP SE, Bill McDermott, who despite spending his childhood in poverty emerged as one of the most powerful businessmen of America. McDermott has described his whole amazing life story in his book, “Winners Dream,” co-written by Joanne Gordon, that has been awarded a gold medal for a business memoir of the year by the Axiom Business Book Awards.

Early Life

McDermott was born in Amityville on Long Island, to Kathleen and Bill McDermott. His father worked as a power maintenance specialist at Con Edison, and his grandfather, Bobby McDermott, was a famous basketball player. According to his book, he had a tough childhood, and his family faced critical financial conditions. Even the family used to live in a house with a floor that flooded every time it rained.

McDermott, from a very tender age, started working in part-time jobs. At the age of 11, he started selling newspapers, greeting cards, cookies, and other products and saved enough money to start a new business. When he was sixteen, he bought a Country Deli for $7,000, with the money he earned in past five years, with different jobs and businesses. His County Deli business proved to be most beneficial for him, as he was able to get admission into an undergraduate course in business management at Dowling College, with the earned profits.

After completing the undergraduate course, McDermott joined Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management to pursue an MBA degree and later, attended the Wharton School of Business, where he completed the Executive Development Program.

Career

Possessed with awesome management skills and an MBA degree, McDermott managed to get a job in the sales department of Xerox. He continued working in the same department for 16 years, and at the age of 36, he was promoted to the post of Division President of Xerox’s sales, becoming the youngest person to hold that position in the company.

Later, in 2000, McDermott became the President of Gartner and served at the same position till 2002. He also worked as the Executive Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Operations at Siebel Systems.

Career with SAP

In 2002, McDormett joined SAP America, as the CEO of the company. Only in few years, he was designated to the SAP Executive Board, followed by gaining the position of co-CEO of SAP AG, in February 2010. SAP is a German company, and McDermott became the first American to hold the position of the CEO of the company, on May 21, 2014.

Personal Life

McDormett is married to Julie McDormett, and the couple has two sons together. At the time he was working in Gartner, Julie suffered from breast cancer. After six months of chemo, she recovered from the disease. But later, his mother suffered and died of pancreatic cancer. The incident encouraged him to launch the Kathleen McDermott Foundation for pancreatic cancer.

McDermott is a member of the Business Roundtable and the European Roundtable of Industrialists (ERT). He has won many honorary awards including the GENYOUth’s Vanguard Award, the City Year’s Idealist of the Year, and the Manager of the Year by the German Business Daily.

Yashica Vashishtha

Yashica is a Software Engineer turned Content Writer, who loves to write on social causes and expertise in writing technical stuff. She loves to watch movies and explore new places. She believes that you need to live once before you die. So experimenting with her life and career choices, she is trying to live her life to the fullest.

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