NEWSBYBRYAN SIMS

[Ed. Note. We're thrilled to brass MEDIA founder Bryan Sims share the story of his very own "Giving Pledge."]

When I was a kid I used to read stories about people like Bill Gates, Michael Dell and Steve Jobs. People who were first time entrepreneurs and started off like everyday people just like you and I. One of my particularly favorite things to learn about them was what they did for their first job.

My first job started at 15 while in high school at the local athletic club. I did maintenance and janitorial work, cleaning work-out equipment and scrubbing toilets in the locker room.

I first began investing as a teenager, taking my janitor’s paychecks and putting them in the stock market. Later in school I decided to create a teen investment club as part of a business class project so my friends and I could all invest together.

It was here that I learned two very important lessons:

1. The power of time and compound interest when it comes to money.
2. The power of a having many people involved in a project.

As 16 year olds investing in the stock market, we had one major advantage going for us, and that was time. Upon graduation and the disbanding of the investment club, many of participants took their money out and immediately reinvested into retirement accounts. In all likelihood, if they stick with it, they’ll be millionaires by the time they retire because they began so early.

The second piece I learned was the value of multiple perspectives. Statistically speaking, investment clubs with both men and women perform better than those with just men or just women. By getting a group of people together who shared a similar interest, we were able to benefit the group as a whole.

It’s because of these two philosophies that I’ve become a big believer in the Giving Pledge recently administered by over 40 billionaires and led by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. It takes these two concepts of people who have built wealth over time, and combines it with a critical mass of people to have a compounded effect for a greater good.