Sam Zell
"It just never occurred to me that I couldn’t do it. If you’re not aware that you’re not supposed to be able to do something, the barriers to doing it are dramatically lessened"
"It just never occurred to me that I couldn’t do it. If you’re not aware that you’re not supposed to be able to do something, the barriers to doing it are dramatically lessened"
Sam Zell (1941–2023) built his career on a simple conviction: bet on people who see opportunity where others see risk. Over more than five decades he founded and led companies across real estate, logistics, energy, healthcare and manufacturing, often turning around struggling businesses, consolidating fragmented industries and taking companies to the public markets.
He founded Equity Group Investments, the private investment firm he chaired for more than 50 years, and served as chairman of five companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange. He also founded Equity Office Properties Trust, the largest office REIT in the United States, sold in 2007 for $39 billion in what was then the largest leveraged buyout in history. Through Equity International, he brought the first Brazilian and Mexican real estate companies to the New York Stock Exchange. In 2017 Forbes named him one of the 100 Greatest Living Business Minds, the same year he shared his philosophy in his book, Am I Being Too Subtle?
Sam believed the most valuable investment is in people, and he devoted much of his philanthropy to entrepreneurial education. Through the Zell Family Foundation he established entrepreneurship programs at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and Reichman University.
Israel held a special place for him. He cared deeply about the country and saw its future in the next generation of business leaders. In 2001 he founded the Zell Entrepreneurship Program at Reichman University, then a young institution with an entrepreneurial spirit of its own. He found a kindred spirit in its founder, Prof. Uriel Reichman, and connected with his vision of an independent university built on initiative, excellence and responsibility.
More than two decades later, the program he founded has produced hundreds of founders and close to 200 companies. Sam passed away in 2023, but the idea behind the program remains unchanged: the barriers to doing something shrink when you don’t know you’re not supposed to be able to do it.
