It is well known that roughly 30 % of Microsoft’s 31,000 employees are millionaires, but that’s hardly an exceptional case. That number may seem small compared with the general population-it’s less than 5 % of all families-but the new millionaires tend to be clustered in the industries, namely high-tech and finance, that made them rich. families worth more than $1 million by the end of 1998. No one can say for certain how many millionaires have been created by Wall Street’s long boom, but according to one government survey there were already 4.6 million U.S. The best you can do is to keep them while they still care. Over the past few years, he’s learned that millionaires come and millionaires go. Eventually, Knowling will know he’s lost the battle, and he’ll stand, warmly shake the employee’s hand, and sincerely wish him well. He needs time to decompress he’s taking his family on a long vacation, points unknown. Sometimes the departing employee is just weary, and he’ll tell Knowling so. The company just isn’t as exciting as it used to be in its scrappy start-up days, he might say, or an offer to become CEO of a pre-IPO company down the street is simply too good to ignore. Knowling will suggest the employee consider other high-level jobs within the company perhaps a new leadership role can be created for him. Over the next hour or so, Knowling and the departing employee will talk in even, dispassionate tones. They don’t have to work-and their money changes everything. The employees who regularly stop into Knowling’s office, like legions of others in the new economy, happen to be millionaires. What is new is how often they’re being proffered these days-because they can be. In the history of business, these are hardly new excuses for quitting. Or maybe he just needs to rest, see his kids again. There is little tension, little acrimony. The employee settles in his chair and smiles. Every now and then, a very talented employee walks into Bob Knowling’s office at Covad, the high-flying Internet services company where Knowling is CEO.
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