I've been in a hurry all my life. I've been in a hurry to succeed, and in a hurry to prove myself.

One, I love the creativity. I love the ability to create a capital structure that is appropriate for a company, no matter what field it happens to be in.

The trouble, in my opinion, with corporate America today, is that everything is thought of in quarters.

I thought at the time that I wanted to go into institutional sales, selling stocks and bonds to institutions. In those days, which was the 1960s, the institutional salesman was making about $100,000 a year. I thought that was just an enormous amount of money.

Our industry expertise (at KKR) enables the firm not only to make better investment choices but also to win the confidence of senior management and sellers, which has enabled us to purchase many companies on an exclusive basis.

I want people who will stand up to me. People who are not afraid to say exactly what's on their minds, even though that's probably not what I want to hear. That's what I want.

And make sure that capital structure we have in place is the right capital structure. I think that's the reason that we've been successful.