I went, and my first interview was with René Obermann, who was the CEO of Deutsche Telekom at the time - wonderful guy. And right after hello, I told him that it was my opinion that he could only fail one way in the US. I said, "Do exactly what you're doing - nothing."

On my very first day at T-Mobile, I demanded that every time I spoke publicly to the company, all employees across the country would be invited to watch. I faced legal and all that crap, but ultimately we were able to figure it out. We record it, too, so if somebody can't leave the sales floor, they can watch it later. Another thing I did very early on is give every employee stock, which we continue to do. So every time I speak to them I speak way over some of their heads.

My interaction with my followers on social media has become a phenomenon, and that's hardcore work every day! I have carpal tunnel from typing on my device.

I'm very careful, especially with the company, to not spend too much time playing the success reel because I really do believe that everything that's been accomplished can be parlayed in an equal amount going forward.

When I go to T-Mobile retail stores, I jokingly tell the employees that everybody between me and them is the enemy. In effect, what I mean is that in my paramilitary hierarchy, if I can hear them and they can hear me, everything will be fine. All we need to do is make sure the entire company understands that it's their job to pass information between us. And so far so good.

I say that the genius of the marketing strategy that we've had in every company that I've ever been in, is that if you ask your customers what they want and you give it to them, you shouldn't be shocked if they love it.

Strangely, from a life-change standpoint, I sold the company I was running and got divorced in the same month. And so there I was, at home, and I'm not the CEO. I took a few months thinking about what I wanted to do. When the first call came in about running a company owned by Deutsche Telekom, I thought it was laughable and really not something I'd do. I took the meeting mainly because the headhunter I knew. At first I thought I was just helping her fill out the roster, but then I dug into it.