Part of my role at T-Mobile is the ability to just be myself, because I'm 58 years old and I've done very well, and I don't need to fight my way up the hierarchy with my suit and hair anymore.

I think this job at T-Mobile has more than anything else helped me really see and understand how to set a strategy, communicate like crazy, and then passionately lead from the front of it.

I visit T-Mobile call centers. We've got about 18 major call centers in the US, and before I was CEO, I heard that no CEO had gone to physically visit them. I go in, they meet me outside, we take selfies as I stand like a piece of furniture, I tell them about how things are going - but most importantly, I say thank you and help them see that their behavior and their work has driven the culture of the company that's changed the industry and the whole world. It's a bit of a love affair.

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.

If you go back in my career, you'll find I've always been a lead-from-the-front people-manager guy. I've always been outspoken. I've always attempted to break the mold. My advice to myself, then, would be to go all in on it. The world doesn't need another cookie-cutter business-school leader. The world needs somebody to stick out and be loud and proud.

Part of my role at T-Mobile is the ability to just be myself, because I'm 58 years old and I've done very well, and I don't need to fight my way up the hierarchy with my suit and hair anymore.

When I finished my last job, at Global Crossing, it was the first time in God knows how many years that I wasn't in a job. It was probably 32 years or so, and there I was, it was like pow!