New Business Lessons From American Gangster.

American Gangster is a biographical crime film directed and produced by Ridley Scott. The movie is based on the life of Frank Lucas, a drug dealer who made a name for himself in the 1970s with his daring, and highly unorthodox, tactics in the New York heroin trade. Since its release in 2007, American Gangster has become a classic in its genre even though it has been accepted that it does not truly reflect the life of Frank Lucas. The performances of Denzel Washington as Frank Lucas and Russell Crowe as Detective Richie Roberts received critical acclaim with their confrontation on screen considered as one of the best ever in terms of gangster movies.

If I were asked to give a simple description of American Gangster, it would be this one: It is the story of a guy who is willing to do whatever it takes to get where he wants to be even it means shattering the life of anyone foolish enough to do business with him. This fact does not mean that Frank Lucas does not have morals. He does. In the movie, he says the following to his brothers and future associates: "The most important thing in business is honesty, integrity, hard work... family... never forgetting where we came from". But when it comes to the consequences of his business, he lets his clients deal with that. As far as he concerned, if there is a free market anybody in that market is free to do what he or she wants. This is where he draws the line when it comes to his personal responsibility.

I watched the movie again recently after nearly ten years. There are other articles on the web titled "Lessons from American Gangster", but my aim, as is always the case, if to offer a fresh perspective. I mentioned in some of my previous articles that time allows you to view and understand things differently. And so these are the three Business Lessons which I identified in American Gangster.

1. Use cheap stereotypes to your advantage.

The key reason why Frank Lucas becomes so incredibly successful is that no one believes that a black man in the 1970s can break the monopoly of the drug trade controlled by the Italian mafia families. Lucas is very aware that the police and even society at large have a very fixed mindset when it comes to someone like him. To them, he simply does not qualify as a competitor to the established drug cartels. Lucas is not even on the list of outsiders and it is only when he makes a critical mistake that Detective Richie Roberts finally spots him.

The ease with which Lucas visibly used the stereotypes applicable to him to develop his empire shows one thing: most people, even those who are supposedly open-minded, will limit their judgments to stereotypes and not go beyond them. Things like: he comes from this country, that's it, she's a pretty girl, that's it, he grew up in this social class, that's it etc etc are far more common than we like to think. Instead of seeing this as a negative, Frank Lucas uses this card to stay off radars and catapult himself to the top of the New York criminal hierarchy. Key Lesson: It is often completely useless to change the preconceived ideas of others. Instead of fighting losing battles, find a way to use these ideas for your own benefit. No one needs to know how you use them except you.

2. Get rid of weak partners before you expand your business.

When the business of Lucas starts rolling, he decides to keep it as a family venture employing his brothers and cousins as his main business associates. There is wisdom in that but Lucas does not seem to realise that not all of his relatives are reliable. Some of them follow his rules but others have a hard time keeping a low profile and are emotionally very volatile. The fact that their fortunes have changed thanks to Frank Lucas does not change the core of who they are. As much as Lucas acts as the undisputed authority, he cannot control the actions of his relatives and this is what precipitates his downfall.

During one his surveillance operations, Detective Richie Roberts catches Jimmy Zee, a cousin of Frank Lucas, trying to kill his girlfriend with a gun. He is quickly arrested with charges of attempted murder and is offered to wear a wire to gather information on the business of Lucas in exchange for a potentially reduced sentence. For Jimmy Zee, the prospect of facing his cousin after his mistake is just too much to handle. He accepts the offer of Richie Roberts and becomes a critical piece in the arrest of Frank Lucas. Key Lesson: Someone who is unreliable is likely to remain unreliable regardless of how good things get. If warnings and threats are consistently needed to force that person to follow important rules, then it is better to part ways right from the beginning before things get too big.

3. When the balance of power changes, accept it or do not get involved at all.

Frank Lucas does not mind having other drug dealers distributing his product as long as they pay their dues just like he did when he was a low class criminal. One dealer who does not seem understand this is Tango, a rival of Frank Lucas who treats him with contempt. In the eyes of Tango, Frank is still the little nobody who used to work with his mentor Bumpy Johnson and is nothing more than a useful idiot. Tango has a hard time accepting that Frank Lucas has upgraded considerably and cannot keep his ego in check when they confront each other for one final time. Tango has become a distributor of Blue Magic, the drug of Frank Lucas and refuses to bow down to his authority. He also does not believe that Lucas will retaliate if he refuses to pay the percentage that they seemingly agreed. The result is swift: Frank Lucas shoots Tango in the head at point blank range in front of a very big crowd before calmly returning to finish his meal in a restaurant. Key Lesson: In any market, positions of power change all the time. This might take years, even decades, but these positions will change. When this happens, the previously dominant forces must change their strategies or leave the market.

Conclusion: American Gangster has certainly aged well. While Denzel Washington's performance might not be his most memorable, he certainly came across as a very convincing drug lord who broke every rule in the book of criminals to surprise his fiercest enemies and competitors. There are things to learn from the American Gangster version of Frank Lucas as long as we do not try to be him.

Good luck,

Ashley Boolell

Check out my latest novel here: Market Dystopia.