Michael Bloomberg’s Handshake That Built a News Empire

Most companies would spend months on feasibility studies before launching an entirely new business line. Bloomberg started one with a handshake.

“Basically, a handshake between Mike Bloomberg and Matt Winkler was all it took to get going in news. That kind of informal, informed decision making is something that most companies find very difficult to do. How it was going to fit in at a tactical level we’d figure out later. Strategically, it made sense. We weren’t paralyzed like others that have the business school/accountant desire to quantify and predict everything before proceeding.”

— Michael Bloomberg, Bloomberg by Bloomberg

Bloomberg’s entry into news wasn’t backed by a 50-page business plan or a board presentation with revenue projections. It was backed by conviction. Bloomberg and journalist Matt Winkler saw a strategic need — financial professionals wanted news integrated with their data — and they moved on it. The details would get sorted out later.

What’s striking here isn’t recklessness. It’s the distinction Bloomberg draws between strategic clarity and tactical precision. He’s not saying analysis is useless. He’s saying that for genuinely new ventures, most projections are fiction anyway. The assumptions are too shaky, the unknowns too vast. The noise drowns out the signal. So rather than perfecting a spreadsheet, he trusted the strategic logic and started building.

Bloomberg goes further, noting that “if we had tried to come up with a detailed business plan, it never would have gotten going.” That’s a damning indictment of how most organizations operate — committees and approval chains designed to reduce risk that end up eliminating opportunity instead. Public companies, he argues, have it even worse, shackled to quarterly expectations and shareholder explanations.

The lesson isn’t to abandon planning. It’s to recognize when planning becomes a substitute for action. When the strategic case is clear and the downside is manageable, the best move is to start — then adapt. Bloomberg News went on to become one of the most influential financial news organizations in the world. All from a handshake and the willingness to figure it out along the way.