Smith's first rule for the Morehouse graduates was the most fundamental: there are no shortcuts. He challenged the common fantasy of entrepreneurship as a path to quick riches, noting that 'the usual scenario is that successful entrepreneurs spend endless hours, days, years, toiling away for little time, little pay and zero glamor.' He spoke from personal experience — before becoming a billionaire private equity investor, Smith was a chemical engineer who spent 'pretty much every waking hour in windowless labs.' It was only after developing deep expertise and the discipline of the scientific process that he was able to apply his knowledge beyond the lab. He punctuated the point with a Muhammad Ali quote: 'I hated every minute of training but I thought to myself, suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.'