Master Leadership

Michael Bernstein has spent his entire career solving problems most people never see.As a college student given only $1,000 to last four years, Michael had no safety net and no days off. To survive, he built a sweater business from scratch, negotiating directly with his uncle, who owned one of the largest U.S. sweater mills. With no family discounts and a one-time credit, Michael would buy closeouts at full price and resell them on campus. He struck a deal with the Dean for premium selling space, expanded to 20 colleges across the East Coast, and became the mill’s largest buyer—all while attending classes. By senior year, he had generated more than a million dollars in sales and graduated able to buy his first car in cash. That relentless resourcefulness carried into his career, where he rose to senior roles in a $2.5B apparel company and later invented the MRI-safe, metal-free plastic snap that transformed hospital gowns and has now been used in over 30 million gowns worldwide.Early on, he developed a small