’That’s my goal here is to hopefully provide an inspirational story that can be a catalyst for the reader to go out and do amazing things.’
Per Wimmer has spent his life soaring to new heights, metaphorically in global finance and quite literally as an astronaut. It’s a fascinating mix, but the two spheres have more in common than you might think.
When you’ve lived a life so full of variety and adventure, it’s a double bind: this is exactly the kind of life worth writing about, and yet how do you choose what to include, and how do you link it all together? We talk about the challenge of making sense of one’s own life in order to create sense for others.
And how do you give people a reason to read, beyond the mere act of goggling? Per’s solution: catalyse inspiration and action in everyone. Winning Business Journey Book of the Year at the Business Book Awards 2024 meant everything to him, as it was a sign he’d achieved just that.
(He’s not one for being constrained by limits, and he’s not done yet; this is just Volume One.)
Per’s site: https://wimmerspace.com/
Alison on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/the-alison-jones/
The 10-day Business Book Proposal Challenge: www.proposalchallenge.com
The Extraordinary Business Book Club on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1447064765612358/
Alison Jones: I’m here today with Per Wimmer, who is an astronaut, an adventurer, an explorer, a philanthropist, entrepreneur, global financier, and author of, I have it right here, The Sky Is No Limit, volume one of his autobiography. I’m going to come on and ask you about that shortly, which won the Business Journey Book of the Year at this year’s Business Book Awards.
So welcome. It’s very good to have you here, Per.
Per Wimmer: Thank you very much.
Alison Jones: And congratulations. How does it feel?
Per Wimmer: Thank you. I’ll be honest with you. I’ve won a number of awards historically quite a few actually from, you know, business and finance and all the sort of corporate things I’ve been up to, but it was a very emotional and very special thing to actually win the Book of the Year Awards because it’s personal at the end of the day. It’s my story at the end of the day. It’s very personal and it’s also creative at the end of the day. It’s a piece of creative work. It’s what you capture, what you include in a book, what part of the story is important, what’s not, which is terribly difficult when I think everything is important, but obviously an objective person would beg to disagree.
So how do you, A, select the right things that are generally of interest and hopefully inspirational to the reader. Because that’s my goal here is to hopefully provide an inspirational story that can be a catalyst for the reader to go out and do amazing things. You know The Sky Is No Limit. So the title gives it away a little bit here.
Don’t be afraid, just follow your heart, follow your passion, go for it, and live out your dreams. And I try to illustrate how I’ve done it, and I’m not saying that’s sort of the way to go necessarily, but it is an example of how you can really achieve, literally, out of this world dreams come true by becoming an astronaut.
Alison Jones: We’ll come on to that in a second. I think let’s just pick up on your point about the nature of this category, because it is actually qualitatively quite different. The Business Book Awards typically are about books that are valuable to business people, that they teach you useful things, and you can practically, and yours absolutely is that, but there’s this memoir, this narrative, non fiction dimension, it’s massively more personal, as you say. And that’s a really interesting observation.
I find often people say to me, Oh, you know, people have said to me, well, you should write a book. And I’ve got such an interesting story. And that may be true, but what the trick I think is, is what you’ve achieved here, which is taking your story and not just telling it in a sort of self indulgent way, but saying it in a way that gives people ideas and inspiration and a sense of what might be possible for them.
Per Wimmer: Exactly. It’s obviously, my story is, in all modesty, quite exciting because there’s a lot of…
Alison Jones: It is quite extraordinary!
Per Wimmer: In all modesty, there’s a lot of very exciting adventures in there, so even for the one who doesn’t care about the big philosophical elements to it, you know, it takes you through the Amazon Jungle, living with the Indians, the skydive, the world’s first skydive over Mount Everest. I mean, it’s not the sort of things most people do on any given weekend.
So my adventures are indeed a lot more extreme, but my genuine hope is that it is really sort of the icing on the cake here. It’s the champagne moment that illustrates that whatever you truly believe in, you can make it happen. Even though it seems very far fetched and it seems like the odds are stacked against you, if you genuinely believe in something, even if you have people saying no, no, no, or putting roadblocks ahead of you, you can, by being dedicated, focused and even if you don’t have the resources, you’ll figure it out.
And those people who are roadblocks in the beginning, quite often end up becoming your greatest supporters because they’ll come around, they realize that there’s no point resisting because this person is not stopping and really heading for the sky, whatever the dream is, and that’s my hope.
You might as well be part of it. If you can’t beat him, join him.
Alison Jones: There is a huge amount of adventure. I mean, obviously the astronaut stuff, the space exploration, particularly fascinating. And let’s, actually, let’s talk about that. What is it about space exploration and private space tourism, I guess is the phrase.
What is it about that that’s just so fascinating to you?
Per Wimmer: So we have, as human beings, traveled on planet Earth between a thousand meters down in the water. That’s typically where the deep submarines go, most of them at least. And about 10,000 meters up in the air. That’s when we fly from London to New York.
That’s typically where we have been moving around in the history of mankind. And I’m now including submarines and airlines. You know, even before that, it was just on planet Earth, as it were. That’s where we’ve been, less than 700 people ever have been into space. It is really a new territory, a new frontier.
There was a lot of excitement in the population when the first moonwalkers walked on the moon in Apollo 11. And everybody was glued to the television. That was this kind of new era of exploration and achievement, et cetera. But after the Apollo era and the 12 moonwalkers had finished their business up there, it kind of sort of died down a bit and we had a bit of a lull.
Fast forward to today, where there’s a massive change going on within the private sector and space, lots of capital is flowing into the private space sector, new businesses, new things, new launch mechanisms, there’s so much happening, and as a human being, that is where the 21st century frontier for adventure lies.
The earth is more or less discovered. Yes, there are still very exciting adventures to be had on earth. But I remember even when I went into the Amazon jungle, which is very remote, then I was living there with the Indians there, you know, remote as they were, and they were living off the forest to be fair, but you could still reach civilization within a boat ride or certainly within a day or two. So you’re not further away than that.
Whereas in space, it’s genuinely the frontier of the 21st century. And now, space is opening up for all of us, for private individuals. And it’s a bit akin to the beginning of the airline industry in the late 20s.
It was opened up for certain government officials. Today we call it NASA astronauts. And to high net worth individuals that were sort of paving the way, willing and capable of funding part of it. And then they sort of plowed through and opened up the doors so that it became cheaper, better. And look at today, I mean, here in London, people would easily jump on a plane flying to Spain or Italy just for the weekend. It’s become a lot cheaper and a lot easier.
Alison Jones: You could have a conversation about how that has impacted the planet. I mean, which is one of the big concerns about opening up space, isn’t it?
This is plan A.
Per Wimmer: That is plan A.
I mean, the good news is from an environmental point of view, yes, there are much more launches taking place, but in terms of the total pollution impact, it’s relatively small. It’s like, it’s very, very small..
Alison Jones: And we’re getting relaunchable rockets, which changes everything, doesn’t it?
Per Wimmer: It does, really. And I think Elon Musk and SpaceX has been a real sort of leader in this business, bringing down the cost of access to space up to 80 to 90 percent. I mean, a very significant reduction. And there are some environmental benefits. I’m not saying it’s clean, it’s not. But you know, you’ve got to advance, you’ve got to push forward with the progress.
And there’s so much still to be learned about space. And by going to space, we also learn new technologies, new ways of doing things more efficiently, which has a huge benefit on planet Earth.
Alison Jones: We saw that in the Apollo program, didn’t we? It was astonishing the technology that was developed as a direct result of that.
Per Wimmer: Absolutely. You could argue more broadly that Silicon Valley was more or less founded or certainly had a big catalyst from the Apollo program because all the technology that was needed, the computing power, etc. came out of that and provided a massive public support into that.
And look what happened, Silicon Valley now has its own life and lots of great technologies being developed there. So there’s huge benefits to planet Earth. But on a personal note, it’s just exciting to go into space as an adventure.
Alison Jones: The word that’s coming to me is moonshots because I mean, you know, obviously that’s literal when you’re talking, but that idea about coalescing your ambition, your energy around something that is startling, something that is audacious.
That has a business application. It has a personal application, doesn’t it? So just talk me through the relationship for you between your business life, if you like, and this adventurer, explorer side of you.
Per Wimmer: Yes, so I was one of the very first, if not the first person to sign up for private space as a European citizen all the way back in 2000. And I did it just because I love adventure. You know, this is what I do.
I’ve been increasingly pushing the boundaries further and further out. I’ve skied at 5,500 meters, the highest skiing station in the world, the Amazon, South Africa, Finland. I just want to keep pushing the boundaries. And obviously when space suddenly was available, I was like, I signed up within 48 hours.
So I was like full in, and I started doing my early space training back in 2000/2001 and onwards I flew fighter jets, I was in the centrifuge training. It was very exciting to be honest, and I just followed my dreams and that’s what I’ve always done.
Now, as life has evolved, or as time has evolved, there has been a little bit of a link between my businesses and the adventurous side of things. Not by design at all, I’ve just followed my dreams. But when I do go into business meetings quite often people would ask about my adventures. They do think it’s very interesting and we do talk about it. And I’ve even had business meetings where people have wanted autographs and selfies. And there’s almost a little bit of a rockstar mentality.
And the same thing when I go to schools. And I give presentations there at schools. I mean, the first rows are always completely full and they are super keen to listen to, you know, what is it being an astronaut and flying to space, etc. So there definitely is a bit of a link between the, not by design, but just by and vice versa, the other way around, when I talk to people in the space industry, who might have some startup ideas or new things, they come to me because they know, I know my numbers, I know a bit about finance.
And they ask for advice, Per, what would be a good way to position this, to do this, to present this, etc. So, I’m sort of a little bit of a link between the two. And we are indeed right now, as we speak, doing a space deal, we’re financing a very exciting space deal in the U.S. So, there has, the links have grown.
Alison Jones: Unexpected synergies.
Per Wimmer: Absolutely. Not by design. It just happened that way. And that’s what happens when you follow your dream, follow your passion, you discover synergies you hadn’t thought about, you attract talent, you attract people, because people find it very exciting to be part of the journey.
Alison Jones: Yes, that’s such a beautiful way of putting it. And we talked right at the beginning about the job that you faced, pulling all this stuff. I mean, it’s a lot. And I’m not surprised this is just volume one, you know, there’s a lot of stuff that you have, a lot of material you have.
Tell me a little bit about the work involved and the byproducts, I guess, of sitting down and sifting through that and pulling it into a single narrative. How did you go about it? What did you discover?
Per Wimmer: To be honest, it was very, it was a quite eye opening experience to actually do that. This was my fourth book. I have written books before and my first book, honestly, was Kamikaze. It was so difficult. It was my first book. So getting a publishing deal in place was virtually impossible, but I still managed.
Secondly, I wrote about a very academic topic of how to integrate Europe, European integration between the different countries, and various academic models of doing so. And to be fully kamikaze, I decided to write it in French, and that’s not my native tongue. So it was really, really hard. But it was still a subject that was sort of remote for me.
Fast forward to The Sky is No Limit, my autobiography. Suddenly I’m looking into myself and I have to share my story, not just describe some third party object or story or theme or whatever it might be. And that was truly difficult. It’s very personal. I think everything is important, what I do, that’s why I do them. But not everybody might share that view.
So picking out what are the most interesting stories. I got a lot of help here from my editor and my co writer, et cetera, who had really sort of those objective eyes on and without that, I think it was really helpful, but to pick those stories and then put it into a narrative that also makes it a page turner. So, there’s a nice logic to it. There’s a nice flow to it. So you just keep turning the pages and suddenly the book is finished. And it was also very, that’s what you want to get to. It’s not easy. And it was also not easy to squeeze everything in.
I remember the early days, we have the meetings with my editor and my publisher. And one of the big problems, they came to me and said, listen, Per, there’s just too much good material here. It’s just too much. So we agree, we agree in part with you that there’s a lot of goodies in here, not everything, but there’s a lot of great stories, and in fact, there’s probably too much. So I said, okay, so what are we going to do?
So I said, do you want to make it a double, double the amount of pages? They said, no, we can’t do that. But we can make a volume two. So quite early on we decided to make a volume two and we quite realized that actually that was a very sensible idea for two reasons. Number one, to get a lot of these good stories in so there’s more to come in volume two, Beyond the Sky, but also to allow for a little bit of a time gap because we capture sort of the journey, the business journey, the personal journey up until space. And then and then when I come back from space, there’s that other leg to it and what happened afterwards, et cetera, et cetera.
So it’s quite nice to have that separation in time as well. Because it does allow for a little bit of follow up but rest assured Volume 2 will be equally exciting and equally good.
Alison Jones: Well, you’re still going, Per. I think there may be Volumes 3, 4 and 5 in the works, you know, ultimately. I don’t know.
Per Wimmer: I’m not going to stop. It’s like a bicycle. It’s like a bicycle. If you stop, you fall over, and that’s game over. So you’ve got to keep going. And this is also the other thing about… yes, that’s also process wise, writing the book was quite interesting, because I’m always looking forward. I’m always looking ahead. What’s the next project? What’s the next idea? What’s the next initiative?
I get together with some adventurers, we do our little brainstorming or maybe there’s a business adventure opportunity that comes along, an acquisition, whatever it might be. I keep going, I keep looking forward.
Doing the book was a very healthy, personal journey and experience looking back and actually taking stock. Because I often have people coming to me and say, Oh, wonderful to meet you. We looked at your background and CV it’s just, wow, totally amazing. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. What are we going to talk about?
You know, I’m onto the next thing. But writing the book was actually an opportunity to just go back and look at the choices I’ve made. Look at the things that I ended up doing, you know, and, there’s an enjoyment in that, in looking back. There’s also a bit of reflection, personal reflection.
Would I have done the same thing? Would I have made the same choices that, you know, life has a number of sort of forks in the road where you got to go right or left or something. And you also learn from that, which hopefully will make me more, even more educated, making choices in the future going forward.
Alison Jones: I think there’s an argument to be made for doing this for everybody, isn’t there? Because that process of reflection, it forces you to do some sensemaking, to understand yourself, to spot the patterns. That’s really valuable before you’re sitting on the porch age 90 looking back and it’s too late to sort of, you know, take that learning forward into your next adventures.
Per Wimmer: Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, for instance, I’ll give you an example. One very big fork in my life was when I graduated from Harvard. This was back in the 90s and I had a lot of jobs available. We were being spoiled left, right and center and trying to be incentivized to go do various things. I had a job offer from the White House when President Bill Clinton was in the White House.
I was super keen to do that. I’m not American, and this was pre 9/11, but I was one of the 42 people who were being invited to join that year when I graduated. I was so terribly excited about that. I also had a job offer after 38 interviews to join Goldman Sachs and Wall Street pre IPO, and that’s what no one talks about they were going to do the IPO. So I know financially, that’s going to be very attractive. Goldman was definitely going to be a great place to work because it has this mystique about being sort of the premier leading investment bank in the world.
So I was keen to do both and trust me, I was trying really to see how I could combine my time between Washington DC and New York, but obviously that was impossible because they’re full time commitments.
So , there are these forks in life where you just have to make a choice.
Alison Jones: Make a choice.
Per Wimmer: And, you make the choice, you do the pros and cons, and then you just get on with it.
Alison Jones: And then you’ve just got to go with it, haven’t you? You can’t spend the rest of your life going, Oh, I wonder what it would have been like…
it’s that sliding doors moment. Yes
Per Wimmer: You get on with it.
Alison Jones: You get on with it and you look forward. Yes.
Per Wimmer: And you look forward and that’s always what I’ve done. And then you live out, I live according to my seven fundamental values, which very briefly are think out of the box, always be open to new ideas, new inspiration.
Number two, follow your heart, follow your passion, have fun with what you’re doing and be authentic because then you will achieve, you will move mountains, you will achieve great things.
And number three once you figure out what it is you want to do, your vision, stop talking about it. Get on with it. Execute, execute, execute, execute. And just be very relentless on the execution part because that’s what makes the difference.
And number four, time discipline. Manage your time so that your time corresponds to your priorities.
Number five, teamwork. One plus one plus one equals five because synergies are indeed created within teams.
I can see that when we do space training, you know, not one single person can do the whole thing. We need doctors, we need engineers, we need space experts, we need Astronauts, we need people who’ve got access to the bases where we’re doing our training. We need all of the above. We need capital. There’s all of that that needs to come together. So teamwork is super important, not just in space, but in everything.
And number six obviously it’s a risky business. Things do blow up sometimes and we have indeed lost lives along the way. Let’s remember that. So therefore always assess, is the upside worth the risk we are taking. And that’s an individual assessment. Not everybody would want to go to space, most people would find it fascinating and they would want to learn about it, but not everybody wants to go. That’s fair enough. You know, that’s an individual choice.
And then number seven, and most importantly, whatever you do, always remember to give back, always remember to inspire others and be a good citizen that way at your local community and on a global scale if you can. And it will come back to you when you least expect it.
And so the last one is by far the most important and we do that within Wimmerspace by supporting various charities when we do these adventures and try to do our little bit to make the world a better place.
Alison Jones: These are great principles for life and business.
I sort of feel we should just have ‘Be More Per’ up on our walls as a sort of reminder, but love that.
Per, I always ask my guests for their best tip. So for somebody who, maybe they’re setting out on their kind of business journey book, or maybe it’s just a broader business book, but I guess I’m asking, what do you wish you’d known before you started out on your book writing adventures?
Per Wimmer: Yes, like I said, the first book was definitely Kamikaze, and the first book is definitely the most difficult, for sure. I would say my advice number one, obviously, think about, come up with the idea.
And a lot of people have that in their drawer. They sort of get inspired, get drawn into something. Whether it’s a subject matter or it’s their own personal story. So, just try to sort of make it as concrete as possible. Secondly, try as early on as possible with a little summary, five, ten pages, to put a publishing deal in place. It’s very difficult, and you’ll get tons of rejections. So don’t be offended. Be thick skinned. But try to see if you can get a publishing deal in place, either by an agent or directly. I’ve done all my deals direct because I’m an entrepreneur, I pick up the phone, I speak to people.
But if you have that deal in place it takes a little bit of the strain off you, because there’s a little bit of automatic processes that kicks in, in terms of finance that gets allocated and you get some professional guidance. And if you’re not a professional author on day one it is enormously helpful.
Alison Jones: And some accountability and some deadline.
Per Wimmer: And accountability and deadlines, although in my personal experience, it ended up being pushed and pushed as well. And they were actually accommodated to that.
I remember when we had actually finished the book and I was like, Ooh, finally, this was hard work. And I think we got it. Then we needed to add the photos into it and because it’s a lot of adventures, you want to have as many photos as possible. And you would think, oh, that’s just another couple of weeks. No, it took us six months, six months of me siphoning through all the pictures, the photos, picking the right ones and then putting them in the right place and working with the editors.
It was, that itself was a big job. Unexpectedly big job. So no, expect it to take longer time.
Alison Jones: Because for volume two, I hate to tell you this, you’re going to have to have alt text for every image as well.
Per Wimmer: I know, that’s right. It’s not going to be less, but it is a very enjoyable journey. I absolutely highly encourage anybody who thinks they have a good story themselves, or something to share, something of inspiration, or a topic where they feel they have some expertise they’d like to share. I highly, highly encourage it. It’s not necessarily a money spinner, but it’s certainly a very enjoyable, something you can be proud of.
And like I said, I’ve won so many awards historically, but it was such an emotional experience when The Sky is No Limit, my book, won the award at the Business Book Awards.
I certainly did not expect it. In fact, I arrived at the ceremony, I remember, I arrived there already feeling like a winner because I’ve been shortlisted. For me, that was amazing. I do remember walking into the place where the awards took place. We had this banner where we took pictures and the organizers put the little signs up with finalists. And I held up that sign as if I had already won. I thought that was, I was a winner.
And I remember when the book was announced as the winner, I was still filming. I sat with my little camera and I was filming and it didn’t even compute because I didn’t even expect it. Yes, my publisher came running and said, ‘Per, stop filming, go on stage. It’s you, go up there.’
It just did not compute. I thought there was so many, it was such a privilege to be amongst these amazing….
Alison Jones: It was a terrific night, wasn’t it? Yes, so much fun.
Per Wimmer: It was so much fun, and it was very emotional. It was very, very emotional for me. I was deeply touched. Yes.
Alison Jones: So I’m going to ask you to recommend us a book. You’re not allowed to recommend The Sky’s the Limit. You’re not allowed to recommend Volume 2, which I know doesn’t exist yet, but just to be really clear. But what book would you recommend that people listening have a read of, if they haven’t already?
Per Wimmer: Yes, well, I’ve always enjoyed Richard Branson’s book, not only because…
Alison Jones: I thought you might,
Per Wimmer: …he’s a good friend and he’s an amazing entrepreneur. But I do find his entrepreneurial journey, his quest for space as well. We definitely share that. And also his charitable heart.
He does have a very good heart. I do find it very, very inspirational. And certainly something I would look up to.
Also, my other good friend, Buzz Aldrin, Apollo 11, he’s also written some fascinating books. I mean, a lot of that does get a fairly space heavy, so you’ve got to be into that to like that. But that’s certainly something I’ll find very inspirational to read, any of his books. He’s a very good writer.
So yes, look up those two authors and you’ll do very, very well.
Alison Jones: Yes, I’m not at all surprised to hear you say either of those. Brilliant. Thank you. Great recommendations.
And Per, if people want to find out, I was going to say more about you. And often at this point, I talk about, you know, the set of things that someone does. I’m not even going to try.
More about all the stuff that you do and your book. Where should they go?
Per Wimmer: Yes, so if they want to buy the book, it’s on Amazon. So just put in my name Per Wimmer The Sky is No Limit and it will come up. You can get it there.
In terms of more broadly about my story, Wimmerspace.com there’s tons of content, photos, videos from space training adventures and there’s also a long biography of the journey through, you know, my four Master’s degrees at the various universities and all sorts of prizes and awards and people and all the glitz and glamour and the wonderful people I’ve worked with in charitable settings.
I mean, I remember when I was homeless in Wales, for instance and I slept at minus 10 degrees in a car park in Bridgend in Wales. It was terrible, but I met some fantastic people there.
So there are lots of stories from the various things. And also some of the documentaries I’ve been helping out with. There is a fabulous documentary about Elon Musk, which is on Netflix, called Elon Musk, The Real Iron Man, about Elon’s journey. And he’s got a really, truly inspirational journey. So there’s a lot of content.
So go to wimmerspace.com and hopefully enjoy yourself a little bit.
Alison Jones: Fantastic. Thank you so much. And I have to say your ‘about the author’ is probably the longest and fullest I’ve ever seen. So it did make me laugh. Brilliant.
Thank you for your time today. It’s been terrific to talk to you, to find out a little bit about your story, but also about how you told your story. So thank you for sharing that with us.
Per Wimmer: Thank you very much. It was my pleasure.
