By Lewis H. Lapham
T. Boone Pickens, chairman of BP Capital Management, 86, at the Lowell Hotel in Manhattan.
How does being 86 affect your work?
I don’t consider myself to be this old. I just go to work like I did 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago. I work the same hours. I haven’t semiretired or slowed down. I have a trainer that comes in at 6:30 in the morning, and I’m at the office at 8 o’clock.
What are the advantages to being your age in your business?
I have a vast amount of experience. There are very few things I see that surprise me. I’ve seen it or something close to it with each thing I come across. I was with a doctor the other day, and he said the reason that I’m so alert and all is probably that I do work. I go to work and start the meeting with my partners, 8 o’clock till 9 a.m. till commodities open, equities open and there’s discussion of world affairs and everything. Then everybody goes their separate ways. . . . We have another meeting when the market closes. We know exactly how we did that day. We know how much we made or lost. After the market closes at the end of every day, we know how we stand.
It seems important to you that you stay relevant. For example, you’re active on Twitter.
I don’t physically do it. My assistant does it for me. But I say what I want to say, and it gets on there. I’m interested when somebody like Drake says, ‘‘The first million is hard,’’ and I said something like: ‘‘Yeah? Try the first billion.’’
I’m guessing there is no point to asking when you plan on retiring?
I’m going to retire in a box being carried out of my office.