Bill Taylor proved the most powerful business stories are personal.

He turned human stories into a movement. By spotlighting the people behind the work, he created the iconic Fast Company publication that felt like a gathering place, not a magazine. In this issue, I show how his use of plain language, real stakes, and a community first mindset created a $360 million media success story.

Plus, you will:

Enjoy fasting on this media success story…LG

During college at Princeton is where Bill Taylor’s approach to journalism took shape.

He dove into campus life. Reporting. Debating. Organizing.

In classes he learned the economics of business. On the ground he saw the human side of impact. The late 70s and early 80s were full of upheaval and innovation, and that mix rewired how he thought about stories. 

Ideas mattered, but only if they changed how people acted.

After graduation he followed the shift to Silicon Valley. Semiconductors and personal computing were redistributing power from the center to the edges. Speed went up. Decisions moved closer to the work. Bill was not chasing scoops. He was mapping patterns and translating them into language builders could use.

During that tenure, came the catalytic invite. Consumer advocate, Ralph Nader, a Princeton alum, asked Bill to help co-author a book. Suddenly a twenty-something Bill was sitting with Fortune 500 CEOs talking about power, responsibility, and how decisions actually get made. The abstraction of business snapped into focus. Business was a lever for impact.

Bill now wanted to tell those stories in a way that felt true to the builders creating the future.

Soon thereafter, Bill landed at the Harvard Business Review. There he crossed paths with managing editor Alan Webber. Their first exchange was spirited. Alan had knocked the Nader book in print. Bill pushed back. The friction turned into long conversations, then a creative partnership.

Alan had just returned from Japan at the peak of its bubble, meeting the next generation of leaders in business, government, and media. He came back convinced that globalization, technology, and a rising class of meaning-seeking young professionals were changing the game. Bill’s time in the Valley had led him to the same conclusion from a different angle.

They started trading notes. What if a business magazine started with the person, not the corporation. What if it treated ideas like competitive weapons. They saw a gap. Traditional outlets covered size and status, whereas they wanted to cover ambition and impact.

Pieces of the future were already on the table. They just needed arranging.

They imagined a platform that took the power of ideas seriously and presented them with wit, design, and accessibility. Not just a magazine, a movement. A place that championed the best practices of the top 5 to 10 percent and set a bar others could shoot for. Value-driven businesses as successful businesses. 

A driving force in this ethos:

They wrote their purpose in plain language so it could govern every choice. Chronicle the massive changes reshaping business. Champion a wider conversation about how work can be meaningful and how business can contribute to the world. Put the point of view on page one and make sure the stories earn it.

It took nine months to raise the first $550,000 from eleven early believers. In 1993 they printed a beta issue and tucked a feedback sheet inside. They read every note. They rewrote the plan line by line. Then they went looking for the right business partner to launch at scale.

They found it with Mort Zuckerman and Fred Drasner, owners of U.S. News & World Report and The Atlantic Monthly. The Atlantic was in Boston, where Bill and Alan lived. They borrowed office space from The Atlantic and tapped U.S. News for ad sales and business support. Lean launch. High conviction.

The first real issue of Fast Company hit in November 1995.

From the start, they wanted to shape the conversation about the real meaning of success. It wasn’t about money and fame. It was about meaning and impact. They wanted to run a company that lived by the values on its pages. In their business plan they wrote that every great magazine needs a great purpose. They put theirs on the first cover.

Work is personal. Computing is social. Knowledge is power. Break the rules.

Inside, the language was plain, useful, and alive. Covers read like declarations. The early culture was scrappy and loud. Borrowed space. Closet desks. Music up. Ideas louder. Editors read copy to each other out loud in ridiculous voices. If it still sounded good, it was good.

They were less interested in an internet magazine than a lifestyle for how modern work gets done. Traditional business was transforming. New technologies were emerging. A global economy was connecting talent, capital, and ideas. Fast Company was the platform that named the shift and rallied the people living it.

Their target audience was not a demographic but change agents.

Entrepreneurs building new ventures. Managers inside big companies leading transformation. Curious, capable professionals navigating careers in a fast, connected, knowledge-driven economy.

From day one, community was a strategy, not an afterthought. They wanted to give readers a way to find each other, not just read and nod alone.

Profiles focused on culture, leadership, and practice, not just earnings and headcount. The magazine shipped ideas you could actually try. Tom Peters’ The Brand Called You gave a generation the words for personal agency at work. Free Agent Nation named a labor shift that was already underway. Strategy pieces read like something you could pilot this quarter.

Readers did not just subscribe. They showed up. In 1997 Fast Company launched the Company of Friends, a reader-run network that met in cities around the world. People traded ideas, made things together, and helped each other act.

Community turned content into momentum.

One issue in 1995. Five in 1996. Monthly by 1998. The voice cut through. The design felt fresh. The themes stuck because they were true to what ambitious people were already trying to do.

Fast Company went on to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence and nearly every award in the publishing industry. Seven years after that first issue, the magazine was sold to Gruner + Jahr for approximately 360 million dollars.

Though it has changed hands and had its ups and downs, the brand still reaches about 26 million across print and digital, with an estimated 1.1 million print readers each month.

Fast Company did not just report change. It gave people a language to act on it. Bill Taylor showed that if you name the shift, build a platform around it, and invite people in, stories become fuel. Here are three storytelling lessons you can lift for your own storytelling. 

In Tversky and Kahneman’s “Asian disease” study, 72% chose the sure option when framed as lives saved, but only 22% chose the equivalent sure option when framed as lives lost. Same math, different words, completely different choices.

Bill Taylor tapped the same principle by framing Fast Company around human meaning rather than corporate mechanics. “Work is personal” and “knowledge is power” didn’t just inform readers, they changed what readers tried next

If you want to get an example of how Bill tells stories about humans vs. just business, here is a short video to watch. LEADERSHIP SPEAKER BILL TAYLOR - Thrive By Reimagining Yourself

Bill spotlights a small community bank and shows how a human-centered story can fuel outsized growth. The takeaway is simple and useful: reimagine yourself first, then your team and customer experience. See how a northwest bank grew to a 4 billion success by focusing on people, clarity, and consistency. Quick watch, strong prompts to rethink your next move.