Stephen and Ayesha Curry talk about the one habit that separates good business leaders from great ones
Good morning. Today, I’m stepping outside the financial industry to talk about how NBA great Stephen Curry and his wife Ayesha Curry built a business empire and what these two superstars learned about leadership in the process. I recently interviewed them about their latest venture as co-founders and brand ambassadors of Plezi Hydration, a sports drink brand from Plezi Nutrition, a public benefit company co-founded by former First Lady Michelle Obama. We talked about the relaunch of the brand and the business case behind the nutritious sports drink. you can read more here.
The Currys bring serious entrepreneurial credentials to the partnership. Stephen, a four-time NBA champion with the Golden State Warriors, is the team’s founder and CEO. Thirty Inksa business holding company. Actress, cookbook author and restaurateur, Ayesha is the founder and CEO of the lifestyle company. Sweet July. Together they also became co-founders To eat. To learn. Play.A non-profit organization founded in 2019 to support children in Oakland.
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So I asked them how they achieved success in both business and philanthropy. “You want to stay as true to your core beliefs and mission values as possible,” Stephen told me. It may look different for everyone depending on their interests, but he said eat it. To learn. Play. “built on a core of service, but then realizing how we can leverage the resources and platform we both have to make a meaningful impact in a community.” He said it’s also important to understand the value you can add to opportunities and “stick with it because there’s no straight line to success.”
Ayesha points to a different but equally important skill: listening. “I think success is more about how willing you are to listen than to talk,” he told me. He said many people are quick to give their opinions and give their opinions without taking enough time to hear what people really want. “I think it’s really important for us to ask these questions: What do you like? What do you like? What do you want to hear? What do you need to see change in your environment? I think we’ve done a pretty good job of staying quiet and listening to what people have to say.”
Research backs it up. 2025 refereed study on supervisor listening It found that leaders’ active empathic listening, processing, responding, and sensing characteristics improved employees’ relationships with the organization and reduced the disconnect between them and leadership. And “Employee’s Listening Status 2026Research by Perceptyx reveals that organizations that link listening to business strategy and act on feedback at all levels continue to outperform their peers in terms of engagement, retention, innovation and financial results.
I also asked the Currys for the best business advice they’ve ever received. “I can say that I understand that when you are leading or managing a business and people you should never stop learning,” Stephen said. To find out what else they cite as solid business advice watch the video here.
Sheryl Estrada
sheryl.estrada@fortune.com
This story first appeared on: Fortune.com
