Leading businesswoman and an inaugural Founder Member of BlueSkyFriday, Andrea Wong, on how friendship is the key to success.
Andrea Wong is really cool. She serves on the boards for numerous companies including Liberty Media and Roblox, and was most recently President, International Production for Sony Pictures Television and President, International for Sony Pictures Entertainment.
She’s so high-flying that she calls Stanford business school ‘laid back’. But what I am really struck by, amongst all of this extraordinary success, is her lust for life. Here is a woman who is just very good at living. And that’s cool.
‘I think being grateful is super important. I describe my life as being like Forrest Gump’s as I often end up in places I should never be. I’m extremely lucky’.
Saying yes to everything seems to be key to Andrea’s success: ‘I have a hard time saying no, which can be a problem’. When we speak, she’s just returned from a trip to Capri with her sister and is about to spend 24 hours in Paris, catching up with some friends from the US. ‘There’s so many things you could be doing everyday and I try to do as much of it as I can because you only have one life to live. I live for maximum fun’.
I’m so intrigued by how Andrea manages her downtime. Pulled in so many different directions, does the water ever grow so murky, the to-do list so long that it feels difficult to switch off? ‘There are times when I feel out of control. All you can do is try to catch up I guess.’ Frankly, she doesn’t seem too phased as she tells me she’s just made split pea soup for lunch. Not the marker of a woman on the edge. She learned to cook during Covid and finds chopping vegetables relaxing. Ah. Not scrolling Instagram and watching Below Deck then.
‘I don’t have time for social media. I go on Instagram maybe once every 4 or 5 days’ and despite having an 86 inch TV screen in her house, the middle of the night is the only window of opportunity she can find for mindless telly.
She’s recently taken up fly-fishing, loves to shoot and is learning how to golf again. Walking is her meditation, as she can think and listen to music – currently Japanese house – and she is passionate about Formula One. Now the 86 inch TV makes sense. Did I mention it has surround sound..?
Overall, however, the constant in Andrea’s life, what relaxes her more than anything and provides her with the most comfort, support and energy when she needs it, is her friends. ‘I have lots of friends from lots of different walks of life’, she muses, some new, some dating back as far as 30 years.
‘Now that I’m a pluralist, I like the flexibility of being able to do what I want on my schedule’.
Which means more time for fun and friendship. She has, she tells me, never looked back.
As we part ways, I ask her what she’s cooking her friends for dinner tonight. ‘Oh we’re getting sushi’. She laughs, ‘I don’t have time to cook’. And to drink? ‘Champagne’. I told you, she’s cool.
August, 2023
