If you're going to build something from nothing, you've got to know what really works.

I took a thousand dollar loan and built a five billion dollar business, and now I make smart investments in new businesses on Shark Tank. This is Barbara

Corcoran and you're listening to Business Unusual. Today I'm Business Unusual I'll

answer your questions about business, motivation, life, or anything

else on your mind.

But first, people say that bragging is not attractive in business, but I can tell you if you don't know how to

brag, you're not going to go very far.

I've had to learn how to speak up in business to be heard.

When I started in the real estate business in New York City it was clearly

a boys club owned and operated by men. I wasn't made to feel welcome and I had to learn

to speak up to make my feelings known.

Here's how I did it.

I would just decide I was just like the guys and think what would a guy do and my arm would go up?

My voice would be louder and I take command of the

situation. I also had to do that to get my job on Shark Tank. After I signed

the contract to be on Shark Tank, I got a polite phone call that said they had changed their mind.

So what did I do? I immediately wrote an email to Mark Burnett, the big producer, and told him he had made a mistake and why and it was that email

that got me my job that I've been doing for the last nine years.

Today on Shark Tank the entrepreneurs that I invested and

succeed so well beyond everybody else are all pushy.

They know like I had to learn that you have to speak up to be heard.

Whenever I hesitate to raise my hand, I ask myself,

...