Success Quote by Richard Branson

Branson’s line lands like a deadpan shrug in the middle of a thunderstorm: “Lightning is something which, again, we would rather avoid.” The comedy is in the corporate understatement. Lightning isn’t a mild inconvenience; it’s a force that fries electronics, grounds aircraft, spikes insurance premiums, and makes CEOs suddenly discover the poetry of risk management. By calling it “something” and tucking “again” into the sentence, he frames a serious operational threat as if it were a recurring calendar conflict.

That “again” is the tell. It suggests a pattern: this isn’t an abstract hazard, it’s a lived one, a reminder that ambitious ventures (aviation, spaceflight, island living, anything branded “Virgin” and aspirational) collide with physics. Branson’s public persona sells audacity and forward motion; the subtext here is the unglamorous backside of daring: contingency planning, weather delays, and the humiliating truth that nature doesn’t care about founder mythology.

The intent is also reputational. When a leader talks about danger in a calm, almost banal register, it signals competence and control. He’s translating existential risk into manageable language, the way executives turn catastrophe into “headwinds.” That’s not just spin; it’s a cultural script of entrepreneurship: project confidence, keep the mood light, and treat even acts of God as solvable problems.

It works because it’s funny without trying to be. The sentence performs resilience: acknowledge the strike, keep talking, keep flying.