Money and Finance
- Howard Marks At The Milken Conference
Link to video: Leaders on Leadership: An Intimate Conversation Institute Chairman Mike Milken joins three icons in their fields for a discussion about long-term thinking in industry, markets, government, education--and life. When Howard Marks issues one...
- Mckinsey Report: Disruptive Technologies: Advances That Will Transform Life, Business, And The Global Economy
The relentless parade of new technologies is unfolding on many fronts. Almost every advance is billed as a breakthrough, and the list of “next big things” grows ever longer. Not every emerging technology will alter the business or social landscape—but...
- Japan’s Economy In 2012: Multiple Challenges - By Vaclav Smil
“Adding insult to injury” sounds like a lawyerly phrase compared to its painfully evocative Japanese equivalent 泣面に蜂 nakitsura ni hachi -- literally “a bee to a crying face”. But even that stinging proverb fails to convey what Japan has...
- Gates Foundation: 2011 Annual Letter From Bill Gates
As I sit down to work on my third annual letter, governments in every corner of the world are facing tough decisions about how to reduce spending. Although foreign aid accounts for less than 1 percent of governments’ total budgets, it is one place being...
- Protecting Your Income
The global economy still isn't back on its own feet as central banks are continuing to prop up the economy by printing more money. It seems like for the past few years all you've heard on the financial news is how the economy could slip into...
Money and Finance
Davos Man and his defects
Thanks to Will for passing this along.
THE two most popular words in the business lexicon are probably “global” and “leadership”. Put them together and people in suits start to salivate. That is perhaps why more than 1,000 corporate bosses are flocking to Davos, a Swiss ski resort, this week. There, at the annual bash of the World Economic Forum (WEF), they sip vin des glaciers with some 50 heads of state and 300 cabinet ministers. Whatever the topic, from deficits to deadly diseases, the talk is all of providing “global leadership”. And not just in the short term: the WEF rigorously selects and nurtures “Young Global Leaders” to form a “next-generation leadership community that is mission-led and principle-driven”.
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World leaders with wings of wax
But there is still a flaw with the very notion of global leadership. Abraham Lincoln observed that “nearly all men can stand adversity but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.” Similar temptations afflict those who are given the title of “young global leader”. Clever businesspeople have a tendency to be arrogant at the best of the times; telling them that they are masters of the universe can only magnify it. Arrogance breeds mistakes: look at all the empire-building bosses who attempt ambitious mergers despite ample evidence that such mergers usually fail.
If leadership has a secret sauce, it may well be humility. A humble boss understands that there are things he doesn’t know. He listens: not only to the other bigwigs in Davos, but also to the kind of people who don’t get invited, such as his customers.
- Howard Marks At The Milken Conference
Link to video: Leaders on Leadership: An Intimate Conversation Institute Chairman Mike Milken joins three icons in their fields for a discussion about long-term thinking in industry, markets, government, education--and life. When Howard Marks issues one...
- Mckinsey Report: Disruptive Technologies: Advances That Will Transform Life, Business, And The Global Economy
The relentless parade of new technologies is unfolding on many fronts. Almost every advance is billed as a breakthrough, and the list of “next big things” grows ever longer. Not every emerging technology will alter the business or social landscape—but...
- Japan’s Economy In 2012: Multiple Challenges - By Vaclav Smil
“Adding insult to injury” sounds like a lawyerly phrase compared to its painfully evocative Japanese equivalent 泣面に蜂 nakitsura ni hachi -- literally “a bee to a crying face”. But even that stinging proverb fails to convey what Japan has...
- Gates Foundation: 2011 Annual Letter From Bill Gates
As I sit down to work on my third annual letter, governments in every corner of the world are facing tough decisions about how to reduce spending. Although foreign aid accounts for less than 1 percent of governments’ total budgets, it is one place being...
- Protecting Your Income
The global economy still isn't back on its own feet as central banks are continuing to prop up the economy by printing more money. It seems like for the past few years all you've heard on the financial news is how the economy could slip into...