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How To Create Your Own Luck; Luck–in business and in life–isn’t always something that happens to you, it’s also something you can find and help create

HOW TO CREATE YOUR OWN LUCK

LUCK–IN BUSINESS AND IN LIFE–ISN’T ALWAYS SOMETHING THAT HAPPENS TO YOU, IT’S ALSO SOMETHING YOU CAN FIND AND HELP CREATE.

BY DRAKE BAER

Failed actors rarely give career advice. “The advice business is a monopoly run by survivors,” writes David McRaney of You Are Not So Smart. The chefs who failed don’t have a line out the door of their restaurant. The entrepreneurs who launched, failed, and didn’t try again don’t end up on the cover of Fast Company. To McRaney, the problem with the stories of the super productive, super creative, and super successful is that they miss half the equation: You must remind yourself that when you start to pick apart winners and losers, successes and failures, the living and dead, that by paying attention to one side of that equation you are always neglecting the other. If you are thinking about opening a restaurant because there are so many successful restaurants in your hometown, you are ignoring the fact the only successful restaurants survive to become examples. Maybe on average 90 percent of restaurants in your city fail in the first year. You can’t see all those failures because when they fail they also disappear from view. As Nassim Taleb writes in his book The Black Swan, “The cemetery of failed restaurants is very silent.” Read more of this post

If life for you is a hill, be a world-class climber. You may be born at the bottom, but the bottom was not born in you

November 29, 2013

For Some Folks, Life Is a Hill

By CHARLES M. BLOW

I strongly reject the concept of respectability politics, which postulates that a style of dress or speech justifies injustice, and often violence, against particular groups of people or explains away the ravages of their inequality. I take enormous exception to arguments about the “breakdown of the family,” particularly the black family, that don’t acknowledge that this country for centuries has endeavored, consciously and not, to break it down. Or that family can be defined only one way. Read more of this post

Dealing With Burnout, Which Doesn’t Always Stem From Overwork

November 29, 2013

Dealing With Burnout, Which Doesn’t Always Stem From Overwork

By ALINA TUGEND

IT’S the end of the year, and lots of us are feeling a little overwhelmed. Tired, unfocused and ready to take a nice break with our families (or away from our families in some cases). We may be feeling garden-variety stress. Or more ominously, we may be burned out. Although most of us tend to use those phrases interchangeably, researchers say stress is to burnout as feeling a little blue is to clinical depression — a much more serious and long-term problem that doesn’t get the attention it should, but can affect all aspects of our lives and workplace. Read more of this post

The Evils of ‘Stack Ranking’ And What Companies Should Do Instead

THE EVILS OF ‘STACK RANKING’ AND WHAT COMPANIES SHOULD DO INSTEAD

THE PRACTICE OF RANKING EMPLOYEES AND FIRING THE LOWEST TEN PERCENT CAN KILL EMPLOYEE MORALE FAST. HERE ARE FIVE WAYS COMPANIES CAN CREATE A BETTER SYSTEM.

BY AUBREY C. DANIELS

There are many ways that HR departments have cooked up to motivate employees. And while some are better than others, there is one that needs to be eliminated fast. There is no good reason to rank employees or what is known as stack ranking. Stack ranking refers to the performance appraisal process where employees are not only ranked but also typically the lowest 10 percent are automatically fired. In my experience, all that does is create internal competition among employees who vie to not be among the infamous 10 percent. Read more of this post

The best books of 2013, chosen by Bill Gates, Junot Diaz, Lucy Kellaway and FT critics

November 29, 2013 6:16 pm

Books of the Year

From the Great War to the gardens of Venice, the best books of 2013 as chosen by FT writers and guests

ECONOMICS

The Bankers’ New Clothes: What’s Wrong with Banking and What to Do About It, by Anat Admati and Martin Hellwig, Princeton, RRP£19.95/$29.95 This is the most important book to have come out of the financial crisis. It argues, convincingly, that the problem with banks is that they operate with vastly insufficient levels of equity capital, relative to their assets. Targeting return on equity, without consideration of risk, allows bankers to pay themselves egregiously, while making their institutions and the economy hugely unstable. Read more of this post

The Most Important Trait Of Successful People May Surprise You

The Most Important Trait Of Successful People May Surprise You

DANNY RUBIN, CAREER ATTRACTION

NOV. 29, 2013, 9:12 PM 39,691 14

http://www.ted.com/talks/angela_lee_duckworth_the_key_to_success_grit.html

Hey, super smart people. Got some news for you. During a recent TED Talk, psychologist Angela Lee Duckworth said that while intelligence matters, a high IQ is not the greatest predictor of success. Rather, the key is to have grit, or determination — the willingness to push through even when the odds are against you. Watch Duckworth’s short lecture, and then we’ll keep going: OK, so grit matters more than any other talent or trait. That means a great deal for your career, especially in these top cities for job-seeking Millennials. Which means it’s time to start asking yourself some hard questions.  Read more of this post

Africa’s Aid Mess: Renowned author Paul Theroux discusses why the philanthropy of Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Bono, and Jeffrey Sachs largely fails. Here’s what works

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 2013

Africa’s Aid Mess

By PAUL THEROUX | MORE ARTICLES BY AUTHOR

Renowned author Paul Theroux discusses why the philanthropy of Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Bono, and Jeffrey Sachs largely fails. Here’s what works.

The desire of distant outsiders to fix Africa may be heartfelt, but it is also age-old and even quaint. Curiously repetitive in nature, renewed and revised every decade or so, it is an impulse Charles Dickens described, in a wickedly accurate phrase, as “telescopic philanthropy.” That is, a focus from afar to uplift the continent: New York squinting compassionately at Nairobi. Read more of this post

Pitcairn’s chief investment officer explains why operatic dramas make him think deeper about investing, life and family

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 2013

The Gift of Opera

By HAROLD F. “RICK” PITCAIRN II | MORE ARTICLES BY AUTHOR

Pitcairn’s chief investment officer explains why operatic dramas make him think deeper about investing, life and family.

On a starry desert night in August, I sat between my mother and daughter at the open-air Santa Fe Opera House in New Mexico. My mom has attended operas there since the early 1960s; that night, before the first note was struck, she regaled us with stories of operas past, about the time when the seats did not have a roof overhead, and how she and my dad had watched Richard Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier in rain suits. A special glow came over me, for my 21-year-old daughter, her granddaughter, was to my right, probably the youngest aficionado there and rapidly developing her own particular brand of expertise. Read more of this post

Sowing the right seeds: Out of a seed, life springs out. A good seed will eventually become a good tree while a bad seed will result in a not-so-good tree

Updated: Sunday December 1, 2013 MYT 9:01:11 AM

Sowing the right seeds

BY SOO EWE JIN

Out of a seed, life springs out. A good seed will eventually become a good tree while a bad seed will result in a not-so-good tree.

IT is possible these days to create a lush instant garden. Much like interior designers, the landscape experts will bring in plants of different species, and even trees, to make your dream garden a reality. But has anyone thought of planting seeds instead? A tiny acorn, we are told, eventually grows into a mighty oak tree 30 years down the line. We are now in the durian season and what makes it special is when our friends have their own orchards and are prepared to share their harvests with us. Read more of this post

The Real Humanities Crisis: For those with humanistic and artistic life interests, our economic system has almost nothing to offer

NOVEMBER 30, 2013, 2:29 PM

The Real Humanities Crisis

By GARY GUTTING

“Crisis” and “decline” are the words of the day in discussions of the humanities. A primary stimulus for the concern is a startling factoid: only 8 percent of undergraduates major in humanities. But this figure is misleading. It does not include majors in closely related fields such as history, journalism and some of the social sciences. Nor does it take account of the many required and elective humanities courses students take outside their majors. Most important, the 8 percent includes only those with a serious academic interest in literature, music and art, not those devoted to producing the artistic works that humanists study. Read more of this post

Doug McMillon: The southern charmer taking over Walmart’s retail empire

November 29, 2013 6:54 pm

Doug McMillon: The southern charmer taking over Walmart’s retail empire

By Barney Jopson

The retailer’s next chief is a keeper of the retail chain’s thrifty culture, writes Barney Jopson

At Walmart’s annual meeting last year Doug McMillon took the stage and made a cocktail. He poured a can of Coca-Cola into a glass of cumin, black pepper and lemon juice to make an Indian masala coke. “Can you start to imagine what that tastes like?” he asked. Read more of this post

Korean economist and bestselling author Ha-Joon Chang says the time is right to embrace moral dilemmas as well as mathematical models

November 29, 2013 6:15 pm

Lunch with the FT: Ha-Joon Chang

By David Pilling

Over fish curry in Cambridge, the Korean economist and bestselling author says the time is right to embrace moral dilemmas as well as mathematical models

Ha-Joon Chang’s hands are chopping the air like helicopter blades. He whirrs them in a tight 360-degree spin or brings them down on the beat like a conductor. Sometimes he tightens his fists to emphasise frustration, or holds his hands flat – palms upwards, fingers splayed – as though weighing two bags of rice. At one point he stretches both arms over his head before bringing them together as if along an invisible monkey bar. What could be prompting so much passion? You guessed it. We are talking economics. Read more of this post

In Paris, umbrellas built to outlast their owners

In Paris, umbrellas built to outlast their owners

Saturday, November 30, 2013 – 16:48

AFP

PARIS – Easily broken and frequently lost, the humble umbrella is not usually seen as a luxury item. But for Frenchman Michel Heurtault, whose creations can sell for thousands of euros, that is exactly what they are. The 48-year-old artisan uses the finest of materials for his umbrellas and parasols, which are made to last and intended to be handed down from generation to generation. Read more of this post