Bamboo Innovator

Book Review by The Rational Walk: The Manual of Ideas

Book Review: The Manual of Ideas

The Rational Walk, Published on September 27, 2013 at 4:01 pm

It’s not given to human beings to have such talent that they can just know everything about everything all the time. But it is given to human beings who work hard at it – who look and sift the world for a mispriced bet – that they can occasionally find one.

— Charlie Munger

During a visit to Columbia Business School many years ago, a student asked Warren Buffett how one could best prepare for an investing career.  Mr. Buffett picked up a stack of financial reports he had brought with him and advised the students to read “500 pages like this every day”.  One of the students in the class happened to be Todd Combs.  Mr. Combs took the advice quite literally and eventually got into a habit of reading far more than 500 pages per day.  This work ethic contributed to a successful career running a hedge fund and a position at Berkshire Hathaway allocating several billion dollars of capital. Read more of this post

Arnault Pits Son Versus Daughter in LVMH Succession Test

Arnault Pits Son Versus Daughter in LVMH Succession Test

Two years ago, Bernard Arnault asked his son Antoine to run shoemaker Berluti, then this month he installed his daughter, Delphine, as executive vice president of Louis Vuitton. While her brief is to revive the handbag maker and Antoine’s task is to transform Berluti into a menswear titan, Arnault is auditioning both for another job: his own. At 64, the chief executive officer of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SA (MC), already qualifies for his state pension. He hasn’t signaled he’s tiring of running the world’s largest luxury-goods company, but “at some point there is an element of succession that needs to take place,” said Berenberg analyst John Guy. Giving his children greater responsibility allows Arnault to test them, Guy said. Read more of this post

Ed Han and his wife went looking for birth announcements. What they ended up with was part of a $333 million payday

September 30, 2013

HOW I THOUGHT OF IT

The Stork Brought a Bright Idea for a Business

Ed Han and his wife went looking for birth announcements. They ended up with part of a $333 million payday. Back in 2005, Mr. Han, a new Stanford M.B.A., and his wife, Polly Liu, were expecting a daughter and were scouring the Web for just the right notices to celebrate the event. “Going back and forth with store clerks to review endless, illegible faxed proofs of baby announcements just weeks after having a baby and likely sleep deprived seemed quite unfun,” Mr. Han says. But they couldn’t find anything affordable and well designed. Mr. Han—who had already been thinking about starting a business with a couple of friends—saw an opportunity. He joined with Laura Ching and Kelly Berger to start an online company that would design personalized baby announcements, and then go after more of the U.S. card market. Read more of this post

Schwarzman Says Selling BlackRock Was ‘Heroic’ Mistake

Schwarzman Says Selling BlackRock Was ‘Heroic’ Mistake

Steve Schwarzman said his decision 19 years ago to sell what would become the world’s largest money manager was a “heroic” mistake. Schwarzman, who runs Blackstone Group LP (BX), the largest manager of alternative investments such as private equity, in 1994 sold a mortgage-securities unit with $23 billion in assets to PNC Bank Corp. for $240 million. Schwarzman, Blackstone’s co-founder, had disagreed with the group’s leader, Laurence Fink, over methods of compensation, and the men parted ways. The unit, which traded mortgages and other fixed-income assets, changed its name from Blackstone Financial Management to BlackRock Financial Management. Read more of this post

Phil Di Bella: Passion is the one thing experience can’t teach

Phil Di Bella: Passion is the one thing experience can’t teach

Published 30 September 2013 11:44, Updated 30 September 2013 12:57

Phil Di Bella

Phillip Di Bella says, ‘Identify your passion, and see if you can build a business around it.’Photo: Glenn Hunt

I spoke at a conference for Banana Growers not long ago. Now, I know you’re thinking, what does Phillip Di Bella know about growing bananas? Nothing! So why did they ask me to speak? What could I share that would inspire farmers? The answer is: passion. Or more specifically, my own passion for my work, and my mission to inspire it in others, whatever their ambition. I think it’s a message that we all need to be reminded of from time to time. Read more of this post

How to trust intelligently

How to trust intelligently

Posted by: Tedblogguest
September 25, 2013 at 11:52 am EDT

“The aim [in society] is to have more trust. Well frankly, I think that’s a stupid aim,” says Baroness Onora O’Neill in today’s talk, What we don’t understand about trust. She argues that the aim to build more trust is a cliché, and instead what we need is more trustworthiness. Below O’Neill gives a more nuanced picture of how to trust more intelligently, based on her criteria for trustworthiness.

By Onora O’Neill

Nobody sensible simply wants more trust. Sensible people want to place their trust where it is deserved. They also want to place their mistrust where it is deserved. They want well-directed trust and mistrust. Trust is well placed if it’s directed to matters in which the other party is reliable, competent and honest — so, trustworthy. Can you trust the corner shop to sell fresh bread? Can you trust your postman to deliver letters? Can you trust your colleagues not to gossip about confidential matters? Can you trust the tax man to calculate what you owe accurately? Trust is badly placed if it’s directed to matters in which others are dishonest or incompetent or unreliable. Read more of this post

Why the Danish mermaid is happier than the S’pore Merlion

Why the Danish mermaid is happier than the S’pore Merlion

According to the second World Happiness Report survey released earlier this month, cold and unspectacular Denmark was again ranked the happiest nation in the world. Singapore in 30th place can at least boast of being the happiest in Asia.

BY AVI LIRAN –

4 HOURS 10 MIN AGO

According to the second World Happiness Report survey released earlier this month, cold and unspectacular Denmark was again ranked the happiest nation in the world. Singapore in 30th place can at least boast of being the happiest in Asia. The standard of living in both countries is high. Singapore ranks 4th in gross domestic product per capita; Denmark is 16th. The Republic has 5.4 million inhabitants, slightly fewer than the 5.6 million Danes. However, Denmark has the lowest level of income inequality in the world, whereas Singapore has one of the highest among the advanced economies. What are the secret ingredients of the Danes’ happiness? Read more of this post

Change rewards culture to fix the integrity minefield

September 29, 2013 8:37 pm

Change rewards culture to fix the integrity minefield

By John Authers

Is the UK’s wealth management industry “open, honest, transparent and fair”? That was the question put to several hundred members of the Chartered Institute of Securities and Investment this week, at its annual debate in the City of London. All worked in the industry. To vote against implied a belief that they were working in a “closed, dishonest, opaque and unfair” industry. And yet almost half did vote against, with the motion carrying only by a wafer-thin majority. Read more of this post

You Have a Great Idea. Now What Do You Do? Many people have no desire to start a business, but they want to make money from their inspiration. Here are some options for doing just that.

September 30, 2013

You Have a Great Idea. Now What Do You Do?

Many people have no desire to start a business, but they want to make money from their inspiration. Here are some options for doing just that.

NEIL PARMAR

Want to know a couple of secrets? You don’t have to be an entrepreneur to have a great idea for a business. And you don’t need to start a business to profit from a great idea. Inspiration can strike anybody—it happens all the time. Someone is struggling with a chore around the house and thinks of a gadget that would be a big help. Or maybe they’re rooting around for obscure information online and realize an app could automate the job. Read more of this post

It’s a woman’s world when nühanzi step up

It’s a woman’s world when nühanzi step up

By Chen Chenchen (Global Times)    08:11, September 30, 2013

Several photos that recently went viral on Weibo, or China’s Twitter-like microblog,showing a girl drinking from a jug instead of a cup and another trimming her toenails withan awe-inspiring pair of pliers rather than a clipper, have drawn attention to the risingdemographic of nühanzi, or manly women. In a bid to redefine the word “female” in China, these “tough Chinese girls” are pointing usback to the periodic table. Given that “fe” represents “iron” – “female” could translate to”iron male” or someone manlier than a man himself, they argue.  Read more of this post