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Greed and Capitalism
What kind of society isn't structured on greed? The problem of social organization is how to set up an arrangement under which greed will do the least harm; capitalism is that kind of a system.
Meet China’s New Top Stock Market Watch Dog -- Former Beijing Police Chief Stalking “Malicious” Short Sellers
by Bloomberg Business
The high-ranking cop who brought down one of China’s top Communist Party
officials has been put in charge of a corruption probe of the
securities industry in the wake of a summer stock crash, said a person
familiar with the matter. The appointment of Fu Zhenghua underscores the
importance that President Xi Jinping has given the investigation into
possible securities fraud linked to the $5 trillion wipeout in June and
July… Read more »
The careers of
superstar CEOs Bill Gates, Andy Grove, and Steve Jobs offer important
lessons about how to become a better strategist.
Many discussions of strategy revolve around companies. But what about the people who develop corporate strategies? How can executives develop their skills as strategists?
There’s no better way than to learn from the masters. That’s the idea behind a recent book by David B. Yoffie, the Max and Doris Starr Professor of International Business Administration at Harvard Business School, and Michael A. Cusumano, the Sloan Management Review Distinguished Professor of Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Both men are experts in business strategy — they’ve been teaching the subject for nearly 30 years at Harvard and MIT, respectively. What’s more, Yoffie and Cusumano have studied or worked closely with some of the world’s leading technology executives. In their book, Strategy Rules: Five Timeless Lessons From Bill Gates, Andy Grove, and Steve Jobs (HarperCollins, 2015), Yoffie and Cusumano explore strategy insights drawn from the careers of the former CEOs of Microsoft Corp., Intel Corp., and Apple Inc.
MIT Sloan Management Review editorial director Martha E. Mangelsdorf spoke with Yoffie and Cusumano about what executives can learn from Gates, Grove, and Jobs about mastering the art of strategy. What follows is an edited and condensed version of that conversation. MIT Sloan Management Review: Your book “Strategy Rules” looks at strategy lessons from three iconic CEOs from the computer industry: Bill Gates, Andy Grove, and Steve Jobs. What made you choose those three CEOs to write about?
Yoffie: There are several reasons for choosing these three. First and foremost, all three of the companies they led — Microsoft, Intel, and Apple — became the most valuable company in the world at some point. We were looking at three companies where we believed it was undisputed that the three individual CEOs had accomplished an extraordinary amount over their careers.
Second, we had spent a lot of time working with or observing all three of these individuals. We knew them, their records, and their companies extremely well. And by identifying three executives whose legacy as CEO was complete — and where the companies they led had continued to perform well after their departure — we could capture a more complete picture.
Like
most people who buy recreational vehicles, Warren Buffett made his
decision quickly. He heard about Forest River in the summer of 20051 and bought the company just seven days later.
Today,
the purchase seems particularly sage. The Recreational Vehicle Industry
Association projects that North American manufacturers will ship
369,100 machines this year at an average price of around $37,000, which
would be a 52 percent boost in business from five years ago and make
2015 one of the industry's best years on record. With a dominant market
share of close to 40 percent, Forest River is in pole position.
"The
sun, the moon, and the stars are all lined up," said Doug Gaeddert,
general manager of Forest River's RV business. "A lot of folks who made
this purchase are doing pretty well right now."
Buffett’s
timing wasn’t even that great. Just a few months after getting into the
RV business, the industry began its peak year. After 2006, the
home-on-wheels industry drove into the crisis, almost disappeared, and
has since been slowly accelerating back to cruising speed.
Forest
River, however, fared better than the industry at large. Despite some
bumpy years, it steadily drove annual sales from $1.6 billion in 2004 to
$3.8 billion in 2014.
A lot of factors are fueling the recent
boom, including a surge in interest from bored baby boomers, relatively
cheap gas, and even cheaper financing. More than anything else, however,
the business rides almost entirely on the economy at large. A consumer
needs to be feeling fairly sanguine to think: "Wouldn't it be cool if we
could drive somewhere with our bed and flat-screen TV in a $400,000 rig?"
A
lot of those consumers happen to be among the more than 10,000 U.S.
baby boomers retiring every day. Roughly 10 percent of RV owners are
over the age of 54, according to the RV Industry Association2.
But younger cruisers are buying in as well, in part because the
industry's major players pour about $15 million a year into a collective
marketing budget that has been sending caravans of big rigs around to
college campuses and music festivals.
Gaeddert
said there is a 50 percent chance that the industry will sell more than
400,000 RVs next year, even factoring in a slight uptick in interest
rates. "That would absolutely be a milestone number," he said.
