[A] people's ability to maintain a shared 'language of good and evil' is critical to the creation of trust, social capital, and all the other positive economic consequences that flow from these attributes. Diversity surely can bring real economic benefits, but past a certain point it erects new barriers to communication and cooperation with potentially devastating economic and political consequences.
- Francis Fukuyama
Friday, October 10, 2008
Thursday, October 09, 2008
Masters of the Universe!
As David Brooks noted, “All great scandals occur twice, first as Tom Wolfe novels, then as real-life events that nightmarishly mimic them.”
This is a great time to re-read The Bonfire of the Vanities.
This is a great time to re-read The Bonfire of the Vanities.
Don't Feed the Trolls
There is a saying in blogging: Don't feed the trolls.
In other words, don't get into extended arguments with abusive people who take delight in the discomfort of others.
Unfortunately, you can find many fat trolls in the workplaces of the world. They are fed by:
In other words, don't get into extended arguments with abusive people who take delight in the discomfort of others.
Unfortunately, you can find many fat trolls in the workplaces of the world. They are fed by:
- Management's ignoring an utter lack of people skills because the troll's technical ones are solid;
- The organization's fear of litigation and confrontation;
- Upper management's denial that the person is a troll;
- A high-ranking ally's protection;
- Employees who permit co-workers to be bullied because that means the troll's attention is not focused on themselves;
- Reinforcement by fellow trolls;
- An education deficit that convinces the troll that he or she has all of the answers;
- Unions that back any troll who is a member; and
- An organizational culture that devalues people.
If management, with little hesitation, can name several trolls, the obvious questions are "How are you feeding them?" and "Why are they here?"
Banks, Helicopters, and Strategy
From a thought-provoking Business Week piece on stopping financial panic:
So far, crisis managers in the U.S. and abroad have relied mostly on using "helicopter money"—that is, dropping dollars across the financial landscape in hopes of reviving lending and spending. Generations of mainstream economists around the world learned this approach at the feet of the late Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman, who coined the helicopter metaphor. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, while parting from Friedman in some particulars, shares his general approach—and in fact earned the moniker "Helicopter Ben" after citing Friedman's coinage in a 2002 speech.
So far, crisis managers in the U.S. and abroad have relied mostly on using "helicopter money"—that is, dropping dollars across the financial landscape in hopes of reviving lending and spending. Generations of mainstream economists around the world learned this approach at the feet of the late Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman, who coined the helicopter metaphor. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, while parting from Friedman in some particulars, shares his general approach—and in fact earned the moniker "Helicopter Ben" after citing Friedman's coinage in a 2002 speech.
Quote of the Day
An empty head is not really empty; it is stuffed with rubbish. Hence the difficulty of forcing anything into an empty head.
- Eric Hoffer
- Eric Hoffer
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
Back in Town
Sorry for the slow posting. Was out of town teaching ethics.
And it wasn't for a Wall Street firm.
And it wasn't for a Wall Street firm.
Tuesday, October 07, 2008
Blame It on the Computer
Michael at 2Blowhards points us to a New York Observer interview where Tom Wolfe provides an intriguing theory about the current financial mess that may be more accurate than many of us would care to acknowledge:
The whole thing, starting with the subprime, is the fault of the computer. I was just talking to a banker the other day, and not that long ago, 20 years ago, an investment banking house, let’s say, Lehman Brothers, when it got a package of mortgages, they would go through every mortgage, every single one, and they’d throw out the ones that just seemed absurd, they just wouldn’t accept them. Things used to arrive on paper. Today things arrive on a screen, and a screen is back lit, and one of the biggest pains in the neck is trying to read something dully written and complicated on a computer screen. It will drive you nuts—I mean, try it sometime. Now they say, ‘Oh, to hell with it,’ and they just accept the whole package. And if it hadn’t been for that, they’d be going over each loan. What’s happened is the backward march of technology.
The whole thing, starting with the subprime, is the fault of the computer. I was just talking to a banker the other day, and not that long ago, 20 years ago, an investment banking house, let’s say, Lehman Brothers, when it got a package of mortgages, they would go through every mortgage, every single one, and they’d throw out the ones that just seemed absurd, they just wouldn’t accept them. Things used to arrive on paper. Today things arrive on a screen, and a screen is back lit, and one of the biggest pains in the neck is trying to read something dully written and complicated on a computer screen. It will drive you nuts—I mean, try it sometime. Now they say, ‘Oh, to hell with it,’ and they just accept the whole package. And if it hadn’t been for that, they’d be going over each loan. What’s happened is the backward march of technology.
Knowing What is Not Known
An advantage of experience and education can be the acquisition of healthy skepticism.
A person who is relatively new to the knowledge game, for example, may be greatly excited about the findings described in one book while an individual who has been around will know that although the one book may be right, there are other ones with opposite conclusions.
It often seems as if the news media writes for the first person. They live by crisis du jour and as you scan the newspaper or listen to the broadcast, you can find international crises and domestic ones and ones you should worry about when you drive, sleep, exercise, work, or eat. If you paid serious attention to them all, you'd go mad. [Another crisis!]
This does not mean, of course, that nothing is worth your enthusiasm or worry. It simply means that part of being experienced or educated is knowing what to worry about. Do you devote enormous worry to a climate problem twenty or more years down the road that has been forecast by people who cannot predict this weekend's weather? Or do you take their warnings with respect, sobriety, and the thought that they might not be entirely correct? Do you take every diet warning seriously [Coffee's bad! Coffee's good!] or do you look for a pattern?
The individual who neither knows nor understands the basis for the opposite side's position may be far more passionate than correct. They don't know what they don't know.
A person who is relatively new to the knowledge game, for example, may be greatly excited about the findings described in one book while an individual who has been around will know that although the one book may be right, there are other ones with opposite conclusions.
It often seems as if the news media writes for the first person. They live by crisis du jour and as you scan the newspaper or listen to the broadcast, you can find international crises and domestic ones and ones you should worry about when you drive, sleep, exercise, work, or eat. If you paid serious attention to them all, you'd go mad. [Another crisis!]
This does not mean, of course, that nothing is worth your enthusiasm or worry. It simply means that part of being experienced or educated is knowing what to worry about. Do you devote enormous worry to a climate problem twenty or more years down the road that has been forecast by people who cannot predict this weekend's weather? Or do you take their warnings with respect, sobriety, and the thought that they might not be entirely correct? Do you take every diet warning seriously [Coffee's bad! Coffee's good!] or do you look for a pattern?
The individual who neither knows nor understands the basis for the opposite side's position may be far more passionate than correct. They don't know what they don't know.
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