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The Psychology of Human Misjudgment

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Charlie Munger is one of my heroes. After attending the last Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting, I read a book on Charlie Munger- Poor Charlie's Almanack . It is a fantastic book. I could not put it down until I finished it. In the last chapter, Charlie summarizes 25 human psychology-based tendencies while generally useful, often mislead. In this post, I will summarize the tendencies for you to become better decision makers and to help others around you. 1. Reward and Punishment Superresponse Tendency People, in general, underestimate the power of incentives. Ben Franklin said, "If you would persuade, appeal to interest and not to reason." Also, prompt rewards work much better than delayed rewards in changing and maintaining behavior. Incentives are superpowers. One of the most important consequences of incentive superpower is " incentive-caused bias." A man has acculturated nature making him a pretty decent fellow and yet, driven both consciously ...

Leadership in Business: Over-rated and Over-paid

Leadership is one of the most talked about topics in the business world. There is no widely accepted definition. In big company meetings you will hear, "everyone in this company is a leader" or "we want you to be leaders and not managers" (your titles will still be managers:-)), etc. etc. There are thousands of books written on leadership. People are constantly fascinated by this topic. There is a fundamental difference between leadership for self-good and leadership for good-of-others. All leadership in the business world is for self-good. People want to lead for money, power, fame, respect, etc. On the other hand, leadership for good-of-others comes with self-sacrifice. Think of what Martin Luther King, Gandhi, and Mother Teresa did for the world and the sacrifices they made. It is not right to put these two leaderships in the same category. In this brief article, I will focus on leadership for self-good and show that leadership in the business world is over-rated...

Leadership: As taught by Cyrus the Great

Management Guru, Peter Drucker , said that Xenophon's Cyrus the Great is the best book on Leadership. So, I recently read it. The leadership principles Cyrus explained seem simple and yet difficult to execute consistently. I find it fascinating that the book was written around 2,500 years ago and little has changed in human nature. All the leadership principles taught by Cyrus are still valid. Please find below the summary of Cyrus's teachings from the book. Enjoy! Book I: Boldness at the Beginning Serve as a Moral Compass It is always the cunning, not the naive, who rise to power, and leaders must use artfulness to make any organization whatsoever work well. Love humanity, wisdom, and courage. Avoid shameful conduct. Bring sorrow to no one. Constantly secure well being of all around you. Absorb as Much Knowledge as Possible Create the vision in your thoughts before you do it for real. Seize the Unexpected Opportunity Hire p...