Reading Period: September 22 - Present
1. The Outsiders (A), by William Thorndike Jr.
Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13586932-the-outsiders
This is a highly regarded business book, but I wasn't quite "feeling it". The main takeaway is really that capital allocation is the most important skill set of a CEO. The Warren Buffet approach to investing and business is optimal (frugality, bottom-up value investing based decision making). The problem is, the whole thing reeks of survivorship bias (take the 8 people who beat the S&P and draw broad lessons, but what about all those who followed the strategy and underperformed?). Also it doesn't consider the size premium or luck vs. skill dynamics, so drawing any real lessons here is kind of pointless. Who cares if a handful of people beat the S&P or outperformed large company stocks by following a certain strategy (stock buybacks, etc.), show me the data! For the love of all things holy show me the data!
