Month: May 2011

Too Big to Fail

I always wanted to read up on the crisis but the thought of delving deep to understand ‘credit default swaps’, ‘leverage’ etc didn’t feel appetizing enough.
Inspired by a friend’s blog post, I started reading/hearing the audio. And right from minute 1, I was hooked. I normally leave thoughts on books for my book review blog and despite the fact that I’ve already reviewed ‘Too Big to Fail’, I simply had to blog about this one.
– TBTF is pulsating. There’s no other word for it. A comparable audio book (~19 hours) that I simply loved took me about 2 months to finish. This book, I finished in 3 weeks because I couldn’t get enough of it!
– TBTF looks at the crisis from the points of view of the personalities in the crisis i.e. all Wall Street CEO’s, key deal makers and the US treasury officials. This seemed tailor made to my interest – of understanding the people, their minds and the rationale behind why they did what they did.
There were many moments that stood out in the book. A few are listed below –
– When JP Morgan’s bankers ‘discovered’ a 20 billion dollar hole in AIG’s balance sheet. I couldn’t even bring myself to imagine what it must have felt to realize that they had to raise an extra 20 billion in 3 days.
– When the annoyed bunch of Wall Street CEO’s ended up having a competition on games on their Blackberry after a discussion with the Fed officials (Hank Paulson and Tim Geithner)
– Bank of America’s CEO Ken Lewis’ wife telling Dick Fuld not to call as he wasn’t willing to talk to him. Dick Fuld, the longest tenured CEO at Wall Street, was for the first time, beginning to taste failure..
– How every Wall street firm tried to merge with every other..
– How everyone ended up going to Warren Buffett whenever there was trouble.
– Lehmann going down – unfortunately and without logic.
– How the smartest financial men in the world tried hard to save the financial market but couldn’t undo accumulated ‘sins’ over 10 years.
– How constant success had bloated so many ego’s and bank accounts to disproportionate degrees..
– George Bush incredulously asking Paulson ‘Does an insurance company do all that?’ when Paulson described the risk that the market faced if AIG went down and thus explaining all of AIG’s businesses.
– How everybody important is from Goldman Sachs
I could go on and on. The book was an eye opener in many ways and of course, extremely educational. During the course of the book, I felt up close and personal with each of these characters. In time, I actually felt lots of sympathy for Dick Fuld – the Lehmann CEO who was painted as the villain as he was probably among the few people present who wasn’t acting in his own self interest and just trying very hard (too hard at times) to save Lehmann, the firm that he loved so. I understood why Jamie Dimon was painted the big hero thanks to the circumstances and his tact and felt a sense of connection with each of those characters.
In fact, one part of me was also heaved a sigh of relief that the US Fed had people of the stature of Hank Paulson (ex-CEO of Goldman Sachs – but, of course) among others. Without men like him, the situation could have been far worse..
A great book – but right at the end, Andrew Ross Sorkin poses a great question. He asks if he have really learnt from the crisis. And I wondered about it too as this note about Jamie Dimon on ‘Time‘ (for being one of the most influential people in the world in 2011) sent a chill down my spine –
‘Dimon, 55, had the wisdom and the long view to prevent his employees from succumbing to the insane greed that enriched so many bankers while destroying their firms, not to mention ruining millions of lives. As a result, JPMorgan caused far less damage during the financial crisis and emerged more powerful than ever, while Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, AIG, Countrywide and WaMu collapsed. For this, Dimon deserves enormous credit.

But at the same time, JPMorgan has had its share of scandal, and Dimon opposes regulation of financial-sector pay, reform of the rating agencies, tighter regulation, greater transparency of derivatives (JPMorgan and four others control 95% of the global market) and, obviously, any move to break up the largest banks. Which means that if in 10 years we have another crisis, Dimon will have to share the blame as one of its architects.‘

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As I warned somewhere in the middle, I could go on and on about this book.
In 1 word, it is fantastic. Go get it!

Checking in on your Bucket List

Once I watched the movie – Bucket List, I simply had to make one of my own. And guess what, it was loads of fun!
I did this as a part of my yearly review process at the start of the year and left it at that.
Having ticked a couple of these dreams thanks to visiting the desert and watching 2 football games, I thought it was time for an update.
The geek within couldn’t help put some numbers in it. And I ended up adding ‘Importance’
and ‘Years’ columns.
Importance moves from 3 (VERY important) to 1(Good to do)
Years basically indicates when I plan to tick them i.e. 20s, 30s etc
A sample small portion of the list is here..
And thus, the 50 point (at this stage) list developed. I had great fun figuring out which of these goals were really important and which weren’t and dreamt a bit as to how I could tick those boxes.
Also, I realized that this year has been a great year as I have ticked 4 items off the list! Writing a list makes a huge difference.
So, have you begun working on your Bucket List yet? :)

PDT Part 2: On PDT’s i.e. Prioritized Daily Tasklists

This week’s learning draws inspiration from ‘The Ten Natural Laws to Successful Time and Life Management’ by Hyrum W Smith.

Smith tells us a poignant story..

Jake, one of Hyrum’s clients had come to meet him. Jake shared with him how he had gone back home after a workshop from Hyrum two years ago and actually, for the first time, thought about his governing values.

He realized ‘Family and the well being of my son’ was a value but yet, it never found it’s way to his daily ‘To-Do’ list.

So, from that moment on, Jake began ensuring he had ‘1-on-1’ time with his son. Over the next few months, Jake and his son spent lots of time playing baseball together, watching movies, taking walks in the park etc.
A year later, his son was diagnosed with cancer and he lost his fight to the deadly illness within two months.

Both Jake and Hyrum, at this point, had tears in their eyes. Then, Jake said simply – ‘ Hyrum, all I can say is that if it wasn’t for you, I might have drowned myself in regret. But, atleast now, I have the satisfaction that I did all I could.. And that made all the difference in the world’

We often associate ‘getting organized’ to just being more efficient, when it is actually a lot more than that. When done right, it is a way of life that is a path to happiness..

Hyrum’s powerful method of thinking of PDT’s or Prioritized Daily Task Lists involves us considering the pyramid above.. And planning with our values in mind. For example – if ‘Growth’ is a key value, then an example long term task could be to read 15 books in the year which could in turn mean 30 minutes of book reading every day, and so on. And, just to help you along, here is my learning from Hyrum on writing down my governing values.

Here’s to creating value based ‘prioritized daily task lists’ this week! :)

The Vietnam Experience

It’s been a day in Ho Chi Minh city in Vietnam. A few thoughts that crossed my mind are –

– The devastation caused during the Vietnam War was worse than I thought it was. Now, I am a big US fan.. But this was pretty atrocious. Especially using toxic chemicals to drive lands barren

– It is admirable that Vietnam has managed to achieve so much and come this far in 30 years

– We are in the tourist-y part of Ho Chi Minh (district 1) and the customer service everywhere has been consistently great. Everyone has a smile on their face!

– I am greatly impressed by the fact that there seems to be wi-fi coverage everywhere! Every cafe/restaurant has had it’s own wifi network. That, my friends, is great infrastructure! (I am writing this from a little cafe next to our student housing)

– HCMC reminds me of home (Chennai) in many ways. Something about the buildings and the crazy chaotic traffic. (it’s slightly less chaotic back home but well..)

– We’ve been riding along in little scooterettes which seem to be the norm here. There are more two wheelers than cars and we’ve had great fun! And the simple road rule here is that you can fo anything you want – absolutely anything!

– Oh and it’s nice being a millionaire – even if it is temporary.. :-D

There’s Mekong Delta and Cu Chi tunnels coming up in the next 2 days. Looking forward to it!