IntenseDebate

11 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - How Disruptive Behavio... · 0 replies · +2 points

I, too, find this process troubling, perhaps not for quite the same reasons. Disruptive individuals can create havoc in the workplace. Professionalism Committees -- panels of judgement most likely occupied by sometimes disruptive, less-than-perfect individuals -- adds another layer of dysfunction (and cost) akin to the Victorian school-room paradigm of annual performance reviews -- one of the most disruptive and negative bottom-line eaters in the workplace today.

A disruptive worker may have to be called, but a private meeting with his/her manager (who should have been vetted for communication skills before being promoted) would be far more constructive and less damaging.

I believe in drilling down on issues to find root causes. Disruptive workplaces drill down to mismanagement, whether it be not encouraging innovative and creative thinking, not holding briefing and debriefing sessions, tolerating gossip in the workplace, promoting non-communicators or micro-managers to management positions, tolerating tiered structures, etc. I could go on and on. They are all management issues, result in disruptive behavior and create awful environments for workers to spend their days.

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - Cable TV Follows Its S... · 0 replies · +1 points

I cut off my cable subscription and fled to the internet, because of the outrageous cable fees charged for mindless, bottom-feeding, bundled cable programs. I sincerely hope cable won't crowd out the interesting and intelligent online videos, documentaries and movies of my own choice that I now watch on line for much, much less than the cable fees I used to pay,

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - One Way to Lower Healt... · 0 replies · +1 points

Good post, Frank, but tough to fight politically correct whiners. Look at all the fuss smokers make about having to pay additional taxes on their smokes.

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - One Way to Lower Healt... · 0 replies · +1 points

Great point!

The beginning and end of the monetary incentive idea.

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - One Way to Lower Healt... · 0 replies · +3 points

Healthy people who live longer don't use the healthcare system.

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - One Way to Lower Healt... · 0 replies · +1 points

A much quicker and more immediate incentive which would cost a whole lot less:

Enrol in exercise programs, nutrition classes and quit smoking or lose your job.

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - Leaving \'Friendprints... · 0 replies · +1 points

Part 2

HR minions might furtively check for on-line photos and posts, because all the other HR minions are doing it. So they find photos of a wild bikini beach party – champagne flowing. So what? The applicant may have the networking skills to double sales; the mind to shift the paradigm for the lacklustre business model. The other day, on the Internet, I saw a photo of a naked woman riding Richard Branson's back. Wise interviewers will find out all they need to know through the application process; not by stalking the applicant in cyberspace.

Imagine if Barack Obama had been afraid of losing his privacy on-line!

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - Leaving \'Friendprints... · 0 replies · 0 points

Part 1

Advertising ourselves on-line is no different from advertising ourselves off-line –just expanded -- turned into paranoia by frightened baby boomers and taken up by young professionals eager to turn fear into money.

Every day net workers give out their business cards with more information than many give out while blogging, networking and chatting on-line. Excellent employees network and party with business associates, clients and strangers all the time, shedding personal information along the way.

For credibility and trust, on-line entrepreneurs have to be prepared to give out their contact information. On-line writers have to be prepared to stand by what they write, not hide under pseudonyms in the cyber shadows.

Continued....

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - Why Economists Failed ... · 0 replies · +1 points

Part 3

(3) Arrogance, Academia and Theoretical Mathematical Models

The founders of Long-Term Captal Management included Myron Scholes and Robert C. Merton, who along with Fischer Black, invented the Black-Scholes fairy option pricing model. Other elite included David Mullins, once a vice chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, and Eric Rosenfeld from MIT and Harvard. Myron Scholes boasted they would make money by being a vacuum sucking up nickels that no one else could see. (*) LTCM's strategy was arbitrage and relative value convergence trading – hedging systematic risk to zero, using computer and theoretical models.

Lesson: Academic models, theories and assumptions fail miserably in the real world. Academic arrogance has no place on Wall Street.

15 years ago @ Knowledge@Wharton - Why Economists Failed ... · 0 replies · +1 points

Part 2

(2) 25% bonuses on Profits

The enormous success of the arbitrage group at Salomon emboldened Meriwether to demand a new form of compensation: 15% share of profits for his traders. When he started LTCM, this practice increased to 25% -- all over and above management fees. Apparently 20% is now routine.

Lessons: (a) The temptation for huge risks with other people's money when the rewards are outrageous by any normal standards of decency. (***) (b) It is the fiduciary duty for portfolio managers to maximize profits for their clients. That goal, then, should be inherent in fund management. Pocketing any percentage of the profits is completely counter to that fiduciary duty. Their compensation should come out of their management fees.

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