The career advice taht really helped me the most to decide what to focus on

My favorite career advice excerpts from The 20 Uncommon Career & Life Lessons from My Weekend with Warren Buffett:

2. Don’t expect people to change. They’ve realized how futile is to try to changes others’ behavior. We love to paint a rosy picture that things will be better after some special event happens (an acquisition, a marriage, kids, a move, a new job, whatever), but for the most part, how people act is out of our control. Make sure the people you surround yourself with are the right fit from the beginning.

“If we thought the success of our investment depended on them taking our advice, we’d move on.” – Charlie Munger

6. Don’t expose yourself to steps that can keep you from tomorrow. It can take a lifetime to build a masterpiece, but only an instant to destroy it. No matter what the possible benefit, these two guys refuse to do anything that opens them to the chance of going back to zero. That’s why they don’t use debt, and in their last 50 years have never faced a truly dire situation.

7. Tell the truth to a group of people who believe what you do, and things will work out. I do everything I can to run Live Your Legend the same way. Align with the right people and do it in an honest way. Pretty simple. 

8. Great things are built as a result of the combination of time and consistency towards a cause you deeply believe in. Find what you’re good at – what you want to build. Then put your head down and allow a lifetime to build it. 40 years ago Buffet wrote out 13 principles of what he wanted to create and how he wanted it run. He then built a culture that executed on that every day. Just about anything can be done with the right focus, time and consistency. As long as you care enough and aren’t in too much of a hurry.

10. There’s little progress without failure. These guys quickly admit not only that they’ve had plenty of failures, but that they wouldn’t have what they do if it wasn’t for the screw ups. Unsuccessful people avoid failure at all cost. The successful ones embrace it, learn from it and keep building. If you’re not screwing up every once in a while, you’re not trying hard enough. 

11. You don’t need to be able to do that many things right to succeed. In fact, success is inversely proportional to how many things you try to do. Do a few things really well. Focus on that. Hire others to do the rest or don’t do it at all. The most successful businesses and people have a much longer list of what they aren’t willing to do, than what they actually spend time on. Warren is notorious for how many things he’s says no to. Stay within your circle of competence. When in doubt, do less.

14. Purpose is the ultimate compensation. Job satisfaction and loyalty come from the autonomy to do the work that matters to you, not from a lofty salary or bonus. Give people autonomy and trust to do things they are good at. Avoid micro-managing. Don’t think you can do their skill better than they can.

Buffett recently mentioned how he’d give up his private jet long before giving up his Internet access. And who wouldn’t? But think what that means. A billionaire has access to every tool in the world, yet the most important is the one that all of us have equal (and free) access to.

From http://www.businessinsider.com/munger-explains-buffetts-success-2014-9 :

So what exactly did Munger identify as some of the unique keys to Buffett being "so unusually successful"? He began by noting:

The first factor is the mental aptitude. Warren is seriously smart.

Munger continued by noting Buffett "out-achieved his mental aptitude." Then there's the good effect caused by his doing this since he was 10 years old. It's very hard to succeed until you take the first step in what you're strongly interested in. There's no substitute for strong interest and he got a very early start.

Warren is one of the best learning machines on this earth. The turtles who outrun the hares are learning machines. If you stop learning in this world, the world rushes right by you. Warren was lucky that he could still learn effectively and build his skills, even after he reached retirement age. Warren's investing skills have markedly increased since he turned 65.

Munger notes this reality is "really crucial," because he suggests, "having watched the whole process with Warren, I can report that if he had stopped with what he knew at earlier points, the record would be a pale shadow of what it is."

And Buffett hasn't just continued his learning, but he's also seen all of the steps laid out on the path set before him as a chance to gain better understanding. Munger compares Buffett to the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius who "had the notion that every tough stretch was an opportunity — to learn, to display manhood, you name it. To him, it was as natural as breathing to have tough stretches."

As a result, Munger suggested, "Warren doesn't spend any time on self-pity, envy, etc."

Put simply, Buffett has continually dedicated himself to refining and expanding his understanding of investing.

The key to remember

Warren Buffett once said:

I insist on a lot of time being spent, almost every day, to just sit and think. That is very uncommon in American business. I read and think. So I do more reading and thinking, and make less impulse decisions than most people in business. I do it because I like this kind of life.

Very nice interview at  Q&A With Guy Spier Of Aquamarine Capital :

My excerpts:

1. What company have you owned the past that was the most surprising to you? (In prospect or in retrospect)

I think that many have surprised me in one direction or another, but one of the more memorable was Duff and Phelps Credit rating - which I purchased in the mid-1990's at a 7 Price to Earnings ratio. The company proceeded to increase in value by seven times over 2-3 years before being purchased by Fimalac, the owner of Fitch. I had expected the stock to double, but I did not understand that I had purchased a super high quality business with a manager who was committed to devoting every cent of free cash, which was in excess of reported earnings, to repurchasing shares.

2. Which rule(s) of your checklist would surprise average investors the most, if any?

I actually think that none of them would. They are common sense items that anyone would look over and say, "yes - that makes obvious sense". What is key is not that they are surprising, but that in the wrong state of mind, I might easily skip over a particular factor in evaluating an investment.

3. Would you advise young people to get a CFA charter or an MBA or is there a better way to become an investor?

I don't think that either is necessary in order to become a good investor. Attending the Berkshire Hathaway meetings, studying Warren Buffett and reading the Berkshire Annual Reports, along with Poor Charlie's Almanack are an absolute necessity, in my view.

5. What would you say is the most common mistake that value investors make? Does this matter if the value investor is amateur or professional?

I think that all-too-often, we feel like we are forced to take a decision. Amateur investors, investing their own money, have a huge advantage in this over the professionals. When you are a professional, there is a whole system of oversight that is constantly saying, "What have you done for me lately!" or in baseball terminology, "Swing you fool!"

Amateur investors who are investing unlevered funds that they don't need any time soon have no such pressures.

6. Financial companies are usually a big part of the portfolio of value investors, because they seem cheap to industrials and utilities. But every now and then financials wipe out in a credit crisis. Why don't many value investors pay attention to credit conditions?

Yes, that's absolutely true. And yes, value investors probably pay far too little attention to the credit cycle. In my case, I think that I was utterly convinced that my stocks were sufficiently cheap, such that I could invest without regard to financial cycles. But I learned my lesson big time in 2008 when I was down a lot. I now subscribe to Grant's Interest Rate Observer so as to help me track the credit cycle.

9. How do you balance keeping an independent view versus interacting with respected professional friends who have their views?

I try to switch off, or distance myself from people who I think communicate in a way that is not productive for me. The key is to have the kind of discourse that allows other people to come to their own conclusion. Asking open ended questions and not telling someone what to do are important aspects of that. When I come across people who do that, I try to build closer relationships with them. If they don't I might still keep them in my circle, but I would not allow myself to interact with them too often - because I don't want to be swayed.

11. How do you feel about quantitative value investors?

If you mean to use statistical methods to uncover value, Ben Graham style, then I'm all for it. That is what I did when I created my Japan basket. That said, I found it hard and monotonous work. Monotonous because, in the case of Japan it did not lead to greater knowledge or wisdom about the world, because there was a limit on the degree to which I could drill down.