CFO Bookshelf

Have you ever left a movie theater where a film left you speechless and made you feel like you needed to rewatch parts of it to figure out what you were missing?

Jeff Hooke's book, The Myth of Private Equity, left me feeling that way after finishing each chapter of his tell-all book about the exaggerations and overstatements of the private equity marketing machine.

During this conversation, we learned much about the myths of PE funds focused on leveraged buyouts. Some of the big ideas in this conversation include the enormous fees fund managers are collecting, the poor fund performance these funds generate, and the lack of transparency in their reporting to institutional investors.

We'll also learn about one of Warren Buffett's worst investment decisions and his advice on where retail and institutional investors should invest their money. 

My favorite go-to person on all matters, Tableau and Dataviz, is Andy Kriebel.

Andy was the first person to create a YouTube channel on Tableau. His subscriber base has surpassed 61,000, and his 750+ videos have 7.5 million views and counting.

Andy is the co-author with Eva Murray of the book #Makeover Monday, and you can also follow his informative and insightful helpful hints each day on LinkedIn.

In this conversation, we find out why Andy has been publishing online for more than ten years, why asking for a dashboard is rarely the right starting point for Dataviz, and why his five daily habits, which I found to be pure gold.

I have my theories on why W. Edwards Deming is not a household name in 'all' business circles. Many view him as the 'quality' guy who had an impact on Japanese manufacturing after the Second World War.

That view is limiting as Deming's management mindset was complete with four central tenets:

1. Pragmatism
2. The Law of Variation
3. Human psychology
4. Systems Thinking

I used to recommend Mary Walton's book to start learning about Deming. That book gave way to a new title by Edward Martin Baker. After meeting and interviewing Gene Kim a few months ago, I have a favorite book on Deming by John Willis. The title is Deming's Journey to Profound Knowledge.

John was one of the earliest cloud evangelists and is considered one of the founders of the DevOps movement. John is the author of 7 IBM Redbooks. He is also the co-author of the “DevOps Handbook” and “Beyond the Phoenix Project,” along with author Gene Kim.

During this conversation, we discuss Deming's influences and how he became such a complete thinker about helping others improve.

Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, technology activist, and journalist. He has written many books, most recently The Bezzle, a follow-up to Red Team Blues, which are the two books we'll discuss in this episode.

These two books are the beginning of a series featuring the fictional forensic accountant Martin Hench. Hench is self-employed, loves being on the red team, and rakes in 25% of the assets he can recover.

Cory's books are fast-paced and entertaining but also deeply thought-provoking, especially The Bezzle.

Cory has authored many books, is a long-time blogger and journalist, and hosts a podcast. You can learn more about him at his website, Craphound.

Alfred Sloan's My Years with General Motors was an immediate success and is considered one of the best management books written by CEOs of his era. Before his book, we'd probably have to go back to Henry Ford's autobiography to find a management book of this popularity.

And then there's Harvey Firestone's book, which CFO Bookshelf considers a gem. Originally published in 1926, the great people behind the Farnam Street blog have republished Men and Rubber, and the author's message is as relevant now as when he published it.

During this episode, we hit some of the big themes in this book:

• Money, capital, and planning
• The key to selling and no superstars
• Treating people right and employee ownership
• Deep thinking and decision-making
• Taking time off and Ford's vagabonds

Gary Stevenson grew up in an impoverished area of East London where he could hold his life's belongings in two arms. About three years after graduating from the London School of Economics, Citibank made him a millionaire at a very young age.

Gary was 'all in' on winning the trading game. But did overnight success bring him happiness? And why did he want to leave the Citibank trading floor?

Gary tells his story in his new book, The Trading Game, which I believe is this era's Liar's Poker, but with more life lessons shared in this special book. Some of the topics explored include:

• The reason why it's challenging to get a job on a trading floor
• Gary's childhood and how it influenced his drive to mastery
• The reason poor people are looked down upon by the rich
• Gary's first day on the trading floor in 2007
• Profound thoughts on the mindset of a trader
• The P&Ls of traders and how they got paid
• The meaning of negative 4.5% interest rates
• Money was never Gary's driver
• Health and mental stress in Tokyo
• Advice for kids wanting to be traders
• Gary's YouTube channel
• Return to the classics

Agile, DevOps, TPS, TOC, Deming's System of Profound Knowledge. Is there a mental construct or latticework that connects these robust systems?

In Wiring the Winning Organization, Gene Kim and Steve Spear introduce the concepts of the three layers of work and social circuitry. The book also explains the author's three biggest learning pillars: Simplification, Slowification, and Amplification.

Readers of  Corporate Counsel do not need to be legal professionals to enjoy this short book writen as a business fable.

Anna is leaving a prestigious law firm to become the first in-house lawyer at a regional real estate firm in the Midwest. The book includes drama, conflict, and a grey beard, Anna's guide throughout the story.

Our guest is the author, Peter Carayiannis, and some of the topics we address include:

• Anna's first 100 days
• The wrong reason to hire an in-house lawyer
• The concept of budgets and #LegalOps
• The Big 3 of risk mitigation
• Definitions for ASLP and MLS
• The moral authority in a business
• A full-scope legal review of all corporate documents

Of all the books written about Warren Buffett, I am unaware of any authors who grew up in Omaha, Nebraska and went to school with his children.

Todd Finkle is the author of Warren Buffett: Investor and Entrepreneur, a book that was fourteen years in the making.

If you are a Buffett student, perhaps you will have heard several of Todd's stories, but are you aware of Buffett's numerous investing mistakes throughout the years or several of Charlie Munger's thoughts on behavioral investing?

In this conversation, we also discussed three of my favorite stories in the book. My favorite is the five-hour conversation between Buffett and Davy Davidson, and Todd does a great job of filling in the details.

You can find additional resources to the conversation on the show notes page.

John Rossman is making his second appearance on CFO Bookshelf. We interviewed him two years ago for one of our top 10 books of 2022, The Amazon Way, Amazon's 14 Leadership Principles.

John's newest book which he co-authored with Kevin McCaffrey is Big Bet Leadership. Highlights from the conversation include:

• What is and what is not a big bet
• A topic for low- and high-tech companies, both
• Big bets are generally found in Day 1 organizations
• Small teams vs. R&D labs
• Thinking, environment, management
• The power of writing
• The portfolio of ideas with limited resources
• The lightning round - lazy pivot, Chief Repeating Officer, quivers, MLPs
• John's recent favorite books

Full Show Notes