Tuesday 15 May 2012

Benjamin Franklin, Warren Buffett and Ghandi?

  I was watching the National geographic channel last night in my favourite Turkish cafe in Coburg, in fact the only Cafe i go to, I'm known there, I'm somebody, I'm local, so i go there, one of the commercials that came on said
One of the best places to hide secrets is in the past
 Too true, and i was thinking of how Warren Buffett is a modern day Benjamin Franklin and i'm thinking of Ghandi and the lessons to be learnt from them moving forward and it continues...

Warren Buffett


It occurred to me on one of my bike rides how influential Warren Buffett is in the world we live in

Why? You say, yeah, i was asking myself the same questions

Well recently he held his annual meeting and 35,000 people descended on Omaha to hear what he has to say, yep it's a time of recession, but the question everybody all over the world is asking is
What's Buffett doing, what's he thinking?
If you can do what he's doing and see how he sees the world, there is only opportunity, yeah, but what is it?
What's the next thing Warren, we're getting killed by this recession over here!

Warren goes shopping


In case you don't know anything about him,
  • He's considered one of the worlds wealthiest guys
  • He started off with $20,000 investment
  • Doesn't like dealing with lawyers
  • Doesn't invest in Hi tech stock or anything Internet related
  • Doesn't get caught up in the hype
  • He's happy to do his deals and not be concerned what anybody else is up to
  • Plays the ukalaie and plays bridge
  • Pays himself a wage of $50,000 a year
  • Lives in the same house he first bought
  • Helped Arnold sort out California's financial mess
  • Wont deal with anyone he doesn't trust and does deals by shaking your hand
  • Will only make one offer, if you don't like it, that's ok, he wont make another
  • His business Charlie Munger is one of the smartest guys he knows, Charlie never had formal education, but models his education, like applying a model for learning chemistry for a model for learning Engineering and is completely self taught
  • He's about the only rich guy in America that thinks rich people are not paying enough tax, much to Obama's relif
  • He doesn't mind paying tax?
  • He never uses a computer or calculator to work out a stock price, if the number doesn't jump at him, he just doesn't bother
  • Sometimes, there are years when he doesn't do much when there aren't opportunities, so he does nothing, but when a good deal comes his way, he's always ready
He's basically driven by common sense, trust and if you break that trust, he wont deal with you, nobody else will too

His idea of fun is delivering newspapers with his grandson, he loved doing it as a kid because it gave him time to think

From all of this, people flock to him with offers and if he does business with you, other people will want to do business with you 

Gandhi

When i was in India i picked up Gandhi's book, 'My experiments with truth'

When Ghandi practiced as a lawyer, he would not tolerate any lies, if he didn't think his client had been wronged, he would not deal with him, and every body knew it too.

One time, he realised his client had lied to him and he asked the judge to award the case to the other party, word got out that Gandhi was really serious about telling the truth and pretty soon, even his less honest clients would only send him the honest cases.

With a reputation like this, as soon as Gandhi walked into a court room, it was a done deal who would win the case and it was all down to honesty and reputation.

Ben Franklin

So too, Benjamin Franklin  built his career on his reputation and honest dealings

I remember reading in his autobiography how Mr Franklin ran away to Philadelphia to escape harsh treatment by his brother, he arrived with only enough money for bread, he bought 3 loafs, carried one under each arm walking up the street, while eating the other, saw a hungry pregnant woman with a kid and gave her 2 loafs, and tha's how he started in Philadelphia!

Check out some of the facts and  interesting stories about Benjamin Franklin

Above all, he built a career on honest dealing, hard work, inspiring, improving the lives of his fellow men and his reputation, in too many ways to mention here.
 Glass, china, and reputation are easily cracked, and never well mended.
He was a very influential states man, writer and if anyone wanted to get an project off the ground, the first question everyone would ask was
What does Benjamin Franklin think?
 Yes indeed, he did write about debt and how it was another form of slavery, take a look at some of his quotes

No comments:

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...