Cove Street Capital requires a modern browser to look and function properly. Internet Explorer stopped receiving updates in January 2020. Using it may cause display issues on our website, and put your own online security at risk. We highly recommend switching to a secure modern web browser such as Chrome, Edge, Firefox, or Safari.

Jeff Bezos’ 2016 Letter

While he is reigning terror on the rest of portfolio, these are thoughts we share from Jeff Bezos.

First, never use a one-size-fits-all decision-making process. Many decisions are reversible, two-way doors. Those decisions can use a light-weight process. For those, so what if you’re wrong? I wrote about this in more detail in last year’s letter.

Second, most decisions should probably be made with somewhere around 70% of the information you wish you had. If you wait for 90%, in most cases, you’re probably being slow. Plus, either way, you need to be good at quickly recognizing and correcting bad decisions. If you’re good at course correcting, being wrong may be less costly than you think, whereas being slow is going to be expensive for sure.

Third, use the phrase “disagree and commit.” This phrase will save a lot of time. If you have conviction on a particular direction even though there’s no consensus, it’s helpful to say, “Look, I know we disagree on this but will you gamble with me on it? Disagree and commit?” By the time you’re at this point, no one can know the answer for sure, and you’ll probably get a quick yes.

Fourth, recognize true misalignment issues early and escalate them immediately. Sometimes teams have different objectives and fundamentally different views. They are not aligned. No amount of discussion, no number of meetings will resolve that deep misalignment. Without escalation, the default dispute resolution mechanism for this scenario is exhaustion. Whoever has more stamina carries the decision.

Share on facebook
Share on twitter
Share on linkedin
Share on email

Important Notice

You are now leaving Cove Street Capital’s website and entering Cove Street’s Mutual Fund website.