巴菲特 我最大弱點是不擅長炒魷魚

Can you build one of the world's most successful companies and also be a great boss? Warren Buffett may be one of the few executives to accomplish this feat.

你能既打造出世界上最成功的公司之一，同時又當一名好老闆嗎？有這樣成就的企業負責人不多，但沃倫o巴菲特可能是其中一位。

In acquiring the dozens of companies that today make up his $315 billion Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA), Buffett has never dirtied his hands much with the sort of cost-cutting, layoffs, and management shakeups that often follow acquisitions at other firms. While Buffett's style of allowing even underperforming businesses to languish is part of what makes him so unique, it is also his greatest shortcoming, the Berkshire CEO and chairman admitted during the company's annual shareholder meeting this past weekend in Omaha.

今天的伯克希爾-哈撒韋公司（Berkshire Hathaway）價值3150億美元，由幾十家子公司組成。在收購這些子公司的過程中，巴菲特從來沒有幹過什麼“壞事”，比如削減成本、裁員以及經常引發新收購行動的管理層重組。上週末，伯克希爾在奧馬哈召開了股東大會。身爲首席執行官和董事長，巴菲特承認自己的風格是允許表現落後的公司不斷滑坡。這正是他如此獨特的原因之一，但也是他最大的弱點。

Asked by a shareholder to highlight his weaknesses, Buffett said that as a manager, he can be "sloppy." "A pure weak point is, I'm slow to make personnel changes," he said on Saturday. "There will be times when what you might call our lack of supervision of our subsidiaries means we'll miss something."

在上週六的大會上，一位股東要求巴菲特列舉自己的弱點。巴菲特回答說，他可能是一名“懶散的”經營者：“我在人事調整方面行動速度很慢，這是一個純粹的弱點。有時候，大家也許會說，對子公司缺乏監管意味着我們會讓某些東西從眼皮底下溜走。”

Without getting into specifics, he recalled one example. "We had a guy, we loved the guy, and it wasn't killing us in our business, and how long before we went to somebody else?" (Neither he nor Berkshire's vice chairman Charlie Munger, who sat beside Buffett on stage, could remember.) "We've waited too long on one manager sometimes," Buffett said.

巴菲特沒有詳細進行解釋，但舉了個例子：“曾經有那麼個人，我們很喜歡他，而且我們的業務也不會因爲他而受到致命的影響，過了多久我們才用別人取代了他？（跟巴菲特同坐在臺上的伯克希爾副董事長查理o蒙格也想不起來）。有時候，我們在更換管理者方面等的時間過長。”

Buffett's comments came amid grumbling from some investors gathered in Omaha that the Oracle is too hands-off and perhaps should take a page from activist shareholders like Pershing Square Capital's BillAckman or turnaround specialists like private equity firm 3G Capital. Indeed, several questions from shareholders and analysts at Saturday's meeting focused on whether Berkshire, which teamed up with 3G in 2013 to purchase ketchup maker Heinz (where management was then swiftly replaced), would adopt 3G's "hands-on" approach for future acquisitions.

有些到奧馬哈參加股東大會的投資者抱怨說，巴菲特過於放任自流，他也許應該效仿一下維權股東，比如對衝基金公司潘興廣場（ Pershing Square）基金經理比爾o阿克曼，或者像私募基金公司3G Capital那樣專門致力於扭虧。週六的大會上，確實有一些投資者和分析師把問題的焦點集中在伯克希爾會不會在今後的收購中採取像3G Capital那樣“親自動手”模式。2013年，伯克希爾和3G Capital聯手收購了番茄醬生產商亨氏（Heinz，而且迅速調整了這家公司的管理團隊）。

While Buffett praised 3G as a partner ("They're smart, they're focused; they're very hard-working and determined.") he also noted that "they're never satisfied," and defended Berkshire's gentler way of doing things. For one, Buffett doesn't like telling his subsidiaries that they need to get rid of employees or restrict their actions in other ways. "We're not big disciplinarians," Buffett said. As Munger put it, "By the standards of the rest of the world, we over-trust."

雖然巴菲特對3G Capital這位合作伙伴表示讚賞（“他們很聰明，也很專注；他們工作時非常努力，而且很堅定。”），但他也指出：“他們永遠不滿足”。巴菲特還爲伯克希爾的溫和處理方式進行了辯護。其中一個原因是，巴菲特不喜歡要求子公司裁員，也不喜歡用其他方式限制子公司的行動。他說：“我們不是特別崇尚嚴格的紀律。”蒙格對這一點的說法是：“如果用世界上其他地方的標準來衡量，我們過於信任別人。”

So much does Buffett trust the CEOs of Berkshire companies that he doesn't keep close track of how much money they send him and when, or bother to double-check that a company even exists. He's never visited Forest River, the Indiana-based recreational vehicle manufacturer that Berkshire owns, for example. "I hope it's there," Buffett joked. "I could see them saying, 'What figure should we send Warren this month?'" he said, laughing. ("I don't want to encourage managers of subsidiaries to do a different way of behaving, if they're listening," he added.)

巴菲特是如此信任伯克希爾子公司的負責人，以至於他都沒有詳細記錄過後者在什麼時候爲伯克希爾貢獻了多少收益，他甚至都不去核實一下這些公司是否存在。比如說，他從沒考察過設在印第安納州的房車製造商Forest River。巴菲特開玩笑說：“但願有這麼一家公司，我能想象到他們正在商量，‘這個月我們應該給巴菲特報什麼樣的數字呢？’”說完之後他自己也笑了。（巴菲特還說：“如果他們願意聽的話，我要說，我不想鼓勵子公司負責人改變自己的行爲方式。”）

When you leave companies alone to run themselves, sometimes things go wrong, Buffett acknowledged. But he took issue with critics who complain that Berkshire's returns would be higher if Buffett ran a tighter ship. "What they won't be able to measure is how much on the positive side we have achieved with so many other people because we gave them that leeway," he said, noting that Berkshire doesn't have in-house general counsel or human resources.

巴菲特承認，讓子公司完全自主有時候也會帶來一些問題。批評者認爲，如果巴菲特加強監管，伯克希爾的回報率會更高。但巴菲特並不贊同這一點。他說：“正是因爲給了他們這樣的空間，我們才能和如此這麼多人一起獲得成功，批評者根本沒辦法衡量這種積極影響。”巴菲特還指出，伯克希爾沒有內部法律顧問或人力資源部門。

As for Ackman's brand of activism, Buffett seemed almost offended by any likeness between Berkshire and the hedge fund manager. First, unlike Ackman, who has lately made headlines for his short position in Herbalife (HLF) and hostile bid for Botox manufacturer Allergan (AGN), Buffett doesn't short stocks or trade in derivatives. He's also skeptical that activists' recent success is sustainable, saying they're usually looking to cause a short-term swing in a stock price, not permanent changes to improve a business. Munger, for his part, swore off investor activism in general, saying, "I don't think it's good for America."

至於比爾o阿克曼代表的維權主義，對巴菲特來說，在伯克希爾和這位對衝基金經理之間做任何類比看來都近乎於冒犯。最近，阿克曼做空了營養品公司康寶萊（Herbalife），還敵意收購了製造瘦臉除皺注射劑保妥適（Botox）的愛力根公司（Allergan），成了媒體關注的焦點。首先，巴菲特不在股市做空，也不參與金融衍生產品交易。同時，巴菲特對阿克曼最近的成功能否延續下去持懷疑態度。巴菲特說，阿克曼等人通常着眼於短期股價波動，而不是通過永久性調整來改善一家公司。蒙格則是從總體上反對所有投資者維權行動。蒙格說：“我覺得這種行爲對美國沒有好處。”

Will Buffett's successor be the hard-line boss that Buffett isn't? Don't count on it.

巴菲特的接班人會有巴菲特所不具備的強硬做派嗎？別想太多了。

One of Berkshire's most valuable assets, Buffett and other investors reiterated over the weekend, is other businesses' willingness to sell to Berkshire -- often at lower prices than what private equity firms would pay -- because they trust Buffett to mind the store. As hedge fund manager Whitney Tilson of Kase Capital Management put it on Friday, "Berkshire is like a museum, like the Met, where people will sell their most valuable art just because they know it's going to be safe there."

上週末，巴菲特和其他投資者重申，伯克希爾最寶貴的資產之一就是別人願意把自己的公司轉讓給伯克希爾——而且實際的轉讓價格往往低於私募股權公司的報價，原因是他們相信巴菲特會照看好自己的公司。正如對衝基金公司Kase Capital Management基金經理惠特尼o蒂爾森上週五所說：“伯克希爾就像一座博物館，或者說大都會博物館。人們都願意把自己最有價值的藝術品賣給它，原因在於，人們知道這些藝術品待在那兒會很安全。”

Added Buffett, "We keep promises, and that means we sometimes end up holding on to some businesses that haven't lived up to expectations."

巴菲特也說：“我們信守承諾。這就意味着，雖然有時候一些公司的表現沒有達到預期，但我們會一直持有它們的股份。”