Five History Lessons For Everybody

Morgan Housel, a partner at Collaborative Fund and a former Wall Street Journal columnist, is a strategic thinker and a gifted writer. His brief but wide ranging article that prompted this post is a rare blend of historical, business and psychological perspectives on the boom and bust cycles we live through. A timely analysis if you wonder what's going on in your company, the markets and global economy. Here are the five lessons in bullet points:

#1: People suffering from sudden, unexpected hardship are likely to adopt views they previously thought unthinkable.

#2: Reversion to the mean occurs because people persuasive enough to make something grow don’t have the kind of personalities that allow them to stop before pushing too far.

#3: Unsustainable things can last longer than you anticipate.

#4: Progress happens too slowly for people to notice; setbacks happen too fast for people to ignore.

#5: Wounds heal, scars last.

To illustrate Morgan's style, here are a few insights from his elaboration on lesson #2:

What kind of person makes their way to the top of a successful company, or a big country?

Someone who is determined, optimistic, doesn’t take “no” for an answer, and is relentlessly confident in their own abilities.

What kind of person is likely to go overboard, bite off more than they can chew, and discount risks that are blindingly obvious to others?

Someone who is determined, optimistic, doesn’t take “no” for an answer, and is relentlessly confident in their own abilities.

Reversion to the mean is one of the most common stories in history. It’s the main character in economies, markets, countries, companies, careers – everything.

Part of the reason it happens is because the same personality traits that push people to the top also increase the odds of pushing them over the edge.

Read the full article here