In his own words · Incentives
“Show me the incentive and I will show you the outcome.”
— Charlie Munger · Poor Charlie's Almanack
Verified. Sourced to Poor Charlie's Almanack.
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More Munger on Incentives
“Never, ever, think about something else when you should be thinking about the power of incentives.”
“Perhaps the most important rule in management is, 'Get the incentives right.'”
From the FedEx night-shift example in the Misjudgment essay; wording varies slightly across editions.
“Well I think I've been in the top 5% of my age cohort all my life in understanding the power of incentives, and all my life I've underestimated it. And never a year passes, but I get some surprise that pushes my limit a little farther.”
First given as a 1995 talk; the canonical wording is the expanded Almanack version.
“We want to win the bass fishing tour, whereas pension fund consultants sell tackle. We're not interested in selling tackle, we're interested in catching bass.”
His doers-vs-sellers point (he framed it as 'Warren and I').