did anyone see the apprentice ? it was interesting and relevant to us traders because it tended to reveal the types of personalities of the contestants.
And this showed me why most corporate types make lousy traders , and I include banks and other vanilla financial organisations as such ( though not hedges and managed futures ).
why ? well , to get on in a corp , one has to be superficially nice ,be " slick " , be macho ( but only the GQ type , yeah , they can't deal with millwall supporters ), get on within the structure of things , be bloody ruthless to your underlings , not upset the applecart too much and ABOVE all , grovel to the boss , and swallow whatever he commands be it good, bad, or ugly for the business.
So , in episode 2 , 3 characters were up for firing . 1 was 100 % the above , the second a wannabe of the above , but was obviously no good at it .
the third was the interesting one , a maverick , a bit if a rebel , independent if maybe a little naive and aggressive.
the final result was that #2 got fired . #1 being the king groveller that he was, stayed and surprisingly so did #3 , the brass apparently impressed by his maverickness ( but of course , being the yuppies that they are wary at the same time ) , to give him another chance.
for traders personality # 3 was much more suited to trading , though of course he would need a bit more discipline and training.
what is more to the point I thought was that none of the other " corporate types " had what it took to be a good trader. all the " qualities " listed above would do them no good .
sadly this in my experience apllies to ALL corporations , even banks and merchant banks .
So , you see , you need to be a bit of a rebel and a maverick , that helps you think out of the box and against the grain becuase that is surely what the other 80% are doing and they are losers.
you want to win .
you also have to be truly independent in the whole sense of even being independent of your emotions ( greed , fear , money etc ).
so really whatever way you cut , to make it in this game you have to be a thorough individual.
And this is against what are supposedly corporate values.
- Can't think OTB if boss gonna get angry coz you outshine him ! -
And this showed me why most corporate types make lousy traders , and I include banks and other vanilla financial organisations as such ( though not hedges and managed futures ).
why ? well , to get on in a corp , one has to be superficially nice ,be " slick " , be macho ( but only the GQ type , yeah , they can't deal with millwall supporters ), get on within the structure of things , be bloody ruthless to your underlings , not upset the applecart too much and ABOVE all , grovel to the boss , and swallow whatever he commands be it good, bad, or ugly for the business.
So , in episode 2 , 3 characters were up for firing . 1 was 100 % the above , the second a wannabe of the above , but was obviously no good at it .
the third was the interesting one , a maverick , a bit if a rebel , independent if maybe a little naive and aggressive.
the final result was that #2 got fired . #1 being the king groveller that he was, stayed and surprisingly so did #3 , the brass apparently impressed by his maverickness ( but of course , being the yuppies that they are wary at the same time ) , to give him another chance.
for traders personality # 3 was much more suited to trading , though of course he would need a bit more discipline and training.
what is more to the point I thought was that none of the other " corporate types " had what it took to be a good trader. all the " qualities " listed above would do them no good .
sadly this in my experience apllies to ALL corporations , even banks and merchant banks .
So , you see , you need to be a bit of a rebel and a maverick , that helps you think out of the box and against the grain becuase that is surely what the other 80% are doing and they are losers.
you want to win .
you also have to be truly independent in the whole sense of even being independent of your emotions ( greed , fear , money etc ).
so really whatever way you cut , to make it in this game you have to be a thorough individual.
And this is against what are supposedly corporate values.
- Can't think OTB if boss gonna get angry coz you outshine him ! -