I guess Warren’s quote only applies to other people, not him. "It’s like choosing the 2020 Olympic team by picking the eldest sons of the gold-medal winners in the 2000 Olympics." (<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/14/us/dozens-of-rich-americans-join-in-fight-to-retain-the-estate-tax.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/14/us/dozens-of-rich-america...</a>)
As I understand, the son is there not to lead the company (Greg Abel is the CEO), but to oversee their family's share in the enterprise.
The Chairman position is to protect company culture, not make operational decisions.
While I liked your comment enough to upvote, I then realized that Chairman isn't an operational position. It's more a position where the person can exercise ownership of a company (to put it in layman terms). In your analogy he wouldn't be the athlete, more like the person who gets the winning money (assuming his son also has shares) and chooses the trainer/coach of the athletes (which still needs skill btw).
Maybe the implication is that Warren thinks it’s significantly easier to run a wealth fund than get gold in the Olympics. I would probably agree.
there's nothing wrong with leaving things to your kids to run.<p>that's the point of the effort after all.<p>warren as smart as he is was tryna go against the grain of thousands of human evolution. if you train your kids - then most likely they would've values similar to yours. hit or miss but most times a hit.
Sat on a couple of boards and the non exec chair mostly just guards the culture and can fire the CEO. Abel runs the business. That's a very different job from Howard's.
Buffett has been planning this since at least 2011:<p><i>CHICAGO (MarketWatch) -- Warren Buffett has told the CBS News program "60 Minutes" that after he dies, he wants his son to become non-executive chairman of Berkshire Hathaway. Howard Buffett, a farmer with no college degree, would be a good successor, the elder Buffett said, because he understands the values of the company.</i><p><a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/warren-buffett-wants-farmer-son-to-succeed-him-2011-12-09" rel="nofollow">http://www.marketwatch.com/story/warren-buffett-wants-farmer...</a>
Many people do not know this but he still holds the stock that he first bought as a 13y old. It is now worth 8+ figures!
So after all no one could be trusted
Warren Jong-il
Best wishes and all. But given Berkshire's scale, and the son's age (71), questions about the next succession plan seem appropriate.<p>Also, since the NYT says nothing else about the son: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Graham_Buffett" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Graham_Buffett</a> In context, his recent involvement in local politics seems rather odd.
Sounds like there's a grandson who's being groomed for that: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Warren_Buffett" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Warren_Buffett</a><p>They all seem very similar to the British "new nobility" in the mid-late 19th century, albeit with less syphilis and opium.
Rags to rags in three generations, don't forget. These people are not Warren Buffett and most likely do not share his skill, luck, and psychological investment.
Is grooming the right word here? The guy is 42, grooming to me has a pedophilic connotation.
You should spend less time on 4chan.
This is how groomed is used, yes. The sexually overt connotation is a very recent thing.
People take what he does and says as gospel so knowing he went with monarchy tier nepotism is going to be very annoying.