Among the few books that are interesting and inspirational, Alfred Sloan’s My Years with General Motors lays out his brilliant managerial practices and provides insights into the new consumer economy that he and General Motors created over half a century ago. An entire era has gone by since, and we find ourselves in a situation that is uncannily similar to all great crises. And his words uttered in 1941 hold so true even today – “It is astonishing what you can do when you have a lot of energy, ambition and plenty of ignorance.”
The lasting value of Sloan’s book is not really his dream, but the ambition, detail, and scale with which he built GM as a consummate organisation. One of the tenets he believed in and which truly forms the backbone of L&T as well is the power of creativity. The greatest thrill that life offers is to create, to construct, to develop something useful. Too often we fail to recognise and pay tribute to the creative spirit. It is that spirit that creates jobs and adds value to life. This has also been the mantra that has been guiding this diversified, multi-disciplined engineering and construction giant that L&T has become today. Read more…..
Chart of the Day
Icarus TV
Markets have been hitting new records, even though president Biden is expected to raise taxes at some point, which has some investors asking why markets aren’t more jittery about potential taxes. Jim Keenan, chief investment officer and global co-head of credit at BlackRock, joined “Squawk Box” on Friday to discuss.
