Zekrets: The Second Edition
September 2020 (Volume 2). Humility. Immigrants & Venture Capital Globalization. Organizational Innovators. Tips on things to watch, read, and listen.
Happy September! This is the second edition of Zekrets. If you missed the first edition, read it here. If you haven’t yet signed up, this is your chance.
Thanks to all those who signed up after reading the first edition. I was expecting that perhaps a handful of former students plus my mother might want to sign up. I wasn’t prepared for 700 of you to care! I hope that our exchanges continue to be valuable for you.
Before moving on to the current edition, I also want to thank those who provided suggestions to name my newsletter. The majority suggested keeping it as Zekrets, so that’s what I’ll do. But there were several highly creative ideas that I’ll try and use in other ways. Some of my favorites were: Zekret Sauce, Chamber of Zekrets, Zekret Handshake, Trade Zekrets, Zekret Weapon, Best Kept Zekret. The possibilities are endless!
Without further ado, the original articles for this edition.
Zekret: Humility Revisited
During unprecedented times like these, perhaps no attribute is more essential (and rare) than humility. Why? Because it’ll help us prevent falling prey to two extreme attitudes to uncertain situations: overconfidence and fear. If you want to see humility in action, pay attention to Dr. Fauci.
Brain Drain or (Venture) Capital Gain?
I’m excited to share the latest results of a research project. My coauthor and I show that immigrant entrepreneurs play a crucial role in explaining the internationalization of venture capital. Counterintuitively, the results suggest that the loss of talented people through emigration (aka “brain drain”) may create a long-term benefit in the form of capital investment gain for sending countries.
In Praise of “Boring” Organizational Innovators
We celebrate the innovators who bring us new technologies and products. We don’t give the same treatment to “boring” organizational innovators that improve the ways we work and coordinate. This is a mistake. I invite you to write about one organizational innovation (or innovator) in the comments to this article.
Following Up
A couple of quick follow ups from the previous edition of the newsletter.
Soon after I wrote my two cents about work-life balance, my colleague Nancy Rothbard (a real expert on the subject) wrote this useful piece: “Building Work-Life Balance in the WFH Era” (warning: paywall). Since what she says is based on decades of research and what I shared is based on my personal experience, you should listen to her!
In my article “Will COVID Kill Globalization?”, I provided several reasons why I believe it will not. One of my arguments was based on the fact that regionalization is more common than globalization. I gave the example of how the subsidiaries of Korean multinational firms are overwhelmingly located in Asia. Just a few weeks ago, I learned about this article by Yujin Jeong and Jordan Siegel (once again: paywall), which offers a counterpoint. Using remarkably detailed data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, they report that “U.S. multinationals are significantly more global than has previously been acknowledged in the [regionalization] literature” (brackets added by me). I don’t think this totally undermines the regionalization argument, but it does weaken it -- at least as it pertains to U.S. firms. I’m curious to know if the same can be said about firms from other parts of the world.
Other Stuff
Watch
Taste the Nation (by Padma Lakshmi) showcases several ethnic food traditions in different parts of the United States. The food itself makes it worth watching, but the real message is much bigger. The show helped me reflect on the disconnect between the immigrant experience and public policy.
Continuing on the food theme: I just watched and loved Babette’s Feast, winner of the 1987 foreign film Oscar. It’s the story of two old sisters who’ve spent their lives denying themselves any kind of pleasure. A special banquet cooked by their French maid forces them to reconsider their extreme views. I won’t say more to not spoil it, but there’s a beautiful lesson in what the maid gives up to teach the sisters about the purpose of life.
Read
Why Information Grows (by Cesar Hidalgo) is one of the smartest books I’ve read in a long time. A physicist provides a truly unique take on economic growth. You won’t find anything like it in the business or economics bookshelves. And that’s exactly why you should read it!
The Fallacy of Obviousness (by Teppo Felin) offers an enlightened criticism of the current wave of research on decision-making biases. It’s definitely controversial. But it does offer a compelling answer to a question I’ve long had: If we actually suffer from so many cognitive biases, how can we possibly function properly? Felin’s intriguing answer is that biases might also be telling us much of what’s right about our brains.
Listen
If you love music, you gotta listen to Hit Parade (by Chris Molanphy). I discovered it only a few weeks ago and have been a bit obsessed with it. The episodes on The Beatles and Bon Jovi were a lovely, nostalgic walk through the history of the music I grew up with. (For the record: Bon Jovi is awesome, despite the host’s opinion.) And “The Great War Against the Single” is a fun primer on how the music industry has changed its revenue model over time.