James Surowiecki
James Surowiecki
James Michael Surowieckiis an American journalist. He is a staff writer at The New Yorker, where he writes a regular column on business and finance called "The Financial Page"...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionJournalist
CountryUnited States of America
running coffee oil
Although oil is a commodity, it's still not a commodity like coffee, which, thank God, we will have with us always. At some point the oil will run out.
jobs careers listening
The paradox of Steve Jobs's career is that he had no interest in listening to consumers - he was famously dismissive of market research - yet nonetheless had an amazing sense of what consumers actually wanted.
procrastination thinking connections
I think there is clearly a connection between free time and procrastination. The more you have of the former, all things being equal, the more likely you are to procrastinate.
smart independent thinking
For a crowd to be smart, the people in it need to be not only diverse in their perspectives but also, relatively speaking, independent of each other. In other words, you need people to be thinking for themselves, rather than following the lead of those around them.
diversity decision independence
Diversity and independence are important because the best collective decisions are the product of disagreement and contest, not consensus or compromise.
thinking people levels
I think people don't understand compound interest because typically no one ever explains it to them and the level of financial literacy in the US is very low.
hard-work intelligent skills
Auto repair, piloting, skiing, perhaps even management: these are skills that yield to application, hard work, and native talent. But forecasting an uncertain future and deciding the best course of action in the face of that future are much less likely to do so. And much of what we've seen so far suggests that a large group of diverse individuals will come up with better and more robust forecasts and make more intelligent decisions than even the most skilled "decision maker."
dream procrastination self
Lack of confidence, sometimes alternating with unrealistic dreams of heroic success, often leads to procrastination, and many studies suggest that procrastinators are self-handicappers: rather than risk failure, they prefer to create conditions that make success impossible, a reflex that of course creates a vicious cycle.
smart thinking way
Paradoxically, the best way for a group to be smart is for each person in it to think and act as independently as possible.
moving commitment views
From a social point of view, it's beneficial that homeownership encourages commitment to a given town or city. But, from an economic point of view, it's good for people to be able to leave places where there's less work and move to places where there's more.
car guarantees driving
If being the biggest company was a guarantee of success, we'd all be using IBM computers and driving GM cars.
team organization decision
If small groups are included in the decision-making process, then they should be allowed to make decisions. If an organization sets up teams and then uses them for purely advisory purposes, it loses the true advantage that a team has: namely, collective wisdom.
benefits may chance
The profit motive, indecorous though it may seem, may represent the best chance the poor have to reap some of globalization's benefits.