Charisma / Power
paulgraham.com
paulgraham.com
We have defined a "Builder Type" CEO who is not charismatic yet is defined by being able to build and ship things. Like Mark Zuckerberg minus his team of PR people.
Then we have a "Charismatic Type" CEO who people like but who can't get anything done.
By this definition, Obama would be the useless yet charismatic CEO. Hillary, who has never built anything (that I can identify), would be a "Builder" type (apparently?). And Donald Trump...who indisputably has built things despite being both charismatic and hated would blend both of these together?
I don't agree with this analysis. It isn't that easy to slice this one.
Useless, no, charismatic, yes. PG isn't saying that you can't be both powerful and charismatic - he's saying if you are to become powerful, you'd better be charismatic as well. His comment about them being the best person for the job is over the "schmoozers", who are charismatic but aren't building things.
> Hillary, who has never built anything (that I can identify)
https://www.congress.gov/member/hillary-clinton/C001041
> It isn't that easy to slice this one.
I agree here. I don't think a clean dichotomy is being discussed. I think PG is just lamenting that charisma is necessary to hold power over other people.
Well what do you define as building? She was a successful legislator and built up a charity and public speaking business for herself out of almost nothing.
I'd be more interested to hear PG explore his own relationship to charisma and power on a personal and professional level than read this oddly deflecting set of statements.
Naturally they both excel at each, ultimately 2 different means to the same end
The dichotomy between Trump and Hillary is false in this case on dimensions other than simply having charisma.
Trump had more charisma than Hillary as well as the 16 or whatever ridiculous number of GOP candidates there were at one point.
Bernie Sanders was the only candidate in this cycle with a similar level of charisma and Democrats did the thing that the GOP did the previous 2 elections - and it cost them.
Trump doesn't build buildings - he licenses his name to buildings other people build. He doesn't even own most of the properties that bear his name. The only thing he can feasibly claim to have built is his own celebrity, and prior to his recent status, his celebrity might generously be described as b-list - he was a reality show star who was once a professional wrestling celebrity heel and sometimes guest starred as himself on various tv shows.
The distinction is important, I believe, because to me, "builder" implies someone with a passion and a deep understanding of the art of whatever they make their living at. I don't see a passion about architecture or design from Trump, nor do I get a sense that he understands how they work, or that he cares.
They don't deserve to be considered "builders" either. Certainly not "builders of buildings."
Describing Trump as someone who builds his buildings gives him credit for a depth of insight and an active hand in the process of architecture, and the gp comment that appears to liken him to Steve Jobs further implies that Trump has an equivalent level of talent and genius in his field. I see no evidence that he is to real estate what Steve Jobs was to Apple computers.
Donald Trump is a builder of fortunes, of his own celebrity and business relationships. As such, I would judge him on the quality of the network he surrounds himself with, because his core competency appears to be choosing people to build things for him.
And I wouldn't necessarily claim that any business co-founder is a builder. Otherwise, I might as well say I build rockets if I invest enough money into SpaceX.
Whitewashing comes early.
He is literally off the charts both. He builds very large, impressive buildings for a living.
He is enough of a charismatic individual that through force of personality won the presidency.
Trump has said he received a million dollar loan to get started (circa early 1970s?). The return he generated, to say the least, was extraordinary.
Further, even going by that bogus story, not all sectors of the economy generate the same returns. A person is not to be shamed for making less money in retail or dog food than in tech or oil. One has to consider the results they generated in the field they chose to focus in. It's disingenuous, and then some, to hold all business people up to the standard of: well if you had just put all your money, at some arbitrary high point, into an index fund for N years, you'd be richer - that would discredit nearly all successful business people.
Hey Sam Walton, if you had just liquidated all of your Walmart shares in 1992 before you died and put the wealth into an index fund, your family would be richer. That's mathematically correct and ridiculous. Off the top of my head I can list dozens of examples like this among the Forbes 400 past or present.
edit: also I'm not entirely sure Marco Rubio counts as "liberal media", but I'm not up to date with the latest lingo. Politifact seems to think $1m is fairly unlikely though: http://www.politifact.com/florida/article/2016/mar/07/did-do...
edit: I never said Marco Rubio was part of the liberal media. You're inventing that false setup. I said the liberal media, that doesn't mean Marco Rubio must belong to the liberal media if he also said x y z about Trump. Given how very heated the race was, why would it be surprising for any of the Republican competitors to latch on to the same attacks?
So in other words, there's zero evidence to support Trump inheriting a vast fortune, exactly as I said.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/fact-checker/wp/...