Becoming Warren Buffett Page #6

and suppose that happens four

times over 40 years or something.

What the hell difference

does it make to me?

Net, the record is

working out is fine.

Both of us know that we've

done better by having ethics.

Warren's not interested

in making money

by cheating people.

Loomis:

Warren's opinions

of Wall Street

investment bankers

would not endear him

to their mothers.

He feels that they're,

for the most part,

not out for their clients.

They're out for their own

business interests.

Warren:
In the late 1960s,

there were just a flood

of accounting

shenanigans and mergers

built upon false accounting

and misleading people.

It was a time

when a lot of charlatans

were prevailing in Wall Street

and were being applauded

by Wall Street.

I understood what

the game was about,

but I didn't want

to play in it,

so I closed down the

partnership at the end of 1969,

and I took on the title of

Chairman for Berkshire Hathaway.

Munger:
Well, I think

the modern Berkshire

is pretty much

all a reflection of Warren.

I have constructed

a business that fits me.

It's kind of crazy

to spend your life painting

if you're painting a subject

you don't want to look at.

I've gotten to paint

my own painting in business

on an unlimited

canvas in a way.

It's a different

sort of place.

I work with a great

group of people

that make my life very easy

and that take good care of me.

Come. Okay.

We have 25 people

in the office,

and if you go back, it's the exact same 25,

the exact same ones.

We don't have any

committees at Berkshire.

We don't have

a public relations department.

We don't have investor relations.

We don't have a general council.

We don't have

a human relations department.

We just don't go for anything that

people do just as a matter of form.

It's exactly the life I like,

and it's not work to me.

It's just a form

of play, basically.

Oh, I...

I like things quiet.

I shut the door,

actually, at the office,

'cause I don't want to hear

anybody talking outside.

Woman on TV:

Broad distinctions between his views

and the belt-tightening

proposals.

Warren:

And I still probably spend

five or six hours

a day reading.

Woman on TV:

...look at what's trending today.

Our quick round-up...

Howard:
Well,

what's amazing is the stuff he remembers.

It's like a little computer,

you know?

I keep thinking the hard drive will

run out of space, but it doesn't.

Melinda Gates:

He's one of the smartest people we know.

So I was at a couple

of the family dinners

at the Gates house

where Mary, Bill's mom,

was trying to convince him

to come out

to the family place

at Hood Canal

to meet Warren Buffett,

and he was resisting

because he was

really busy with Microsoft.

And finally he said, "Mom,

okay, I'll come for lunch."

Bill Gates:

So the two of us flew out there

somewhat reluctantly,

'cause you know,

buying and selling stocks...

which is how I thought of Warren...

wasn't of particular interest to me

and didn't seem like value added.

It turned out

that was completely wrong.

We knew that day that

we'd be very close friends.

In fact, we just couldn't

get enough of each other.

Warren:

Shortly after I met Bill Gates,

Bill's dad asked each of us to

write down on a piece of paper

one word that would best describe

what had helped us the most.

Bill and I, without any

collaboration at all,

each wrote the word "focus."

Well, focus has always been a

strong part of my personality.

If I get interested in something,

I get really interested.

If I get interested in a new subject,

I want to read about it,

I want to talk about it, and I want to

meet people that are involved in it.

Bill:

We both love to work hard.

You know, neither of us

like frivolous things.

You know he doesn't know

much about cooking,

or art, or...

a huge range of things.

I can't tell you the color of the

walls in my bedroom or my living room.

We're on a satellite phone.

I don't have a mind that relates

to the physical universe well.

Man:

Warren checking the DOW.

But the business universe I...

I think I understand reasonably well.

Warren's ability to size

up people and businesses,

it's a pretty magical thing.

He is the best at that,

anybody we know.

We... we should all try to be

20% as... as good at that.

Warren:

I like to sit and think,

and I spend

a lot of time doing that.

And sometimes it's

pretty unproductive but...

but I find it enjoyable

to think about...

particularly about...

about business

or investment problems.

They're easy.

It's the human problems

that are the tough ones.

Sometimes there aren't any good

answers with human problems.

There's... there's almost always

a good answer with money.

Susie:

He was sort of a genius.

I think sometimes

geniuses are,

by default,

lonely and isolated.

He was not

really well adjusted.

He was just this funny...

I mean,

humorous guy who maybe had a moat around him,

because he was afraid

and he didn't know anyone

that he wanted to let in.

And to this day,

I mean, I don't know...

Well, nobody

knows him like I do,

and probably any wife

would say that, but...

Howard:

He's a loner in a sense.

And it's difficult to connect

on an emotional level,

because I think that that's not

his basic mode of operation.

He was there... physically,

but he was upstairs

reading all the time.

I always told my mother

we have to talk in sound bytes.

I learned that early on,

that if you start going into some long thing,

unless you've explained to him ahead of

time that it's going to be a long thing

and you need him to hang in there,

you lose him.

You lose him

to whatever giant thought

he has in his head at the time

that he was probably thinking

about before you came in

and really wants

to get back to.

Peter:

He's not like the rest of us.

I don't think my dad ever

took anybody for granted,

but you are

a little bit blind, I think,

sometimes to what other people

might be doing behind the scenes,

and my dad's gotten

a little bit of a pass.

Susie:

Warren can't find the light switch,

and it's probably my fault.

One time, years ago

when the kids were little,

I was feeling really sick.

I had the flu,

so I lay down on the bed,

and I said to Warren,

"Will you get me a pan?

Or something from the kitchen.

I may not get to the bathroom.

I feel so sick."

He said, "Okay."

So he trottles down to the kitchen,

and I hear this bang,

bip, boom, bang!

And he comes up,

and he brings me a colander.

I looked at it, and I said, "Look,

honey, this has holes in it."

"Oh, oh, okay."

So he ran down,

all this banging

and everything.

And he comes up and he puts the

colander on a cookie sheet.

Physical proximity to Warren doesn't

always mean that he's there with you.

He's so cerebral, you see?

That's why I learned

to have my own life.

We were

two parallel lines and...

but very connected when

he was open to connecting.

Susie Jr.:
I did make a joke at one point.

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