My son, Douglas, gave me Rules of Civility by Amor Towles for my birthday. And while I don't often read novels, the review in the WSJ painted it as a book I should read (it likened it to The Great Gatsby, and after finishing it I can see why). Given that performance...

When I was an undergrad math major at Temple University, roughly 40 years ago, a professor, who was teaching a Numbers Theory course, mentioned that there were three things mathematicians should always remember: the Pythagorean Theorem, Fermat's Last Equation, and he...

I'm sitting in the Lufthansa business class lounge, preparing to return home, after spending a few days in Budapest, Hungary, where we held our 51st meeting of The Performance Measurement Forum. The reading material includes the WSJ's European edition weekend edition,...

Motivational speaker Zig Ziglar frequently interjects jokes into his presentations. One deals with a Roman Catholic girl who was asked by her Baptist boyfriend to marry him. This occurred many years ago, when such “mixed marriages” were often frowned upon. When the...

Dippin' Dots' claim of being the "ice cream of the future" appears to have been a bit aggressive, as it declared for bankruptcy.Granted, this bold statement was merely their tag line, and perhaps some could foresee ice cream actually universally becoming like their...

A client recently asked about the appropriateness of reporting volatility and tracking error, for one and three month time periods, based on daily values. In addition, whether the results should be annualized. He was curious about the "best practices" for reporting...

We've discovered a way to enhance performance, at least in the short term: if you have a portfolio begin late in the month, to make the monthly return look better, treat the return as if it was for the full month!What do we mean by this? Well, consider the Modified...

#5  Using the wrong approach to measure, analyze, and report performance and riskThe good news is that there are plenty of great software packages available today, to assist firms with all aspects of their performance and risk measurement. The bad news is that...

#3 Not training your staffEntrepreneur magazine cited lack of staff training as one of the top reasons companies fail. As consultants to many types of firms (e.g., asset managers, custodians, software vendors, pension funds, endowments), we often encounter cases where...

This weekend's WSJ has two stories, reflecting opposite views.Michael M. Phillips' "The Old Soldier Who Didn't Fade Away" tells the story of a 59-year old U.S. Army staff sergeant who is currently deployed in Afghanistan. He has my admiration and appreciation for his...