Principles are ways of successfully dealing with reality to get what you want out of life.
Ray Dalio, one of the world’s most successful investors and entrepreneurs, cites principles as his key to success.
In 1975, Ray Dalio founded Bridgewater Associates, out of his two-bedroom apartment in New York City. Over forty years later, Bridgewater has grown into the largest hedge fund in the world and the fifth most important private company in the United States (according to Fortune magazine), and Dalio himself has been named to TIME’s list of the 100 most influential people in the world. Along the way Dalio discovered unique principles that have led to his and Bridgewater’s unique success. It is these principles, and not anything special about Dalio, that he believes are the reason behind whatever success he has had. He is now at a stage in his life that he wants to pass these principles along to others for them to judge for themselves and to do whatever they want with them.
Work Principle
Make clear what type of communication you are going to have in light of the objectives and priorities.
If your goal is to have people with different opinions work through their differences to try to get closer to what is true and what to do about it (open-minded debate), you will run your meeting differently than if its goal is to educate. Debating takes time, and that time increases exponentially depending on the number of people participating in the discussion, so you have to carefully choose the right people in the right numbers to suit the decision that needs to be made. In any discussion try to limit the participation to those whom you value most in light of your objectives. The worst way to pick people is based on whether their conclusions align with yours. Group-think (people not asserting independent views) and solo-think (people being unreceptive to the thoughts of others) are both dangerous.
Work Principle
- Get and Stay in Sync
- If it is your meeting to run, manage the conversation. If it is not your meeting to run, follow the lead of the person who is running the meeting.
- Make clear what type of communication you are going to have in light of the objectives and priorities.
- If it is your meeting to run, manage the conversation. If it is not your meeting to run, follow the lead of the person who is running the meeting.
Any person or organization can adopt Principles to better achieve their goals.
Learn what Principles are and how they are applied at Principles.com
