No. of Recommendations: 19
"Picking people who will have this ability is a completely different skill set from doing it oneself. Although I am cautiously optimistic about Abel, I think Buffett’s track record in picking collaborators is much less impressive. I am thinking of David Sokol, the crooked Haslams of Flying J notoriety, the 3G Capital guys, Gen Re’s Ronald Ferguson and Joseph Brandon, and AIG’s Maurice Greenberg and his son Evan at Chubb, and I have probably missed a few. My examples mostly involve integrity and not capital allocation skills, but I think the point remains - doing something well oneself is not the same as choosing someone else who can do it."
I think that's a fair summation. What I believe is a little bit different however is the fact that most of your examples were bolt on acquisitions or investments, whereas he and Greg worked side by side for a long time. You also mention people with questionable character he "chose" but conveniently left out a deep ocean of people he "chose" that were fantastic. Bottom line is we are moving into a new era and it is fair to keep an open mind as to the abilities of Mr. Abel and at the same that open mind includes the possibility that Warren has it right!
