面试资产管理公司的秘密,从e of the Best to Ever Do It

投资过程中的核心互动是一系列采访。

Across 20 years in the business, I conducted interviews with money managers two or three times a day, totaling thousands. In all that time, I only peripherally thought about the process of interviewing until I started the podcast.

Interviews are different from conversations. Conversations are casual discussions between people. They are back and forth interactions often balanced in airtime.

Interviews are conversations with a purpose. For the most part, interviewers ask the questions and interviewees answer. An allocator’s purpose in a manager interview is to gather information and evaluate the manager on both content and persona. CIOs seek to confirm or refute the validity of their hypothesis for investing in the manager. At the same time, each interview offers an opportunity to learn about social interactions and trustworthiness for a partnership that may last years or decades. These interviews require focus and attention in every aspect of the conversation.

That purpose sounds straightforward, but we’ve all experienced ineffective meetings in which the objective gets subjugated to an allocator peacocking by expressing their views to prove their intellectual worth. Tom Bushey found in his initial market meetings for Sunderland Capital that probably two-thirds of the people interviewing him told him why what he was doing was ludicrous and how they would do it instead.

播客面试是不同的。我讨论了我在面试作为分配器时所做的许多同一主题，但评估不再是我的目标。我让CIO和投资经理讲述了他们的故事，我无需以后想和他们一起投资。

Other forms of interviewing carry a different purpose and call on different skills. Jon Wertheim has written and conducted interviews for Sports Illustrated and 60 Minutes for 25 years. His interviews have sought quotes for stories, entertainment for television, and facts for journalistic investigations. When filling a story with a quote, Jon wants just one nugget. A half-hour conversation can be horrible for 29 minutes, but if the subject gives a sound bite when wrapping up, he will have accomplished his mission. He may purposefully express boredom, excitement or provocation, all in the interest of getting one little gem.

His television interviews are the opposite. The medium requires a cadence and flow throughout that matters as much as the material. If the interviewer and subject interrupt each other, the television viewing will be poor and will usurp otherwise great content.

Investigative journalism is different again. Conducting research for a story requires in-depth probing and verbal interrogation techniques where substance matters more than style.

The style and techniques of interviewing across podcasts, stories, television, and investigations are all different from the evaluative interviews conducted by allocators. At the same time, the different disciplines share common techniques that are effective across the board and useful for allocators to improve their skills for evaluating managers.

Preparing

Sitting in-between managers and clients as the co-CIO of a fund of funds, I was stunned how frequently interviews took place with no prior preparation.

Time in front of managers is limited. Wasting that time drawing out easily accessible information that could have been learned in advance is highly inefficient.

Great interactions come from preparing to blend structure and flow in the conversation. Interviewing legends Larry King and Cal Fussman take different approaches that both rely on detailed preparation. Larry conducts research and develops an outline for the interview. He never contemplates specific questions ahead of time. Cal does his research by creating a long list of interview questions, picking out a few of his favorites, reading them carefully, and then throwing away the list before he conducts the actual interview. He plans for the conversation without getting anchored to specific questions.

我有机会改变我prepara的程度tion across podcast interviews. In the first few podcasts, I massively overprepared. I created long question lists and brought them into the session with me. In the actual interview, the question list was a weighty anchor. I glimpsed at it often to make sure I didn’t miss anything, distracted myself, and whiffed on asking obvious follow-up questions as a result. That over-preparation created a rigid agenda that took me away from being present and in the flow of the conversation.

我退出了准备的问题越多，我就越多信任我的本能在对话中提出问题。在一点，我的舒适舒适，我的玩具完全跳过我的准备。

我妥善了，但是，如果我在工作中，我就知道面试会更好。我最终在准备对话流程和透明细节的转向的轮廓方面发现了一个甜蜜点，将结构与开放空间混合，以便对话自然流动。

Allocators can similarly do homework in advance of a meeting to discover areas of exploration. This preparation includes reading all available materials and past meeting notes, determining an objective for the meeting, and structuring the meeting to elicit information. In Appendix A, I share a sample outline and Cal Fussman-like set of questions to help prepare for a first meeting with a long-short equity hedge fund manager.

Meeting objectives may vary. Early meetings focus on information gathering and getting to know the principals. Meetings with long- standing managers in a portfolio may dive into a specific investment, theme or organizational issue. Each meeting may call for a different set of questions, depending on the investment strategy, team, process, and risk appropriate to implement that strategy.

分配器还要考虑组织meeting itself – who is attending from both sides, who will lead the questioning, and how will they interpret verbal responses and body language. Conducting manager interviews with more than one person expands the team’s bandwidth to divide and conquer, with one focusing on questions and content and another on behavior and style.

Setting the Stage

经理面试旨在收集信息，因此有才能的分配者可以创建一个以尽可能多的信息引出的环境。人们在放松时开放。面试的物理设置可能是讨论的基调的重要因素。

大多数经理会议在会议室举办桌面，这是一个直接对抗的建设。随着时间的推移，分配者可以找到与管理人员远离该设置的方法。斯科特Malpass定期邀请经理参加Notre Dame足球比赛。替代投资管理的Jon Harris与经理及其配偶或在分配资本提前与经理及其配偶或重要的其他投资进行了结交。CIO运动，运动，参加经理人参加文化或慈善活动，以了解更多有关他们个性的信息。我曾经在打高尔夫球和经理打球后退出投资，并观察他对待消音器。郊游帮助解释了为什么他的组织经历了令人不安的人员营业额。

Beyond the physical setting, an allocator’s tone and style in the interview can also influence the manager’s degree of openness. Allocators can consider a number of shared lessons that help foster a productive chemistry in manager meetings.

• 找到共同点
  
  We are inclined to embrace those who are like us. Discovering commonality across backgrounds, relationships, or interests at the onset of a meeting can go a long way towards shifting the tone of the interview from transactional to relationship-oriented.



• Ask simple, brief questions
  
  Jon Wertheim discovered that simple and brief questions are the most effective across all formats. He noted:
  
  It’s taken me way too long to learn that sometimes less is more, and a simple question and letting the subject fill in any silence is better than jumping in and trying to prove that you belong at the table.
  
  他进一步表明避免了一个常见的诱惑来展示你做了多少研究以及你有多聪明。记住，在一天结束时，它是关于一个连接。



• 从如何，何种方式开始？
  
  开放式问题，从如何，何种方式开发，或为什么为管理人员提供空间来讲述他们的故事。通过以鼓励广泛答案的方式措辞，分配者可以收集超出他们记住的问题的详细信息。



• 让人们说话
  
  My uncle used to say, “You have two ears and one mouth, so listen twice as much as you speak.” It is amazing what you can learn when you let people talk. If the purpose of conducting an interview is to learn, then it should follow that allocators listen far more than they speak.



• Express humility
  
  Investing is a humbling business, even for the best managers. Allocators can similarly be humble. The best interviewers are not afraid to ask naive questions. Asking for help to better understand the basics is a welcoming approach.



• Be curious
  
  An allocator’s job offers the gift of continuous learning. Approaching interviews from an inquisitive perspective rather than an evaluative one allows allocators to take in all the information available from a manager. Tom Russo at Gardner Russo & Gardner has a knack for remembering details of his conversations. When he hears something surprising, he regularly follows up with personal notes recalling those facts.



• Lose the script
  
  The best interviews flow unpredictably. Thorough preparation includes an outline and list of questions, but sticking too closely to a prescribed Q&A will create distractions from hearing what the manager is saying and asking clever follow-up questions.

积极倾听

Once the preparation is complete and the meeting begins, great interviewers become great listeners. Charley Ellis describes the importance of listening to the success of Capital Group:

John Lovelace对帮助人们学会如何非常善于听力，这是一个非常强烈的兴趣。不听听听到的是说的话，但听听听到什么是含义和与上次不同的东西。当您试图了解公司时，这是非常有帮助的，但是当您与其他人准备做出决定的其他人做出决定时，这也很棒。

听取学习是在成功采访的核心。它需要清除你的思想，出席，并关注受试者在没有反应的情况下说的话。当思想进入你的脑海时，听被阻止，你不能让他们走。在面试中积极地倾听的工具集包括注意到分心，镜像，验证和同情。

• Noting Distractions
  
  Listening without cluttering your mind with thoughts is challenging. Like a meditation practice, noting when your mind drifts and bringing it back to the conversation keeps an interviewer focused on the content at hand.



• Mirroring
  
  I first got exposed to mirroring at a relationship workshop taught by Harville Hendrix nearly 20 years ago. Since then, I found the same concept as a core tenet of communication across casual conversation, spousal relationships, business decision-making, and hostage negotiation. Interviewing managers is another use case for mirroring.
  
  Mirroring is parroting back what someone says, although it sounds a lot simpler than it is in practice. Good follow-up questions often arise spontaneously from something an interview subject has just said. By repeating back parts of their thoughts, you can ensure you have listened and let them know they have been heard. Mirroring leverages neural resonance, slows down the pace of conversation, and softens emotional triggers. As a result, it creates a magically safe space to communicate.



• Validating
  
  Validation is the process of letting the other person know that what they said is logical. Whether or not you agree with the points made, you can confirm that they have followed a sensible thought process.
  
  Effective validation requires presence. Oftentimes, we have a different opinion about what the interviewee is saying and react. The trick in validating is confirming their perspective without needing to agree with it.



• Empathizing
  
  Expressing emotional empathy can open up an interviewee to discuss difficult subjects. Empathy is often the antithesis of what investors expect to encounter in the world of money, as it moves away from thoughts and touches on feelings.

Receiving Feedback

对于大多数高性能领域的参与者，大多数投资专业人员都不常见的反馈意见。精英运动员有教练和商业管理人员有董事会和审查，但投资经理人在自己的泡沫中独立进行。

Among the podcast interviews I have conducted, only two guests went out of their way to explicitly request feedback on their performance. Who are those two you ask? Author and former poker champion Annie Duke and Farnam Street creator Shane Parrish – two experts in human behavior and decision-making. Having studied the field, they know the importance of receiving feedback.

Conducting post-mortems on interviews can be a valuable tool for both podcasting and investing.

播客是录制的访谈，这让我有机会倾听和批评我的工作。我经常倾听我的采访，发现我不断变化的缺陷，并定期要求别​​人这样做。我经常在声音，错过问题和口头抽搐的声音中消灭了不同的​​拐点。我想到了一个复合问题通常会导致客人只回答问题的第二部分，而缩短问题可以阻止我影响客人的答案。同样，分配者可以汇报关于经理对团队成员的访谈，以批评其表现。

Over the last few years, I regularly re-engaged in my past work investing in managers and advising allocators. On one occasion, I caught up with an investment manager on behalf of a foundation for whom I serve on the investment committee. Rather than assume my prior allocator evaluative interviewing style, I naturally began the meeting as I had grown accustomed to from the podcast. We connected personally, reviewed the investment program philosophically, and then talked strategy. I listened actively, mirrored, asked why, and explored topics of interest in the portfolio. To my pleasant surprise, the conversation was richer and revealed more about the manager than any I had conducted with him previously.

投资团队每天面试经理。准备，设定舞台，听力和反馈都有助于面试技巧。

Hours upon hours spent interviewing managers leave allocators with a wealth of information to make decisions about the managers to hire, retain, or replace. The process of making good decisions is tricky, so let’s turn to that to make sure all these interviews don’t go to waste.