Insightology

Michael Mauboussin is Chief Investment Strategist at Legg Mason Capital Management, adjunct professor of finance at Columbia Business School and Trustee at the Santa Fe Institute. Unconventional thinking is his calling card. I first came across his name in this column by James Surowiecki, in what apparently was a precursor to Surowiecki's subsequently popular book, The Wisdom of Crowds.

In the column, Surowiecki talks about some simple experiments that Mauboussin has conducted for years in his classes (watch the video here ) that show that the group as a whole seems to be more intelligent that any individual in the group. Readers of The Wisdom of Crowds will note that experiments of this type form the fundamental premise behind the book. (As an aside, I have also seen a similar effect even with a small number of people in my company who were asked to guess the number of M&M candies in a glass jar). Subsequently, Mauboussin has extended his thinking in this area to a general skepticism of the conventional uses of experts.       

Apart from being an inspiration for a popular book, Mauboussin has also earned praise for his unconventional thinking with regards to markets and investing. This  article is an example of his thinking regarding the high valuation of internet stocks in their heyday and how a simple mathematical function actually explains the seeming insanity. His book, More Than You Know, places great importance on diversity and learning from different places in order to be a good investor. Of course, the same strategy is very likely true whatever your field of endeavor. So, whether investing is your passion or not, Michael Mauboussin is a person whose thoughts you should pay attention to.