The most important thing a billionaire hedge fund manager looks for in job applicants
The founder of London-based hedge fund The Children's Investment Fund, which manages about $58 billion, told Norges Bank Investment Management CEO Nicolai Tangen in his most recent podcast episode that his top-performing employees are not just motivated by a paycheck.
Hohn said they think a lot about someone's personality when they want to work at the company.
"There's a human aspect to work," he said. The best people don't simply come to work for money, Hohn explained, they also come because they enjoy the environment.
"It's really important how we treat people, how everyone treats each other," he said. "I'll never hire someone without the blessing of my senior team because we could destroy the culture."
The Children's Investment Fund has a small investment team of only seven or eight people, with an overall head count of about 200.
"We've known each other a long time, and there's something we've built which is intangible trust," Hohn said.
He shared some insight into how to get a coveted spot at the hedge fund.
Hohn said one of the questions they ask applicants is: "What makes a good business?"
"We ask for a case study or two, and it becomes immediately obvious whether you know what you're doing," he said. "It's not enough just to be a good investor; you have to want to work in a team — not everyone wants that."
Hohn also said you need to be able to get along with people, in a way that you should be open-minded to being wrong.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
4 hours ago
- Yahoo
Meet the British billionaire who still works harder than anyone he knows
'Foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds'. This was a phrase used by economist John Maynard Keynes and he is so right. If you go down the status quo road, you will always be mediocre. You have to have alternative thought. It is a lesson the late Richard Thornton taught me. I had first met him at his London office in the late 1970s, having had no idea what I wanted to do after leaving university. I had studied economics at Oxford but didn't really know what a bond was. Richard was in a hurry to hire young people for his new company GT Management (now LGT) on a starting salary of £5,000 and the job based in Hong Kong. I was thrown into the deep end and within days I was managing other people's money. I didn't own a suit and I later used it as a rag to wipe my car down as it was so cheap. Read More: 'In our workplace, we look for passionate, slightly unhinged mountain climbers' The company grew very quickly into an international investment leader. In 1979, there were still capital controls from the export on foreign currency from the UK. When Margaret Thatcher came to power she abolished the premiums and there was a boom from the 1980s onwards. It was a great time to be a fund manager. Richard was in his late 40s, a ball of energy and was highly impulsive, which was a bad thing in fund management. I was his 'bagman', we travelled a lot to Japan, I had to prepare all the questions for meetings and it was a lot of fun. An office was later opened in San Francisco and I was put in charge as a 21-year-old of their US fund at the start of the tech boom. Richard saw me as a hard-working person and someone he could rely on. I later met a house build company in Ireland, said we should buy 25% of the company and so Richard invited the two brothers over for lunch. The fact they had six glasses of wine each didn't impress him and, thanks to his irascible temperament, said we had to sell all the shares, which then went up 100 times. Richard was later fired from his own company after shouting at a subordinate. He asked staff whether they would like to join him in a new company and the only person who said yes was me. Read More: 'I returned to my old office to sell ties after being made redundant' I could put up with his temper as I had a vision to be an entrepreneur and invested cash in a new business called Richard Thornton Management. We went to $1bn in a year and sold to Dresdner Bank four years later. It gave me enough money to start my own business as Richard had become very unpredictable and would take to phoning up staff very late at night. It's not the way I have ever operated and I now get up at 4am and don't work after 6pm. You have to have some rules in your life otherwise you will be overwhelmed. I also never shout at my employees, most of whom have been with me for 30 years. Treat people kindly and you get a lot more back. I gave up fund management in 2000 and since then I have maybe done too many things: biotech, property investment, the food business. I am interested in new things and have worked harder now than I did in my early twenties. Where most people talk about cultivated meat, 'clean food' is our definition of what we are now doing at Agronomics. We are trying to make it more accessible to investors and the general public and making bio-identical foods and materials using laboratory conditions. We are building a factory in the US dedicated to the production of dairy and egg proteins. We own 52% of the company and the $120m facility will be making eggs without chickens, dairy without cows, with very low emissions, no contaminants and low land and water use. In an industry where people are against it for luddite reasons, we started Agronomics four years ago and the asset value has trebled. We have two customers which will absorb the factory's capacity for the next five years. The UK is a leader in food tech and it's important for the government to get behind it. It's a growing eco system but it's not enough when you consider we import about half of our food into the UK. Read More: Meet Britain's 'king of billboards' who sold his business for £1bn We are in the same situation today of food insecurities as we were before the Second World War, so why would we not use our natural strength in this area at home? If I hadn't applied to Richard and got the job over 40 years ago, I would not have the luxury of doing passion projects like this which I now have. That is all down to him. He was very bright, intemperate and very disorganised. I'm maybe not as bright as Richard was, but I am very organised and temperate. Those three factors, plus working harder aged 68 than anyone I know today, is what gets me up in the morning and to be very joyous about life. Read more: Meet the 'jokers from London' who sold 100,000 blocks of butter in first 10 weeks 'My sofa took six months to arrive — so I built a £20m business' 'I paid myself £4 an hour to get my Rollr deodorant off the ground'
New York Post
4 hours ago
- New York Post
Canadian government ends Air Canada strike, imposes binding arbitration
The Canadian government brought the Air Canada strike to a screeching halt Saturday by imposing binding arbitration on the airline and its flight attendants. The move came less than 12 hours after Air Canada's 10,000 flight attendants walked off the job, at 1 a.m. Saturday, after months of stalled negotiations over a new contract. Canada's labor policy minister, Patty Hajdu, said she met with both sides Friday night and determined there was a low likelihood of a near-term deal. 'They are so far apart on a number of issues that they are going to need some help,' she told the Wall Street Journal. 3 The Canadian government imposed binding arbitration Saturday to bring a strike by the country's largest airline carrier to a screeching halt. AFP via Getty Images 'This is not a decision that I've taken lightly, but the potential for immediate negative impact on Canadians and our economy is simply too great,' she said. The most contentious issue in the contract talks has been the Canadian Union of Public Employees' demand for compensation for time spent on the ground between flights and when helping passengers board. Flight crews are currently only compensated when their airplane is moving. 3 Striking Air Canada workers walk the picket line at Pearson International Airport in Toronto. AFP via Getty Images Montreal-based Air Canada formally requested this week the government impose binding arbitration, arguing talks were at an impasse. 3 Air Canada said it was premature to discuss when flights would resume as the arbitration order was just unveiled. AP The union in a statement said the government gave Air Canada what it wanted. The union, known as CUPE, made 'reasonable proposals for a fair cost-of-living wage increase,' it said. 'Air Canada responded by sandbagging the talks.' Air Canada said it was premature to discuss when flights would resume as the arbitration order was just unveiled. Air Canada transports about 130,000 passengers daily, operates nearly 200 flights daily to the U.S., and flies to nearly 60 countries.
Boston Globe
4 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Hawaiian Airlines to cancel only direct flight to Boston
'Despite our team's best efforts, soft post-pandemic travel demand from Asia combined with various market challenges have persisted in Seoul, as well as in Fukuoka and Boston,' Hawaiian Airlines CEO Joe Sprague said. The airline began service to Boston in 2019 and currently operates four direct, non-stop flights between Logan International Airport and Honolulu's Daniel K. Inouye International Airport each week. Advertisement Logan International Airport did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Hawaiian Airlines was the only airline that offered direct flights between Logan International Airport in Boston and Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu, according to the 'We remain committed to continuing to provide robust Hawaiian Airlines service between Asia and Hawai'i through our nonstop Japan flights, and via one-stop connections to and from Incheon and beyond with our global partner airlines,' Sprague said. The suspension is set to go into effect Nov. 19, when all direct flights between Boston and Honolulu will cease operation. After the suspension, Boston-based travelers will have to arrange for connecting flights on their route to Honolulu and the state of Hawai'i. Advertisement 'Between Honolulu and Boston, guests can connect daily on Alaska Airlines' flights via Seattle, Portland, San Francisco and San Diego,' Hawaiian Airlines said in the statement. Travelers who booked Hawaiian Airlines flights between Honolulu and Boston after the Nov. 19 suspension will be reaccommodated with another flight to their location or receive a refund, the airline said in the statement announcing the suspension. The planes that were used to fly between Honolulu and Logan International will redirect their courses to support high-demand flight paths, the airline said. In the statement, Hawaiian Airlines said that the aircraft will be redeployed to offer an increased number of flights between Honolulu and Sydney, Australia, Papeete, Tahiti, Los Angeles, and Seattle. 'These adjustments will ensure we are meeting strong demand for travel to Hawaiʻi – both internationally and domestically – while providing all our guests access to more destinations,' Sprague said. Hawaiian Airlines and Alaska Airlines The deal was intended to offer more flights between the 138 destinations the airlines accommodate and maintain Honolulu as a travel hub, the Katie Cressman can be reached at
