Business Books
By Bob Diddlebock
The Partnership: The Making of Goldman Sachs By Charles D. Ellis Penguin Press; 729 pages
No publisher could craft a more sterling publicity campaign to launch Charles D. Ellis' saga of Goldman Sachs than Wall Street has for the past three months. Proving, yet again, that there's no such thing as bad publicity, the white-knuckle drama being played out in today's market offers a scarily fitting backdrop for Ellis' ambitious and absorbing tale of men (no women), money, ambition and redemption. It is, he writes, the saga of a company and its people "with unusual strengths [whose] aspirations were not on what they wanted to be, but on what they wanted to do."
The Partnership first finds Bavarian immigrant Marcus Goldman in 1869, reselling commercial paper in New York City's Jewish community. Over the next 35 years, the enterprise grows in small steps, thanks to the boss's shrewd, conservative moves and the help of his broad-thinking son-in-law Samuel Sachs.
Underwriting the public stock offerings of Sears Roebuck in 1906 and F.W. Woolworth & Co. in 1912 put the firm on the map. And from there, Goldman--long stigmatized as an outsider "Jewish" firm by its white-shoe rivals--plows on, evolving from what Ellis terms a "marginal eastern U.S. commercial paper dealer" into a global-trading, investment-banking and financial-services behemoth.
One key to success: continually tweaking the firm's game to fit the times, the markets, the opportunities and Goldman's talent--managing partners like the brilliant and charming seventh-grade dropout from Brooklyn, Sidney Weinberg (a.k.a. "Mr. Wall Street"); the worldly, turbocharged Gus Levy; and John Whitehead, whose prescience helped shape the firm into a master of the financial universe in the 1980s. U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, now a flummoxed bureaucrat in the hot seat, also ran the show after forcing out Jon Corzine in 1999.
Over the decades, the firm has survived its share of crises, including the Long-Term Capital Management hedge-fund blowup in 1998 that cost Goldman $1 billion. But the lessons learned and applied may be why the company isn't neck-deep in blood today. As ambitious as its cutthroat competitors, Goldman didn't go completely mad during the past decade when it came to, say, overleveraging itself or overvaluing dicey assets.
With The Partnership, Ellis has fashioned a taut and anecdote-rich narrative stretched over a sturdy frame of historical context. A longtime consultant to Goldman, he sometimes lets the book lapse into press-releasey hagiography. But for a job well done, Ellis deserves to take a victory lap around Wall Street. You'll surely recognize him; he'll be out there by himself.
Business Stripped Bare: Adventures of a Global Entrepreneur By Richard Branson Virgin Books; 342 pages
Richard Branson, The Brash, Blond Brit behind Virgin Everything, would have been well within his rights to title his new book My Message Is Me (with apologies to Gandhi).
The volume spills over with Branson's advice, as well as his wisdom, his opinions and his accomplishments--all gussied up to show everyone who's not as lucky, as smart, as gutsy or, well, as cool as Sir Richard how to succeed in business. And you've got to give him his due: the guy can sell just about anything, and with flair. Perhaps even books.
Each of the volume's seven chapters hammers on a theme, be it people, learning from mistakes or social responsibility (Branson code for saving the world). Important, even noble, topics. But thanks to Peter Drucker, Jim Collins and that gang, you should already know what Branson will pitch: Hire smart men and women. Deliver what you promise. Creative destruction is the soul food of any enterprise. Give back to the community.
Now you understand what Business Stripped Bare is really about; it probably could use a chapter about reading between the lines. So ask yourself, Do I really need another lecture along these lines, especially from some bloke who's also dying to sell me an airline ticket or cell-phone service?