The content of this book is quite complicated, but the context is clear. The main idea is that Rui Dario, founder of Bridgewater Fund, abstracts and refines his life's way of dealing with people and managing enterprises into specific standards or principles, which can be divided into three parts in terms of the arrangement of large chapters: my history, life principles, work principles, and life principles and work principles, In combination with his own experience, Rui Dario described the book to the readers item by item in vivid words. In a sense, this book can also be used as a reference book. When encountering similar problems in life or work, he can ask for advice from this book. Even if he can't solve the problem immediately, he also gives a perspective on the problem.

Bridgewater Fund uses financial technology means to the extreme. It has a complete set of economic analysis methods and structured investment analysis tools, which has made him stand out in the economic crisis for many times and become rich against the trend. For example, the famous stock market crash in the United States in October 1987, with a daily decline of more than 20%, and Bridgewater Fund gained 22% of the income, known as the "October Hero"; In the 2008 US financial crisis, the hedge fund industry as a whole was bleak, Lehman Brothers collapsed, Buffett's funds also lost 9.6%, and Bridgewater Fund gained 14% positive return; Also, in the 2010 European sovereign debt crisis, Bridgewater once again performed well, earning up to 45% of its income.

As the helmsman of Bridge Water Fund, Rui Dario also applies the essence of this systematic investment analysis method to all aspects of life and work, or life and work, and investment decisions interact. In Rui Dario's world, every decision, every action, and every thing we do have rules to follow. They are all acting in accordance with his established principles. Of course, this principle will be constantly adjusted and updated as time goes by and things change. After several successful experiences, it will become a relatively fixed principle.

Rui Dario has always stressed that we should not mechanically copy the principles of him and Bridgewater, but must establish principles that are suitable for us. This is an objective and realistic attitude. As soon as possible, I have been reading this book with a critical eye, and there are still many bright points in the book that give me meaningful inspiration.

The book talks about "credibility weighting", which is used to make decisions. Everyone has his or her own areas of expertise or familiarity, and also has his or her own areas of unfamiliarity or unfamiliarity. When making decisions on an issue, different weights can be attached to each person according to the degree of familiarity with the issue. In the past time, the person who has dealt with this type of problem for many times with the highest credibility should be given a higher weighted score, otherwise, People who do not have knowledge in this field and have not dealt with it effectively have low credibility scores. In this way, the best opinions can be selected by weighting the credibility of people involved in decision-making. This method also points out the limitations of such traditional decision-making methods as democratic centralism and minority subordination to the majority, because such traditional decision-making methods assume that everyone's ability level is the same, and truly excellent views may be buried. This is an excellent theory, but how to practice it? How to empower different people in different fields? In the small ecological environment of Qiushui, there is a set of tools for selecting the best for creativity, such as "point collector", "baseball card", etc., which accumulates a large amount of data through daily records of employees as the basis for decision-making. If this method is used in other environments, or even in a large scale, it should be a systematic project. There is still a long way to go.

The book talks about "extremely open mind" and points out that the two biggest obstacles affecting rational decision-making come from self-consciousness and thinking blind spots. Self consciousness is a defense mechanism in the individual subconscious. Everyone has "two selves", one is a logical and conscious higher level self, the other is an emotional and subconscious lower level self, such as when others oppose your views, Most people are easy to be occupied by the lower level of me, and regard this as an attack, rather than being interested in different views. The blind spot of thinking is the difference in everyone's ability to recognize and understand things. No one can see the whole picture. Everyone tends to think that what they see is correct. In this case, it is difficult for two people with closed minds to make optimal decisions. The solution is to be extremely open-minded, admit that you have blind spots, accept that others may be more accurate than you in something with an open mind, overcome the desire to always be right about yourself, and always let the high-level self control themselves. Previously, I often mentioned "empathy" and "helicopter thinking", which are similar to this point of view.

Moreover, the "extreme truth-seeking and extreme transparency" mentioned in the working principles shocked me a little. I think that if we remove all the perceptual factors of people in a social system and keep the information absolutely transparent and symmetrical, we can definitely improve the efficiency of social operations. But what a complicated creature is human. Is excessive information better for a person, or is it better to keep it in the dark? I think it would be a great adventure for any enterprise in China to promote the culture of "extreme truth-seeking and extreme transparency". However, Qiushui does. Colleagues are frank with each other, and everyone can openly evaluate each other's views. Regardless of their job level, the company's conference recording and video recording will be open to the whole company, and everyone's ability will be maximized by establishing such an environment of mutual trust. Of course, Rui Dario also mentioned that the so-called extreme transparency is not complete. For example, personal privacy, business secrets, and matters that are easy to be misread and distorted by the media need to be kept confidential. However, in terms of the construction of transparent documents, this has also been a big step forward than many enterprises. In 20xx, the COVID-19 epidemic broke out all over the world. On March 18, Bridgewater broke out online, and then various rumors were refuted. Under the epidemic situation, the panic in the market could be seen. I wonder whether Bridgewater can continue to write a legend.

May the world be peaceful.