Max Beauroyre

Measure everything. You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” Over a thousand KPIs cascaded across the organization, all in service of five main objectives. Variable pay was split evenly between the main company-wide target (17% EBITDA growth) and individual metrics. If your personal numbers were less than half complete, you received no bonus at... See more

It confirmed that American businesses had room to improve. And it confirmed a lesson his 3G co-founders had already learned. Minority stakes cannot remake a culture.

The idea came from Telles, who had used annual competitions to transform Brahma’s chaotic distributors into a disciplined sales force. He’d picked it up from weeks studying Anheuser-Busch. The principle was simple: centralize the what, not the how. Set the goals, define the boundaries, then get out of the way. 

The Diesel Cup reduced fuel... See more

It was the same rule Lemann had imposed at Garantia, where children and spouses of partners were forbidden from working at the bank.

Lemann had done his calculations, however. Who was the richest man in Venezuela? A brewer. The richest in Colombia? A brewer. Argentina? A brewer. 

“These guys can’t all be geniuses,” Lemann said. “It must be the business.”

Lemann’s Garantia offered below market salaries and no perks, but if you beat your targets, you could make four or five times your base pay in bonuses. He staffed his business with what Alan Greenberg, the legendary Bear Stearns CEO, called PSDs—kids who were poor, smart, and had a deep desire to get rich.

The firm became synonymous with zero-based budgeting, where every expense must be justified from scratch. To 3G, it was a principle of ownership: Spend every dollar as if it were your own. The business press fell on it. “Squeezing Heinz.” “Chainsaw Capitalism.” Here were investors grounding corporate jets, unplugging mini-fridges, making executives... See more

The first - you are assuming retention rates remain high and stable. You need this to be true in order to predict stable cash flows in that 10 year calculation. If retention rates drop, your cash flows drop precipitously.

Second - you are assuming there IS terminal value! Said another way - you are assuming the terminal value is not 0 :)

Again, the difference between rhetoric and realness. Canada has already struck a trade deal with China, and the EU is searching for something similar. China has focused on the real while America flirts with this strange performative economy, mixed at once with endless TV and endless financialization.

China is welcoming other countries with open... See more