Good analysts don’t just consume a lot of detail in an academic fashion. They build knowledge in a purposeful, strategic way... some of the things they do include:
- Identify critical biz drivers & pressure points / risks
- Weight the most important information correctly
- Understand how management think, what they want & what they are motivated by
- Always benchmark their views to the expectations they believe are discounted in the price
- Form independent views from a variety of sources
- Are creative in how they think (both in how they think about research & how they think about a company or industry)
- Filter out ideas quickly (eg based on risk / downside, circle of competence or lack of an expectation gap)
- Come up with long term ideas where the upside is significant
- Are comfortable in saying ‘I don’t know’
- Always understand the short thesis on something they think is a buy
- Have identified, in advance, signposts that could indicate they are wrong
- Understand time is a scarce resource and prioritise well
- Realise when they have come across a potentially unique or exceptional investment and drop everything to work on it
- Question / interview well: eg ask pertinent and short questions, use silence and do not interrupt
- Focus their work on areas that are likely to provide mispricings
- Develop mutually beneficial relationships with people who can help them
- Understand their biases & weaknesses
- Happy to change mind when they get new evidence
- Honesty when they think they have made a mistake
- Carefully observe real world trends, eg they think about how consumer behaviour is shifting based on what they, their friends & family are doing... they seek opportunities on the right side of the big tailwinds
- Where possible, ask every business they are a customer of what services they use & what do they enjoy using, eg where do they advertise, who does payments, which productivity tools they use, who does website, who does payroll, who does banking etc... analysts are curious
- Dig deeper to seek to understand things that ‘don’t make sense’
Analysts should review their research process to see if it is producing good output. Some might prefer a continuous effort or something for team away days. A useful approach is value analysis a concept from lean principles.
It’s about working on the process vs the work itself.
Investors are different, but I generally separate out idea generation from the research process. Research is about idea validation / testing and building conviction.
Research has to be timely and actionable otherwise in competitive public markets the opportunity might be gone.
Understand how each part of your research process adds value to the end outcome - getting a good idea in the portfolio. Try to think about activities in the context of value-added, essential non-value-added and non-essential non-value-added.
Excellent 1991 HBR article on learning by Chris Argyris
The dilemma: “…success in the marketplace increasingly depends on learning, yet most people don’t know how to learn…those members of the organization that many assume to be the best at learning are…not very good at it.”
A few highlights for me…
1/ Don’t just think about ‘problem solving’ with a focus on the external environment. Look inward - reflect on your own behaviour. Hold yourself accountable for how you contribute to an organization’s problems.
…way a PM / team can help is by asking good qus. Eg:
- How are you thinking about this new datapoint?
- Why is the co going down this strategic path?
- Are results & strategies of competitors consistent with what mgmt are saying?
- How does this expert view impact our thinking?
Has to be done in a kind, supportive, collaborative but intense way with full buy-in from everyone that that is how it works. If it is aggressive, it burns people out & makes for a less durable culture over time. What should be deep conversations about ideas just become fights.
1/ Give people the freedom to innovate: hierarchy helps predictability & control, but when you seek to “recruit the most intelligent, innovative, talented people on Earth, telling them to sit at a desk and do what they’re told obliterates 99 percent of their value.”
2/ The customer is first: “Every company will tell you that “the customer is boss,” but here that statement has weight. There’s no red tape stopping you from figuring out for yourself what our customers want, and then giving it to them.”
Douglas H. Bellemore’s six characteristics for success as aggressive investors…
Source: The Strategic Investor, 1963
Patience
“The aggressive investor should not expect quick results… Success depends, in large measure, on the ability to select undervalued situations not presently recognised by the majority of investors and to wait for expected developments to provide capital gains…”
Courage
“The investor must have solid convictions and the courage and confidence emanating from them - that is, courage, at times, to ignore those who disagree…Decision-making ability…is vital to success in investing…[this] assumes judgments are right more often than wrong.”
The foundations of the philosophy of Scout Capital were the investment values of:
1. Quality 2. Misunderstanding 3. Self-knowledge
Key aspects of quality:
- Unit economics
- Returns on capital
- Appropriate leverage
- FCF conversion
- Market share
- Margin resiliency
- Moat
- L-T growth potential
- Management
Why a quality focus? Reduces the frequency of blow ups & these types of biz often have tailwinds.
Misunderstanding:
“However appealing the business, if it’s widely recognized as such by others, that will be reflected in the share price. That’s why misunderstanding has to play a role.”