Ray Dalio

In Principles, investor and entrepreneur Ray Dalio shares his approach to life and management, and he lays down the rules and frameworks he uses to navigate his life. The book explores truth-seeking, decision-making, and implementing systems to achieve success. Afterward, Ray goes over the management principles he used to build his multibillion-dollar hedge fund, Bridgewater.

Life and Work

Principles

#1 New York Times Bestseller “Significant...The book is both instructive and surprisingly moving.” —The New York Times Ray Dalio, one of the world’s most successful investors and entrepreneurs, shares the unconventional principles that he’s developed, refined, and used over the past forty years to create unique results in both life and business—and which any person or organization can adopt to help achieve their goals. In 1975, Ray Dalio founded an investment firm, Bridgewater Associates, out of his two-bedroom apartment in New York City. Forty years later, Bridgewater has made more money for its clients than any other hedge fund in history and grown into the fifth most important private company in the United States, according to Fortune magazine. Dalio himself has been named to Time magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people in the world. Along the way, Dalio discovered a set of unique principles that have led to Bridgewater’s exceptionally effective culture, which he describes as “an idea meritocracy that strives to achieve meaningful work and meaningful relationships through radical transparency.” It is these principles, and not anything special about Dalio—who grew up an ordinary kid in a middle-class Long Island neighborhood—that he believes are the reason behind his success. In Principles, Dalio shares what he’s learned over the course of his remarkable career. He argues that life, management, economics, and investing can all be systemized into rules and understood like machines. The book’s hundreds of practical lessons, which are built around his cornerstones of “radical truth” and “radical transparency,” include Dalio laying out the most effective ways for individuals and organizations to make decisions, approach challenges, and build strong teams. He also describes the innovative tools the firm uses to bring an idea meritocracy to life, such as creating “baseball cards” for all employees that distill their strengths and weaknesses, and employing computerized decision-making systems to make believability-weighted decisions. While the book brims with novel ideas for organizations and institutions, Principles also offers a clear, straightforward approach to decision-making that Dalio believes anyone can apply, no matter what they’re seeking to achieve. Here, from a man who has been called both “the Steve Jobs of investing” and “the philosopher king of the financial universe” (CIO magazine), is a rare opportunity to gain proven advice unlike anything you’ll find in the conventional business press.

Stephanie 

„I used to think that the upper-level you needed to fight with the lower-level you to gain control, but over time I’ve learned that it is more effective to train that subconscious, emotional you the same way you would teach a child to behave the way you would like him or her to behave—with loving kindness and persistence so that the right habits are acquired.“

Guillaume Gelin

Timeo Williams

Fantastic book, with a serving of cold truth. As one of Ray's first books, this one has blown right out of the field. 

Principles. That's what the title of the book is. One could assume that's what this book is all about, then think to themselves that military like - principles is the secret to Ray's success, and call it a day. 

But I'd beg the reader to go further, abd really understand the principles Ray advocates for and the reasons why. You won't be disappointed.

Jeremy Bobb

Lena Köninger

It's hit or miss.  A lot of the advice is good, but it feels dated and very much specific to one company.  It does have thought provoking sections that help you form your own principles though.

Erik Horton

Could be a lot shorter IMHO. You can get 60% of the book by reading the titles/subtitles...

That said, its a good book. Life principles was more useful to me than Work principles, because the work principles is mostly how a company should be run, and not so much how you should behave in a company that already exists.

Nevertheless, interesting to know a bit about the way Dalio thinks.

Carlos Becker

Could be a lot shorter IMHO. You can get 60% of the book by reading the titles/subtitles...

That said, its a good book. Life principles was more useful to me than Work principles, because the work principles is mostly how a company should be run, and not so much how you should behave in a company that already exists.

Nevertheless, interesting to know a bit about the way Dalio thinks.

Bouke van der Bijl

I read this as an audiobook. Some parts were read by mr Dalio and others by someone else, which was a bit weird but both narrators have a good voice.

Ray Dalio is a very successful hedge fund manager who lives his life and operates his company under a well-defined set of ‘principles’. The book goes through his history and then he lays out his principles, how he arrived at them and how to apply them. He lays out a very compelling framework for how his company works, built on the foundation of rational discourse, transparency, and open-mindedness. His principles revolve a lot around the idea of introspective everything, from the machines/companies you built to your own though processes, instead of just letting them happen to you.

I recommend this book to anyone who wants to think through their work and life rationally. You might be able to read a summary (or the supporting PDF http://download.audible.com/product_r...) and read through a lot of the lessons, but to actually understand and imprint them it’s worth it to receive the context of the man’s life story to understand why these are his principles.

What are my principles? Everyone has principles, you might just not be aware of them, or rationally agree with them. It is probably worth it to think about it and write them down.

Dalio "shares the unconventional principles that he's developed, refined, and used over the past forty years to create unique results in both life and business--and which any person or organization can adopt to help achieve their goals"--Amazon.com.

Jimmy Cerone

A good book that will probably only get better with time.

Felipe Saldarriaga 

Sencillos y contundentes aportes de Ray Dalio que no solamente dan a entender el transfodo de su desarrollo como inversionista y empresario, sino como persona, lo cual viene genial para quienes buscan desarrollar herramientas profesionales e incluso gerenciales.

Sin duda es de esos libros que no los terminas nunca porque volverás a el una y otra vez para contextualizar lo que entiendes a una etapa diferente de tu vida.

How do you rate and review a book, that is both, (in my opinion) one of the best non-fictions out there and at the same time one of the most tedious reads ever?

The book contains three, more or less independent parts, so I will share my individual thoughts on each of them.

PART I - Ray Dalio and his biography - 3.5 

I love reading biographies and the stories of interesting persons and Ray Dalio is definitely one of them. What he achieved and how he achieved it is super impressive and motivating. For those who don’t know him yet, he’s a pretty successful entrepreneur, investor and hedgefonds manager. For me, one of those people I would die to meet over dinner.

But even though this part was interesting, it was also quite challenging because he talks a lot about financial strategies, concepts and the relationship of economic development and investments on a detailed and sometimes even technical level. I didn’t mind per se, being an enthusiast for these topics, but I felt that it was easy to get confused in some passages.

On the other hand, his life principles and the responding chapters are what made the book one of my most loved non-fics. It might seem exaggerated, but for me they were truly life-altering and eye-opening and there are some principles that actually live rent free in my head since I’ve picked up the book the first time several years ago. Even if the rest of the book is not your cup of tea, which I can understand, I’ll never stop recommending these chapters. His perspective on life is astounding and yet so logical, reasonable and down to earth, I devoured these pages.

Lastly, the work principles. Or in other words, the reason this read took me over half a year. Don’t get me wrong, they weren’t bad or less insightful but not as entertaining. Maybe I’m not the primary target group (many principles are out of a management perspective) and I think you need a specific mindset and company culture to actually be able to live by them. It’s impressive if it works out, but out of my work experience so far, it’s often quite the opposite in reality. What made the part the most tedious is that it often felt repetitive - the chapters themselves and also to the life principles. I ended up diving the last 180 pages in smaller, digestible chunks because this part of the book was nothing I could pick up to get lost in and rather got exhausted from reading.

So would I recommend this books? Yes, but with a disclaimer. Read the first part if you’re into biographies and finance, and the third if you’re interested in management strategies, styles or corporate culture. Otherwise skip these and only read part two.

How do you rate and review a book, that is both, (in my opinion) one of the best non-fictions out there and at the same time one of the most tedious reads ever?

The book contains three, more or less independent parts, so I will share my individual thoughts on each of them.

PART I - Ray Dalio and his biography - 3.5 ⭐️

I love reading biographies and the stories of interesting persons and Ray Dalio is definitely one of them. What he achieved and how he achieved it is super impressive and motivating. For those who don’t know him yet, he’s a pretty successful entrepreneur, investor and hedgefonds manager. For me, one of those people I would die to meet over dinner.

But even though this part was interesting, it was also quite challenging because he talks a lot about financial strategies, concepts and the relationship of economic development and investments on a detailed and sometimes even technical level. I didn’t mind per se, being an enthusiast for these topics, but I felt that it was easy to get confused in some passages.

PART II - Life principles - 5 ⭐️

On the other hand, his life principles and the responding chapters are what made the book one of my most loved non-fics. It might seem exaggerated, but for me they were truly life-altering and eye-opening and there are some principles that actually live rent free in my head since I’ve picked up the book the first time several years ago. Even if the rest of the book is not your cup of tea, which I can understand, I’ll never stop recommending these chapters. His perspective on life is astounding and yet so logical, reasonable and down to earth, I devoured these pages.

PART III - Work principles - 3 ⭐️

Lastly, the work principles. Or in other words, the reason this read took me over half a year. Don’t get me wrong, they weren’t bad or less insightful but not as entertaining. Maybe I’m not the primary target group (many principles are out of a management perspective) and I think you need a specific mindset and company culture to actually be able to live by them. It’s impressive if it works out, but out of my work experience so far, it’s often quite the opposite in reality. What made the part the most tedious is that it often felt repetitive - the chapters themselves and also to the life principles. I ended up diving the last 180 pages in smaller, digestible chunks because this part of the book was nothing I could pick up to get lost in and rather got exhausted from reading.

So would I recommend this books? Yes, but with a disclaimer. Read the first part if you’re into biographies and finance, and the third if you’re interested in management strategies, styles or corporate culture. Otherwise skip these and only read part two.

Neil Murray

Going into the book, I expected to enjoy and get the most value out of the business principles, personal principles and Ray’s story in that order, when in fact, it ended up being the reverse for me!

Ethan Ding

i love this style, but it doesn't work for most people, and it feels a little arrogant (especially when read after random walk down wall street)

Udit Desai

Read the first half on his life and story and it was alright.

Bradford Fults

The form and format of this book may be as important as its content. The whole idea of setting down principles and describing how and when they apply, and walking through conscious trade-offs is a powerful exercise for sharing an intellectual framework.

The content of the principles are good for reflection, and as the author notes: you should figure out principles of your own—his aren’t meant to apply to everyone. But he has some deep thinking that have gone into many of his principles, and they are relatively well-balanced against one another, enabling them to work well together as a whole. That last bit is notable because many writers love to talk about their principles or approaches, but never actually manage to create a balanced whole of attributes that don’t conflict with or confuse one another. Dalio does.

Pranav Mutatkar

Nothing new. But a good summary. This should have been 1/4 as long and ghostwritten. But many of the principles are sound.

I wrote this long review lol and it didn't take. 

Basically, masterminds, fail small, pain + reflection. Create reviews. Emotional regulation. Create petri dish. Lazy philosophy. Triangulate believable people (antifragility and multiple failure points). 

HOD, make the right things self-reinforced. Tie the right things to your identity and disassociate the rest like emotions. 

Use CBT, emotional accounting for noisy emotions. Look only to logical feedback and reflect and meditate to get better at not seeing the hot emotion. 

Blue sky great goals with good KPIs, don't result use vanity metrics, ask 5 whys, reflect. Create antifragility so you learn from this. 

Figure out what problems are and root causes of them so you aren't fixing some small dumb shit. Design a lazy plan and systems to autopilot yourself to success. 

Create heuristic mental models while also letting stuff through the glasses. Aka tries to take all good behavior and habit it. Or type 1 it. However, beware of the map is not the territory argument. Make sure you are always updating like software. Truth is often unfavorable to you. 

Realize the difference between the rate of change and levels. And use bets aka statistical thinking looking for patterns and not anomalies or one time events. Aka collect a lot of data.

Angel Herrera

Tied for the best book I have ever read. Ray is a genius. Anybody can learn tons from reading this.

Nat Welch

I listened to the front half in audiobook form, and the back half on kindle. Enjoyable and interesting.

Diana Platgalve

The highlight of this book is that it shows the importance of meta-knowledge for decision making. From logics perspective, one of the most important sound argument builders. If you will lack the knowledge on the topic, you'll simply make lousy judgements. The accent is put on systematic decision making versus forecasting the future, however, it is possible to develop systematically irrational decision-making. Most likely, there will be something to point that out. To mimic this aspect, the knowledge of how human mind actually works, is being presented (another aspect for sound argument building).
Another highlight is willingness to succeed. The approach is clearly stated: manage others to get what you want. Therefore, his principles can be analyzed as logical versus psychological persuasion. 
The text overall DID NOT convince me that principles displayed were the determinants of success, rather an attempt to rationalize. As ideas were re-visited and repeated, as radical open-mindedness, it worked as an overkill rather something that would link ideas. 
Overall, it is not a bad book, something more autobiography style. It is not radical, and, at the end of the day, you still have to find your own way.

Doug Belshaw

I didn't get very far into this as, while he wasn't saying anything too controversial, Dalio seems to have lucked out and retrospectively applied principles which handily justify people making obscene amounts of money...

Omar

This book has a lot of great insights. It would be a good reference book as situations arise. 



The key concepts are: 

(1) The best performance will come from people and organizations that produce and act on the best ideas. 

(2) In order for the best ideas to bubble up within an organization and survive/be acted on, you must have systems and processes in place that foster this. 

(3) An idea meritocracy is how Ray Dalio accomplished this at Bridgewater Associates. As its essence, it is a voting system in which the best idea is chosen by vote. However, not all votes are equal. Each person's vote is weighed by that person's believability score for the particular topic/area in question. 

(4) A person's believability score for a particular area in question is assessed throughout time based on their input, knowledge and accomplishments/output over time. 

(5) For the whole system to work, everyone in the organization must be open and honest. Not just a little bit, but what Dalio refers to as 'radically transparent'. At its most basic, this includes ruthlessly finding the truth in every situation with little regard to feelings/emotions. It is more important to openly find and agree on the truth, than to protect one's own pride, interest, and emotions. 

The book is an accumulation of processes and practices that follow from those concepts above. There are many insights within them. Many principles are very interesting and worth trying out. Most importantly, as Dalio says, is to embrace the concept of an idea meritocracy and radical transparency so that you can then build out your own set of practices and processes that help you reach your goals.

P.S., this applies as much to an organization, such as a company, as it does to a team or an individual. A huge part of self-improvement is understanding your strengths and weaknesses, figuring out areas where you are believable and taking charge in those, and following advice from more believable people on the other areas.

Ivaylo Durmonski

Ray Dalio’s attempt is to identify the specific habits and behaviors that his company uses to be and to stay successful. By doing so, he wants to help us get what we want from life for us and for our business. He believes that any company’s results are primarily determined by its people and its culture. And if you manage to create a great culture, get the right people together, you’ll achieve excellence in what you’re doing. Read my full summary: https://durmonski.com/book-summaries/...

Lance Willett

My full review: https://sensible.blog/2017/12/30/dali...

This book immediately shaped my thinking by bringing clarity to decisions, problem solving, mindfulness, and effective teams and organizations. Like a modern, conscious Drucker. After my third reading these are my top highlights:

Good principles are effective ways of dealing with reality.

Beware ego block by remembering that you’re looking for the best answer, not simply the best answer that you can come up with yourself.

Use pain to trigger quality reflections, learn what causes your pain and what you can do about it. This is the most effective habit Ray developed over 40 years.

Practice being open-minded and assertive at the same time, and think about your and others’ believability when deciding what to do. Find the most believable people possible who disagree with you and try to understand their reasoning.

Ideas versus decisions. Meritocracy is for hearing everyone’s voice — not for everyone making the decision.

I recommend buying both the hard copy and electronic, and making it a daily ritual to dip in and capture the insights, applying them to your life and work.

Simon Bronders

Hugo Ahlberg

Lots of good stuff in here. While far from all is applicable to me, it's still interesting to hear how he thinks/Bridgewater works.. Really makes me wish more people would share their principles like this.

Josh Dzarir

Incredible book for running an organisation.

Eihab Khan

Amazing book, great knowledge & wisdom from the legendary Ray Dalio

Principles Life and Work

Reviews

Highlights