Beginnings
Everyone starts somewhere...
Welcome to Around The Traps.
This is a bit of an experiment on my part with writing, publishing, and being more active on social media.
Why am I doing this?
Well, that gets into a bit about me, my journey so far, and where I'm going. So, lets jump in.
My professional career so far has been in IT consulting, focusing on large HR and payroll systems. It has been a good run for the last 25 years. I've worked with a lot of great people, some of the world’s largest companies, and had the chance to see the world. It has also been a well-paid career, which gives me a degree of freedom to explore other opportunities. A luxury that I am full of gratitude for.
How did I get there?
When I has at university, I had this Sliding Doors moment when it came to choosing what to major it. I was studying business, and that was all I wanted to study throughout high school. But should I focus on IT or finance?
Growing up I had always been a computer geek. I'd spend my time not only playing games, but learning how to make them run on the, limited, hardware we had. And also programming, learning Excel and anything that I saw as a problem-solving challenge.
Still, finance fascinated me. My dad worked as a research analyst for one of our local stockbrokers. We would chat in the evenings about companies he was studying, and he had all the price charts on his PC. A rarity in the early 90's (at least as far as I knew).
I made my decision based on a advice from people who escape me at this point. I'm sure it was quite a few people, and I'm grateful for the counsel of them all. It was advice like the Steve Jobs, Warren Buffett quotes about following your passion, and work won't feel like work.
If not there, then where?
Partly it is the 'what if' of that decision 25 odd years ago. Do I want to devote my entire working life to only one profession? Throughout my career I'd always invested, but treated it more of a hobby than anything else.
The other part was the intellectual stimulation. In the IT world, learning new stuff can be exciting and challenging, fun even. After a decade or two, I found it all ends up being very similar, less fun. Plus, as my career progressed, the work became not so much about the technology itself. It was more sales, service delivery and team management, something I was 'ok' at, at best.
The other part was this wonderful essay (behind a paywall now) from Steven Wilkinson.
I had read, and enjoyed, a lot of Robert Kiyosaki's early series of books, and I recommend them. But the epiphany of using the Cashflow Quadrant, not only as a model, but also as a career map, hadn't dawned on me. Seeing this was eye opening and brought into focus that being an investor was the end game.
So, why this?
My interest in investing and financial markets has spanned three decades so far. In that time, I've read (or listened to) hundreds of books. More recently there has been an explosion of blogs, podcasts and YouTube channels. In my typical routine I'll consume an hour or two of content a day (in the gym, walking the dog etc.).
Over time that builds up a lot of 'knowledge' about what is going on in the world and markets. Talking to people who share this interest, I know (to myself at least) I know a lot. But, I struggle to express my views as elegantly as I would like. Putting my thoughts down in writing, I hope, will give me a bit of clarity in my own head.
Paul Graham has been writing for years on a range of topics. One of my favourite pieces is his writing about writing.
I've added this reference in as I was editing the original draft. Without even thinking about it in my first cut I meandered from one question to the next. Not sure if this is a style I'll continue with in this endeavour, but it makes a lot of sense given my quest for answers.
Another part of the inspiration was this excellent discussion Steve Clapham hosted with Grant Williams at the start of this year.
Hearing Grant talk about the formation of his email list, that went on to become his newsletter, struck a chord. When I struggle to explain an idea, I'll generally send someone a link to some other content on the topic. Rather than doing this ad-hoc and individually, my plan is to to combine my own learning journey with this sharing culture. My hope is that doing this in public will help others as well.
The other inspiration was this panel, talking about the influence of podcasts and the network building benefits.
I'm from outside of the traditional finance world. My current professional network is in a different industry. To make connections in a new industry, I figure, I need to do 'something', my hope is this is useful to others. As Jared Dillion often says "Luck doesn't find you in your apartment". This is a first step out into a new industry, with more to come.
What's next?
In a lot of ways this is going to be a work in progress, so please comment, share and reach out. My initial aim is to post weekly(ish), I'm still working part time in IT, have a young family, blah blah blah. I'll share a handful of content pieces that I thought were valuable with a run down of what I took away from the piece. Either in each piece or in a monthly summary I'll curate these into my own framework and how I'm investing.
What this won't be is: 1) financial advice, I'm learning, if you don't know what to do, talk to some one who does. 2) a stock picking service, if a company comes up, it is an idea, I may buy it, I may sell it, I may do nothing. You do you. 3) advertising supported, I'm doing this for my journey more than anything else. While I get the need to monetise, I get frustrated with so much content trapped behind many layers of ads/
Finally, although I doubt he will read this. As I've been writing this blog, I've found my inner monologue sounding like a Grant Williams podcast. The Hemingway quote about imitation and flattery comes to mind. Either way, thank you Grant for being the rational voice in an irrational world.
See you all around the traps.