Farnam Street

How does one of the world’s most powerful investors spot raw talent and then hand them the keys to billion-dollar decisions? Watch Brookfield CEO Bruce Flatt explain why he bets big on young people, how a true meritocracy works inside a global investment powerhouse, and why blending experience with youthful ambition gives Brookfield an edge in every market they enter. Check out the 1+ hour long conversation wherever you get you podcasts. https://lnkd.in/gMEF5aNH

In this rare conversation—only his second public podcast appearance—Brookfield CEO Bruce Flatt reveals the investment philosophy behind building one of the world's largest alternative asset managers with over a trillion dollars under management. At the core of Brookfield's strategy is a disciplined focus on downside protection that has delivered 19% annualized returns over 30 years. Flatt identifies three major trends driving their investments: digitalization (including AI infrastructure), global energy transition, and reindustrialization as supply chains shift. The conversation explores Brookfield's approach to risk management, their expansion into insurance, and their meritocratic culture. When Shane Parrish presses for clarity on Brookfield's complex corporate structure, Flatt provides rare insights into how the organization's design creates both operational flexibility and investment opportunities. If you want to understand how the smartest capital allocators think and what it takes to build something enduring, this episode is essential listening. Out now wherever you get your podcasts.

Andy Grove on why the people closest to customers usually see strategic inflection points before senior leadership (Hint: Find and listen to your Cassandras):

When Dyson showed people his prototype, industry experts quickly offered their verdict: “If a better vacuum were possible, Hoover or Electrolux would have invented it already.” This dismissive logic—that if something were possible, industry giants would have already done it—is the comfortable assumption incumbents have relied on throughout history, right until an outsider proves them catastrophically wrong. It’s the same reasoning that led Western Union to dismiss the telephone, IBM to scoff at personal computers, and Kodak to overlook the digital camera. Behind every revolutionary product lies a moment of everyday frustration. For James Dyson, it was watching his vacuum cleaner lose suction as its bag filled with dust – a problem millions simply accepted as inevitable. Facing thousands of failed prototypes, crushing financial setbacks, and a dismissive industry that insisted a superior vacuum was impossible, Dyson transformed doubt into fuel that created an empire he still owns and operates today. Dyson embraced an uncomfortable truth: failure isn't just a step on the path to success – it is the path itself. Check out the newest episode of our Outliers series wherever you get your podcasts. Let us know what you think!

We get personal this week on the podcast, diving into dating with Logan Ury. Most people date the wrong way. They chase the spark, mistake attraction for compatibility, and expect their partners to read their minds. Then they wonder why relationships don’t last. Logan thinks about dating differently. As a behavioral scientist and the Director of Relationship Science at Hinge, she’s spent years studying what actually makes relationships work. Her findings will change the way you think about attraction, communication, and commitment. If you want to stop wasting time on the wrong people and start building something real, this episode is for you.

Before Estée Lauder built a multi-billion-dollar empire, she was mixing face creams in her kitchen. Department stores rejected her. Industry experts dismissed her. Competitors copied her. But none of it stopped her.  She didn’t fight obstacles—she outmaneuvered them. When stores refused to stock her products, she created demand they couldn’t ignore. When experts claimed women wouldn’t spend $115 on face cream, she proved them wrong. Her true genius wasn’t just in chemistry—it was in psychology, persistence, and the power of storytelling. In this Outliers episode of The Knowledge Project, we break down how she turned rejection into fuel, why perfection was her baseline, and what we can learn from the relentless drive of one of history’s greatest business minds.  

In our recent conversation with Josh Wolfe of Lux Capital, he shared a perspective that struck us as profoundly important for anyone thinking about our technological future: "I think it's human to human. I think that if you always can frame things as what's abundant and what's scarce, in a world where there's going to be an abundance of access to information and an abundance of access to creative construction of things, art, and literature, and movies... the advantage is going to come in [asking], 'What do I do with that when I output it?'" He reflected on a profound conversation with the late Danny Kahneman: "The great human feeling is commiserating about the thing that we experienced together. Or the memory—and laughing hysterically, which I still do with my childhood friends—of this shared moment. And AI will never get that. A person will get the inside joke... All the value, all the market capitalization of all social media is about sharing. And I still think that we're going to produce, we're going to share, and what becomes scarce is human connection, because we are still human and we still want that. We want to be hugged and we want intimacy, and we want to laugh with each other." These ideas have profound implications for how we build organizations and relationships in an increasingly AI-driven world.

In 1823, a 9-year-old boy walked 21 miles to Pittsburgh. His family's farm was called Poverty Point—a brutally honest name for their circumstances. The boy's name? Thomas Mellon. That walk changed everything. Thomas wasn't mesmerized by the roaring factories or bustling streets, but by something unexpected: a vast estate overlooking the city. Fifteen hundred acres, a mansion that seemed to command Pittsburgh itself. "The whole scene," he later wrote, "impressed me with an idea of wealth and magnificence I had before no conception of." He stood there, a poor farm boy from nowhere, and asked himself: Could I build something like this? That single question ignited a fire that would transform American financial history. Instead of accepting life as a farmer, Thomas found his blueprint in Benjamin Franklin's autobiography. While others worked the fields, he studied Franklin's strategies like a tactical manual. He saw wealth not as luck, but as a system to be mastered. He chose law—not as a destination, but as a platform to spot opportunities. His practice became his intelligence network: every foreclosure, every property dispute, every business failure taught him how money truly moved. By 29, he was already wealthy—not from practicing law, but from quietly acquiring assets. Land. Houses. Businesses. He waited, positioned, then pounced when others panicked. His philosophy was simple but revolutionary: 💡 The big money isn't in buying or selling—it's in waiting 💡 Control capital and opportunities will find you 💡 Life is competition, and only the fittest survive Thomas passed these principles to his son Andrew Mellon, who scaled the system to historic proportions. Andrew funded nascent American industries like aluminum, oil, and chemicals. He controlled half of Pittsburgh's banking resources and became one of America's greatest wealth architects. But it all began with that 21-mile walk. Listen to episode 2 of our new series, Outliers, wherever you get your podcasts.

Imagine leaving a six‐figure Wall Street salary behind to chase a single, daring idea. In this week's episode of The Knowledge Project, David Heacock shows you how he turned a basic product into a $250M empire. At 29, he left Wall Street to bet on air filters. That bet transformed into Filterbuy, now serving more than 7 million customers through a ruthlessly efficient operation. Today we talk about what actually matters when building a business, balancing obsession with family life, selling on Amazon, what he’d do differently if starting over, and the freight decision he calls his biggest mistake. If you’re driven by bold decisions and value hard-won lessons, this conversation is your playbook. Don’t miss out on the insights that could redefine your own path to success.

So far with The Knowledge Project podcast, we’ve focused on interviews. But we’ve learned as much from reading biographies as from interviewing amazing people. That’s why we’re starting ‘Lessons from Outliers.’ Every other week, we’ll study an outlier who did remarkable work. From industrialists who reimagined commerce to the irreverent personalities who challenged the foundations of their fields, we’ll explore what they did and how they did it. We can learn something from everyone. We’re starting Outliers with Timothy Eaton, a Canadian name that might not be familiar to many listeners today, but his innovations fundamentally changed retail and how we shop. Eaton’s was a giant on the Canadian retail scene, garnering almost 60% of department store sales in Canada, sufficient to make it the eighth-largest retailer in the world. This episode is about how he built that empire, the principles that drove its success, and the forces that eventually brought it all crashing down... Whether you’re building a business, leading a team, or trying to understand how great companies rise and fall, Timothy Eaton’s story offers timeless lessons about innovation, trust, and the true price of success. You’ll learn why even the mightiest empires can crumble when they forget the principles that built them and why success—no matter how massive—must be earned daily.