Larry Cunningham, author and editor of The Essays of Warren Buffett, is coming out with a new book later this year, which will hopefully be read by a few of the media that continually ask the same succession plan questions over and over again.
Link to book: Berkshire Beyond Buffett: The Enduring Value of Values
Berkshire Hathaway, the $300 billion conglomerate that Warren Buffett built, is among the world’s largest and most famous corporations. Yet for all its power and celebrity, few people understand Berkshire and many assume that it cannot survive without Buffett. This book proves that assumption wrong.In a comprehensive portrait of the corporate culture that unites Berkshire’s fifty direct subsidiaries, Lawrence Cunningham unearths the traits that assure the conglomerate’s perpetual prosperity. Riveting stories recount each subsidiary’s origins, triumphs and journey to Berkshire. A flowing narrative reveals the strategies managers use to generate economic value from intangible values, such as thrift, integrity, entrepreneurship, autonomy, and a sense of permanence.Rich with lessons for those wishing to profit from the Berkshire model, this engaging book is a valuable read for entrepreneurs, business owners, managers and investors as well as an important resource for scholars of corporate stewardship. A general audience will enjoy this account of how an iconoclastic businessman transformed a struggling textile company into a corporate fortress destined to be his lasting legacy.