From his
2003 talk at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln:
I can do anything in the world I want to do but what I want to do is run Berkshire Hathaway. Now why do I want to run it that way? There's a couple of things:
A) I get to paint my own painting. I go down there every day and I feel like Michelangelo working on the Sistine Chapel or something. Nobody else may think it's a great painting, but I get to paint my own painting. I do not have people second-guessing me. I do not have people saying 'Why don't you use a little more red paint, or blue paint. Why don't you paint a seascape instead of a landscape.' I get to do my own thing. It's a form of creativity. It's exactly like somebody feels that's a professional golfer, or like somebody feels that's a painter. They're not doing it for the money, primarily. They're doing it because they like doing something well and that happens to be down the route of their talents.
And the second thing I like, frankly, is I like applause. I like appreciation. So I like having shareholders who feel good about what I've done.... Everybody in our family has got all of their money in Berkshire, and so those people are counting on me. And that's kind of fun to have something where you can actually deliver for other people and change their lives in positive ways.
