TBP Episode 9
Welcome to the ninth episode of The Better Podcast! We’re your co-hosts CHIN Hui Leong and CHONG Ser Jing. In The Better Podcast, we want you to get better at this game called life, together with us. This podcast is designed to share what we’ve learnt about life, business, investing, and so much more.
If you prefer videos of our conversations, we have a Youtube channel too, which you can find here [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCDSE4Cz6WaTKm5gSUsUqBg]!
For our ninth episode, we discussed a whole bunch of things, including:
* The history of Visa (and the creation of its network effect), from its earliest days as a card scheme created by Bank of America, to how it became adopted by banks all across the USA
* The brilliance of Dee Hock, one of Visa’s early leaders, in setting the stage for the company’s future growth by (1) running Visa in a decentralised manner, and (2) creating important constraints for banks who were using the card scheme, that ended up being de-constraining (throwback to Episode 8 [https://thebetterpodcast.substack.com/p/tbp-episode-8#details]!)
* The importance of Bank of America spinning out Visa as an independent entity, and how Amazon could potentially make its cloud-computing arm, AWS (Amazon Web Services), an even more valuable entity by allowing it become a stand-alone company
* How innovation in organisations could better flourish if individuals were given greater autonomy and freedom to explore in a decentralised way
* The idea that as markets become larger, individual units within the market can become sizeable businesses - for example, an early Ford Motors factory had to bring in rubber, coal, metals, etc; in contrast, a modern automobile factory would have specialised suppliers
* Why Michelin, a tire manufacturer, ended up recommending restaurants
* A funny anecdote on how traditional financial institutions in Indonesia still cannot handle digitalisation today
Nothing on this show should be taken as investment advice. It is purely for informational and entertainment purposes only. All opinions expressed in this show by us and our guests are solely our own opinions. We and our guests may hold positions in the financial assets discussed in the show. These holdings are subject to change at any time.
We value your feedback, so let us know your thoughts! Contact us at thebetterpodcaster@gmail.com
Show Notes
* Article on Visa’s history by Fast Company: Link [https://www.fastcompany.com/27333/trillion-dollar-vision-dee-hock?page=0%2C5]
* Podcast featuring Kenneth Stanley that describes how companies should handle innovation for better results: Link [https://www.joincolossus.com/episodes/88083127/stanley-greatness-without-goals]
* Podcast featuring Martin Casado that features the idea of how markets become granularized over time as they become larger: Link [https://www.joincolossus.com/episodes/1290016/casado-the-past-present-and-future-of-digital-infrastructure?tab=blocks]
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thebetterpodcast.substack.com [https://thebetterpodcast.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]
