The Deputy Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Charlie Munger died at the age of 99 on November 28, 2023.

Renowned for his investing acumen and dry wit, he was an intelligent, plain-speaking man who always got to the point.

His ” Mungerisms” will be long remembered.

He earned a degree from Harvard Law School coming top of his class but was never impressed by MBAs and other professional and scholarly titles.

Munger proudly let it be known he has never taken a course in business.

Our Today picks out some lines by the Great Charlie Munger for those who aspire to have a good career in business or simply want a life well lived:

1. People calculate too much and think too little.
2. Those who keep learning will keep rising in life.
3. There is no better teacher than history in determining the future…There are answers worth billions in a history book.
4. You don’t have to have the kind of ability that quantum mechanics requires. You just have to know a few simple things and really know them.
5. Acknowledging what you don’t know is the dawning of wisdom.
6. It’s amazing how intelligent it is just to spend some time sitting. A lot of people are way too active.
7. Live within your income and save so that you can invest. Learn what you need to learn.
8. To this day I have never taken a course anywhere, in chemistry, economics, psychology or business.
9. Remember that reputation and integrity are your most valuable assets – and can be lost in a heartbeat.
10. We have three baskets for investing yes, no and too tough to understand.
11. The iron rule of nature is you get what you reward for. If you want ants to come, you put sugar on the floor.
12. There is no way you can live a life, an adequate life without making many mistakes.
13. I would argue that passion is more important than brain power.
14. Our game is to recognise a big idea when it comes along when one doesn’t come along very often. Opportunity comes to the prepared mind.
15. When you borrow a man’s car always return it with a tank of gas.
16. Do the best you can do. Never tell a lie. If you say you’re going to do it, get it done. Nobody cares about an excuse.
17. Most people are too fretful, they worry too much. Success means being very patient, but aggressive when it’s time.
18. The difference between a good business and a bad business is those good businesses throw up one easy decision after another. The bad businesses throw up painful decisions time after time.
19. Quickly identify mistakes and take action.
20. Don’t drift into self-pity because it doesn’t solve any problems. Generally speaking, envy, resentment, revenge and self-pity are disastrous modes of thought.
21. Warren reminds me that once I asked a man who had just left a large investment bank, How does your firm make its money? He said off the top, off the bottom, off both sides and in the middle.
22. Those of you who are about to enter business school or who are there, I recommend you learn to do it our way. But at least until you’re out of school you have to pretend to do it their way. People don’t seem to get that point.
23. I don’t like multitasking. I see those people doing three things at once and I think, God what a terrible way that is to think.
24. Every time you hear EBITDA just substitute it with bullsh.t.
25. Money management requires people to pretend that they can do something that they can’t and like what they don’t. I think that’s a terrible way to spend your life, but it’s very well paid.
26. A formula on successful investing? I can’t give you a formulaic approach because I don’tb use one. If you want a formula, you should go back to graduate school. They’ll give you lots of formulas that won’t work.
27. It is remarkable how much long-term advantage people like us have gotten by trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.
28. Everybody engaged in complex work needs colleagues. Just the discipline of having to put your thoughts in order with somebody is a very useful thing.
29. It takes character to sit with all that cash and do nothing. I didn’t get to where I am by going after mediocre opportunities.
30. I try to get rid of people who always confidently answer questions about which they don’t have any real knowledge.
31. You make your money by the waiting.
32. I paid no attention to the territorial boundaries of academic disciplines and I just grabbed all the big ideas that I could.
33. Take a simple idea and take it seriously.In my whole life, I have known no wise people.. who didn’t read all the time. You’d be amazed at how much Warren reads, at how much I read. My children laugh at me. They think I’m a book with a couple of legs sticking out.
34. A business model that relies on trickery is doomed to fail.
35. If you don’t allow for self-serving bias in the conduct of others, you are, again, a fool
36. Spend each day trying to be a little wiser than you were when you woke up. Day by day and at the end of the day, if you live long enough… you will get out what you deserve.
37. Choose clients as you would friends.