Early “Catastrophic” Blackstone Deal Led to Schwarzman’s Passion for Preserving Capital
W e tend to remember and apply best those life-changing lessons that were painfully learned. For Stephen A. Schwarzman, chairman, CEO and co-founder of The Blackstone Group, one of those early painful lessons was the importance of establishing and following a rigorous process for assessing all the risks before making an investment. By Robert Stowe England “We go from the premise that our first job, sort of like a doctor, is do no harm – and in the financial business that means don’t lose money,” Schwarzman said November 6 at a Reuters Newsmaker event for his new book What It Takes: Lessons in the Pursuit of Excellence . He was interviewed at the Thomson Reuters building in New York before invited guests by Reuters editor-at-large Sir Harold Evans. Schwarzman in his book cited “don’t lose money” as the number one rule at Blackstone, acknowledging that saying that out loud sometimes prompts smirks. Since before the September 17 release of the book, Schwarzman has granted...