Lecture Date: April 10, 2018
The UMW College of Business Lecture
Warren Buffett has been called “the most fascinating American success story of our time.” Although the media track him constantly, Buffett has largely kept his life private, especially by celebrity standards. He set out to prove that nice guys can finish first and, over the years, he treated his investors as partners and championed honesty as an investor. In the process, he became the world’s richest man, all from the modest Omaha headquarters of his company Berkshire Hathaway. According to his biographer, Alice Schroeder, his life, like most lives, has been a mix of strengths and frailties. Yet, according to Schroeder, “Notable though his fortune may be, Buffett’s legacy will not be his ranking on the scorecard of wealth; it will be his principles and ideals that have enriched people’s lives.”
Speaker: Alice Schroeder
A native of Texas, Alice Schroeder earned her undergraduate degree and an MBA at the University of Texas at Austin before moving east to work in finance. While working as a Wall Street analyst and a managing director at Morgan Stanley, she attracted the attention of Warren Buffett, who suggested that she write full-time and, in addition, agreed to grant her unprecedented access to explore directly with him and with those closest to his work his opinions, struggles, and wisdom. Though he has never written a memoir, Schroeder’s biography provides extensive insight into the man known widely as “The Oracle of Omaha,” and became an immediate best-seller. It remains the standard biography of Buffett.