Ray Dalio is a fascinating person. He purchased a one-word .com to share his personal and management principles, and now he is attempting to train a learning system to automate and preserve his decision-making.
There's a movie script somewhere in here. Exaggerate the narcissism, advance the science 50-100 years and we've got an eccentric billionaire that causes an artificial intelligence uprising. Like something between Transcendence and Westworld.
A few other thoughts from reading the article:
• Dalio seems like a classic case of someone pursuing immortality in whatever way he can. His coming out of retirement, his efforts to leave a legacy of "radical transparency" and to make his company an "altar of openness", etc. He is also 67 years old. He may feel as though he is "running out of time", and I've seen an uptick in media mentions surrounding him and Bridgewater. There's quite a few religious themes here.
• Bridgewater might be an excellent case study in radical changes that result in success, but it also might not. In particular, there are two challenges. First is the culture of Wall St, which lends itself more to a "show me the results" manifesto and can probably tolerate a culture of open criticism more than most other companies. The other is that Bridgewater is a single datapoint. We know almost nothing about the inner workings of e.g. RenTech, but they are just as impressive (albeit with lower AUM) and have a more "academic" culture. Does the culture matter that much, or is the success a result of a confluence of other factors? Someone who appears to pride himself on his contrarian decision making like Dalio might see his culture as the defining differentiator responsible for his success.
• I find it much more likely that Bridgewater's culture of open criticism (and elements of quantified self?) is like Zappos Holacracy and Valve's "no managers" manifestos, rather than a new set of principles to be brought down from on high. Each of these companies prides itself, and to some extent claims is the reason for its success, on a culture that was deliberately implemented instead of organically grown. After you see enough of these I feel you start to become "culture agnostic", and from my point of view I don't feel any of them has a causal relationship with profitability or productivity.
• A nitpick here - it seems hypocritical to reduce a culture of "radical transparency." If you decide to change the status quo from radical transparency for 100% of the staff to radical transparency for 10% of the staff, then what is so radical about it? Equally, what does it mean to only dole out radical transparency to those "responsible enough" to receive it? That sounds like...transparency.