Text of "Ten principles for a Black Swan-proof world (2009)" that's not behind a paywall

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2009/04/08/ten-principles-...

I agree with the first part of that quote, but when it says "No incentives without disincentives" that's where the bankers would argue that there are disincentives, like the "performance culture" (firing the bottom performing 10% etc). I would disagree with them (the bottom 10% may just be more aligned with reality, or considering the long term for example) but these guys are slippery and will find any means necessary to justify this behaviour.

The balanced scorecard provides a way to manage non-financial measures of performance, and incentivize long-run measures.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balanced_scorecard

If you measure the result of independent inspections and auditors on the executives' scorecard, don't be surprised if you get a financially healthier long run management of the firm.

I think at some point Taleb was learning the math and theory behind statistics, and then decided it was time to stop learning.

That seems better than judging performance based on a single metric, but still wide open to gaming.

In my experience, it's better to use your full range of objective and subjective facilities to select a good manager, and then trusting them until it's time to re-evaluate (using the same means but now with more evidence of their performance).

An organization that runs on extrinsic motivations can only ever be mediocre at best (and often worse), and there's very little that kills intrinsic motivation more than putting people into systems designed reduce a human's potential to a number (or several numbers in the case of your balanced scorecard).