craig picken

Managing Partner for CRAIG PICKEN Executive Search

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

https://t.co/cBc7c1uCOU #urbanmobility #aviation

[Brown Gibbons Lang & Company @BGLandCo]

BGL Managing Director Meghan Welch, who is a senior member of the firm’s Aerospace, Defense & Government Services investment banking team, recently appeared on the Aerospace Executive Podcast with @CraigPicken to discuss mergers & acquisitions in the sector. Listen to the full episode here: https://t.co/Le7VEuXz8x #InvestmentBanking #MergersAndAcquisitions #Defense

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

https://t.co/Jbp5Qu5iD2

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

I found an awesome podcast on The Podcast App that I think you'd like. Give it a listen: https://t.co/GpWjMWiHvN

[Chamath Palihapitiya @chamath]

Elect this man!!!

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

Epic!

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

Scratch 2 Growlers…😞

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

A simple reminder.

You are your most valuable asset. If you’re not willing to invest in yourself and your career then nobody else will either.

[Secretary Sean Duffy @SecDuffy]

Nice job, Pete.

[John Mauldin @JohnFMauldin]

This. Senator Warren has the blood of Spirit Airlines on her hands. Instead of being part of JetBlue, she and Biden/Buttigieg killed that merger. And now your tickets prices area already rising.

[Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 @pmarca]

I have never been so bullish on the United States of America.

[John Ʌ Konrad V @johnkonrad]

https://t.co/hE2DWyZmiG

[OSINTdefender @sentdefender]

Multiple plane spotters filmed and photographed a KC-135 Stratotanker and several other aircraft supporting a test refueling flight by a B-21 Raider today over Eastern California. The flight lasted roughly five hours, as testing accelerates for the B-21, with the next-generation long-range stealth strategic bomber expected to enter service next year with the U.S. Air Force.

[Charles Gasparino @CGasparino]

Couldn’t have said it better myself cc @andykessler

[Mohamed A. El-Erian @elerianm]

China’s economic hurdles are increasing.
Having already lost access to discounted Venezuelan oil, Beijing is now seeing a second source of cost-effective energy--Iran--falter.
This is happening as the 2025 strategy of propping up growth through aggressive global export expansion to offset dwindling US shipments looks increasingly difficult to repeat.
#economy #China

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

What you did is an activity. What you accomplished is what your future employers will care about.

“Attended trade shows” is a useless comment that nobody cares about

“Attended to trade shows and made 30 million in sales“ is a huge accomplishment.

Achievements matter!

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

Airbus softens output target in engine row with Pratt & Whitney - https://t.co/i4mnileQdC

[Ryan Cohen @ryancohen]

The Hollow Men

American capitalism is rotting from the head down. We have replaced the "Owner-Operator"—the risk-taker-with a new, parasitic class of corporate bureaucrat: The Risk-Free Insider.

By "Insider," I am not referring to a specific title. I am referring to the entire administrative state that has captured the modern corporation. This includes the Directors who exist solely to collect fees, the Executives who exist solely to collect bonuses, and the Managers who exist solely to hire consultants.

These are the hollow men of the boardroom. They are masters of PowerPoint. They wear the right suits. They say the right buzzwords about "governance" and "ESG." But they are mercenaries fighting a war with someone else’s ammunition.

In a functioning economy, authority is tied to liability. If you make a bad decision, you lose your own money. That fear of loss is the only thing that keeps a business honest. It forces you to cut waste, obsess over the customer, and stay late to fix what is broken.

Today, we have severed that link.

We have rigged the game so that heads, the Insider wins; tails, the shareholder loses.

If the stock goes up, the Insider collects a massive performance bonus. If the stock crashes due to their own incompetence, they are fired with a "Golden Parachute" worth tens of millions. They are gambling with the house’s money, and they never leave the table poorer than they arrived.

This looting starts in the boardroom.

We have normalized a "Country Club" culture where directors are selected based on social profiling rather than their ability to build a business. The modern board member is often a professional tourist—paid an average of $350,000 a year.

Let’s be brutally honest about what that number represents. The average director is paid nearly five times the GDP per capita of the United States. They earn more for attending four quarterly lunches than the vast majority of Americans earn in five years of hard labor.

And for what?

Most of these directors are "over-boarded," sitting on three or four boards simultaneously. They treat directorships as a gig economy for the elite. They fly in, rubber-stamp a compensation package they didn't read, and fly out. They collect checks from companies they do not understand, do not use, and certainly do not love.

They are not there to ask hard questions. They are there to be collegial. They are there to protect the other Insiders.

And what happens when these boards hire executives who also have no personal capital at risk?

We get the Delegation Economy.

When a Risk-Free Insider faces a crisis—bloated expenses, a broken supply chain, or a stale product—they do not roll up their sleeves. They hire a consultant. They pay a strategy firm millions of shareholder dollars to produce a 100-page deck telling them what they already know.

This is not management. It is intellectual money laundering.

They use shareholder capital to buy an insurance policy for their own careers. If the plan fails, they can blame the consultants. They delegate the work because they are terrified of the responsibility. They would rather preside over a slow, comfortable decline than risk a bold mistake.

While American Insiders are busy optimizing their severance packages, our global competitors are optimizing their products. They are not slowed down by bureaucracy. They are not waiting for a slide deck. They are outworking us.

If we continue to fill our C-suites with administrators instead of operators, we will lose our edge. We will see iconic American franchises hollowed out by fees, managed for the benefit of the Insiders, while the true owners—the shareholders—are left holding the bag.

The time for polite governance is over.

If we want to save the American economy from mediocrity, we must demand a return to the "Owner’s Mentality." We need leaders who treat shareholder capital with the same reverence they treat their own savings. The era of the Risk-Free Insider must end.

[Patrick Bet-David @patrickbetdavid]

15 things money can’t buy:

1. Your Kids SEEKING your company when they’re adults and no longer need your financial help.

2. The first time you experience someone believing in YOU

3. The moment you find leaks in your way of thinking. This is a sign that life is about to improve if you choose to make the changes.

4. Being missed for who you are, not what you provide.

5. The look someone gives you who trusts and loves you.

6. Genuine respect from loved ones and enemies.

7. The ability to sleep calmly after making a big decision.

8. A night of laughter with friends and family that lasted hours.

9. A sincere apology given or received. Received feels better, but given strengthens the right relationships.

10. Someone praying for you without you asking for it.

11. Character under pressure.

12. A spiritual relationship with God.

13. Being misunderstood for A VERY LONG TIME until people come back saying you were fair and right. (This one is priceless)

14. Having footage of people you love who are no longer here. To be able to hear their voice and their mannerisms is priceless + comforting.

15. Inner peace in the wake of being in a chaotic phase of your life.

These are in no specific order.

Future looks bright.

[craig picken @CraigPicken]

https://t.co/4fi0RM0eQw