The bartender pours one glass and provides no straws. Only one set of lips touched the glass, yet they all partook of the fine beverage.
How could this be?
Before I offer the answer to this riddle (if it’s not already obvious to you), allow me to cite the inspiration to this piece. A couple of weeks ago on NAPA Net, Nevin Adams wrote of the results of his “best career choice” reader survey (see “The Best Job? Investment Manager"). Being an investment advisor by day, (indeed, for my entire career), I couldn’t help but want to read the story, which listed the top 10 career choices of the NAPA Net readers who took the survey. Besides the number one choice, two other selections stood out: astronomer and broadcaster.
What’s odd about these choices is that the opportunities to serve in these professions are rare, and, in the case of astronomer, rarely seen. In fact, I bet most peoples’ image of astronomers come from some 1950s sci-fi movie. Even with broadcasters, who we see every day, there’s an unobserved behind-the-scenes reality that throws cold water on the apparent celebrity of the position.
So, without any frame of reference to guide them, why would financial professionals identify these particular two career choices as eye-catching? To answer this question, we must first answer two other questions:
• What do astronomers and broadcasters do that might make sense for financial service professionals to view them as attractive careers?
• How does that contrast with the real-life banality (in the case of astronomers) and anxiety (in the case of broadcasters) of those positions?
Astronomers dream big, just like financial professionals. Not only do they dream big, but they live in a universe of — pardon the puns — astronomically large numbers. Most people can’t fathom the largess of 93 million miles (the distance between the Sun and the Earth, which to astronomers is but a meager “astronomical unit”) let alone 6 trillion miles (the distance light travels in a year, commonly referred to as a “light year”). Astronomers, on the other hand, consider a single “parsec” but a mere smidgen of distance (it’s actually 3.26 light years or roughly 19 trillion miles).
Sure, these numbers dwarf the seven-, eight-, nine-, and even 10-digit numbers most investment managers comfortably swim in. The point is, just as astronomers have no problem floating in a sea of arithmetic enormity, so are investment managers far more comfortable than the average bear when it comes to working with relatively large numbers.
But, there’s a dark side to astronomy. No, I mean it. It really is dark. Astronomers, as they are too quick to mention (not without a geekish chuckle), do their best work at night. Indeed, before the advent of satellites and computerized charged couple devices (a fancy name for an earthbound telescopic camera), observational astronomers could only do their work at night. Theoretical astronomers — the ones who played around with mathematical formulae — have the luxury of being able to work during the daylight hours, often manipulating the data obtained from observational astronomers as this latter group slept.
Yes, there’s a subtle sibling rivalry between observational and theoretical astronomers, but it’s probably not as bad as the rivalry between active and passive managers.
When it comes to coworker competition, however, no field takes the cake like broadcasting. Sure, laymen have a vision of never-ending celebrity parties, but the truth is there’s a reason why Ron Burgundy was such a funny movie — because all that backstabbing really happens. It’s an industry where appearances matter more than anything else, a fact which anyone who’s had to explain quarterly performance might appreciate. Yes, it’s great to ride the wave of popularity while you’re riding it, but you’re only one bad ratings period away from being replaced by the wunderkind de jour. Sound familiar?
By now you’re probably wondering why I would spend so much time researching for a flippant article like this. Heck, I’ll admit it: I’ve spent a lifetime researching this article. You see, the astronomer, broadcaster and investment manager who walked into that fictitious bar was one person — me!
While studying astronomy, I worked regular radio and sports broadcasting gigs to help defray the cost of tuition. I can tell you firsthand it’s cold and boring sitting in an observatory at night. I much preferred the warmth (not to mention the access to supercomputer power) of theoretical astronomy, which is where I focused. And when I wasn’t bathed in the greenish aura of those classic CRTs you now only see in dated pre-millenium movies, I was encased in a glass studio or press box with a big microphone in front of my face.
And, yes, I was constantly checking my back looking out for that unknown person coming to steal my airtime. But I discovered the one thing more important to station managers than ratings: advertising dollars. At the height of my broadcasting career, my shows were bringing in the most advertising dollars of any the station offered (they were probably the most listened to, also, but that’s not important here).
If you’re looking for a moral to this story, here it is: For all the otherworldly and celebrity allure of astronomy and broadcasting, know this: If given the choice, most astronomers and broadcasters would prefer to be investment managers.
This is one side where the grass is definitely greener.
