How openness is a motto at Renaissance Technologies
Bloomberg has a long article on Renaissance Technologies LLC and its founder Jim Simons, in which the point out an interesting value inside the multi-billion dollar hedge fund with a few hundred employees:
From Simons on down, the company encourages openness, whether it’s about market signals that show where a security might be headed or about technology or trading. Frey says he doesn’t recall Simons ever raising his voice at an employee. Simons says new hires are encouraged to troll computer files detailing Renaissance’s past strategies, successful or not. “If Simons’s door was open, you could walk in,” Weinberger says. That would go for everyone from secretaries on up.
What’s also interesting from that description of the company, is there doesn’t seem to be the “corporate way”, or “invented here” syndrome - everyone who just joined the company is invited to question the established beliefs and practices. The fund, nevertheless, is very secretive to the outsiders, but remains hugely profitable, and beats the market even in highly bearish environments.