MarketPsych: How to Manage Fear and Build Your Investor Identity

Chapter 8. Being Your Best Self

To change one's life: Start immediately. Do it flamboyantly.

——William James

Probably the most widely known performance coach in the investment industry is the late Ari Kiev. Dr. Kiev, a psychiatrist who was formerly employed by the United States Olympic Team, coached traders and analysts at SAC Capital Advisors LLC. SAC has one of the best performance records among hedge funds, and as a result SAC charges among the highest fees of any hedge fund: 3 percent of assets and 50 percent of performance.^[79] Dr. Kiev worked at SAC for over a decade and presumably made a significant contribution toward the firm's profitability. Performance coaches such as Dr. Kiev typically draw from a common set of techniques: goal setting, structured relaxation training, visualizations, self-talk skills, concentration training, and the use of positive mental rituals.

In the previous chapters, we've given you tools and exercises to understand your unique investor identity. In this chapter we'll help you create a plan for cultivating your strengths and identifying your "best self." The exercises in this chapter are derived from the field of performance psychology. In the wake of Dr. Kiev's apparent success, more and more performance psychologists have joined hedge funds and investment firms to help improve investment decision-making and, consequently, returns.

Establishing a high-performance environment and positive rituals supports long-term success. While this chapter opens ...