Lawrence A. Cunningham: Mimicking Warren Buffett

By Lawrence A. Cunningham, who will discuss his new book, Berkshire Beyond Buffett: The Enduring Value of Values, at Washington University’s Olin School in St. Louis on Wednesday February 25 at 4:00 pm.  Special guests include Tom Manenti, CEO of Berkshire’s MiTek subsidiary.   

Berkshire Hathaway, the conglomerate Warren Buffett built, is vast and unconventional. Yet despite unusual traits, the company’s success comes down to favoring old-fashioned business values like trust and thrift while shunning the fast buck and debt. For businesses of all sizes, it offers a model worth emulating.

If Berkshire were a country and its revenues its gross domestic product, the company would be among the world’s top 50 economies. Berkshire’s cash alone exceeds the total assets of...