Letter about Mr Johnson – Fidelity’s founder

Mr Johnson’s perspective on investment stars

From: Institutional Investor, July 1984

Sir,

Your article on Jerry Tsai appearing just a few pages from Edward C. Johnson’s obituary took me back twenty years, to the day Jerry handed in his Fidelity jersey. All the Fidelity wholesalers were in town for our annual session with the wizards, and Jerry’s loss was heavy stuff. How could you fire up brokers in Oshkosh without the Jerry Tsai story?

Mr Johnson called us together and said something that not only proved prophetic but has been useful when other stars have dropped from other teams. ‘Never forget,’ he said, ‘that stars give their best performances on their way up. This is true in sports, the arts and business. Once there, they seldom repeat.’

Then he continued with the most important part: ‘And when they leave,’ he said, ‘it opens the way for another member of the team to step up and create his own legend.’

He concluded: ‘So don’t worry. We’ve designed the system to let talent develop, and the system is alive and well.’

That was vintage Mr Johnson. He knew how things worked.

Duvall Hecht, Boettcher & Co., Denver