What Happened to Goldman Sachs: An Insider's Story of Organizational Drift and Its Unintended Consequences (41 page)

I think this is a very interesting idea and is just one example in which this case study could have been improved. However, I found in this case that it would be challenging for me to have a framework that included society in depth over a long period of time. In 1958, Kroeber and Parsons recommended that culture and social system (society) be analyzed as independent (“The Concept of Culture and Social System,”
American Sociological Review
23, no. 5 [1958]: 582–583). This, of course, was not to say that the two systems are not related, or that various approaches to the analysis of the relationship may not be used. They thought it was often beneficial to researchers to hold constant either cultural or societal aspects of the same concrete phenomena while addressing attention to the other. For this study, I adopted Kroeber and Parsons’ recommendations because I found that in my empirical work it was too vague over long periods of time and needed to be broken into its relevant categories.

Appendix B

1
. See Diane Vaughan,
The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996); and Diane Vaughan, “The Dark Side of Organizations: Mistake, Misconduct, Disaster,”
Annual Review of Sociology
25, no. 1 (1999): 271–305, doi: 10.1146/annurev.soc.25.1.271.

Appendix C

1
. “Goldman Sachs’ Revolving Door,” CBS News, April 7, 2010.

2
.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/19/business/19gold.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
.

Appendix D

1.
http://www.businessweek.com/1999/99_20/b3629102.htm
.

Appendix E

1
. J. Creswell and B. White, “The Guys from ‘Government Sachs,’”
New York Times
, October 17, 2008,
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/19/business/19gold.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
.

Appendix G

1
. D. Vaughan, “The Dark Side of Organizations: Mistake, Misconduct, and Disaster,”
Annual Review of Sociology
25, no. 1 (1999): 271–305, doi: 10.1146/annurev.soc.25.1.271.

2
. Allan Sloan, “An Unsavory Slice of Subprime,”
Washington Post
, October 16, 2007,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/15/AR2007101501435.html
.

3
. Andrew Clark, “Success Shines Unwelcome Spotlight on to Goldman Sachs,”
The Guardian
, December 21, 2007,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/dec/21/goldmansachs.useconomy
.

4
. M. Taibbi, “The Great American Bubble Machine,”
Rolling Stone
, April 5, 2010,
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-great-american-bubble-machine-20100405
.

5
. “Mergers & Acquisitions Review,” Thomson Reuters, 2011,
http://dmi.thomsonreuters.com/Content/Files/4Q11_MA_Financial_Advisory_Review.pdf
.

6
. G. Smith, “Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs,”
New York Times
, March 14, 2012,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/14/opinion/why-i-am-leaving-goldman-sachs.html?pagewanted=all
.

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the faculty, graduate students, and administrators at the Department of Sociology at Columbia University, and in particular Professor David Stark, my thesis adviser and mentor, and Professor Josh Whitford, the director of graduate studies, for their training, support, and advice. In addition, I would like to thank the faculty and administrators, as well as my MBA and Executive MBA students, at Columbia Business School for their encouragement.

I want to thank my agent, Susan Rabiner, who, together with my editor at Harvard Business Review Press, Tim Sullivan, saw my PhD dissertation for what it was—a book not just about Goldman Sachs, but a book that brings business and finance together with sociology to improve the study of management, sociology, and public policy. They understood my vision and helped make it a reality.

Thank you to those I interviewed. I would love to recognize your contributions, patience, and time on an individual basis, but I want to respect your privacy.

Many professionals, professors, students, classmates, research assistants, and friends helped with my training and/or the book. Many thanks to Gary Ashwill, Red Ayme, Peter Bearman, Erin Brown, Soman Chainani, Manu Chander, Sidney Dekker, Helena Ding, Yige Ding, Erin Dolias, Nate Emge, Gil Eyal, Michelle Fan, Stephani Finks, Joe Gannon, Jie Gao, Kyle Gazis, Katrin Giziotis, Angel Gonzalez, Angelito Gonzalez, Simon Gonzalez, Ryan Hagen, Kathryn Harrigan, Charles Harrison, Simon Head, Jon Hill, Gailen Hite, Karen Ho, Paul Ingram, Jane Jacobi, Sam Johnson, El Kamada, Ko Kuwabara, Nan Liu, Emily Loose, Yao Lu, Evangelos Lyras, Donald MacKenzie, Jeff Madrick, Kinga Makovi, Yarden Mariuma, Joanne Martin, Charles Masson, Debra Minkoff, Carlos Morei, Joy Nee, Olivia Nicol, James O’Shea, Neni Panourgia, Christina Perez, Allison Peter, Damon Phillips, Katherine Phillips, Joyce Plaza, Paula Reid, Ernesto Reuben, Tim Rich, Nan Rothschild, Jonathan Salky, Krista Schult, Hersche Shintre, Hana Sromova, Richard Swedberg, Noriyuki Takahashi, Matthias Thiemann, Mathijs de Vaan, Diane Vaughan, Oliver Wai, Karl Weber, Joanne Willard, Sang Won, Stacy Xing, and Xu Zang.

I would like to thank those who have researched and written about Goldman Sachs over the years, because without their diligent work it would have been impossible to write my PhD dissertation. Many are cited in my work and some are not, but I want to specifically acknowledge a few: Justin Baer, William Cohan, Susanne Craig, Charles Ellis, Lisa Endlich, David Faber, Richard Freedman, Boris Groysberg, Jonathan Knee, Susan McGee, Bethany McLean (who was in my Goldman 1992 M&A analyst class), Gretchen Morgenson, Andrew Serwer, Scott Snook, David Ross Sorkin, Louise Story, Matt Taibbi, Gillian Tett, Jill Vohr, the US Senate Subcommittee on Investigations, and the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

I would like to thank some people who manage to be pragmatic and entertaining at the same time: Stephen Colbert, Jim Collins, Malcolm Gladwell, Vijay Govindarajan, Tony Kornheiser, Michael Lewis, Bill Maher, Roger Martin, Robert K. Merton, Bill Simmons, Jon Stewart, Jack (and Suzy) Welch, and Michael Wilbon. I am sure they never dreamed that they would be acknowledged in a book related to Goldman Sachs, but their work stimulates my thinking.

Last, this book is a result of the love and support of my family and close friends. I didn’t specifically acknowledge each and every one of you because I hope that I do that each and every day.

About the Author

S
TEVEN
G. M
ANDIS
worked at Goldman Sachs from 1992 to 2004 in the investment banking, private equity, and proprietary trading areas. He assisted Hank Paulson and other senior executives on special projects and was a portfolio manager in one of the largest and most successful proprietary trading areas at Goldman. After leaving Goldman, he cofounded a multibillion-dollar global alternative asset management firm that was a trading and investment banking client of Goldman’s.

During the financial crisis, Mandis was a senior adviser to McKinsey & Company before becoming chief of staff to the president and COO of Citigroup and serving on executive, management, and risk committees at the firm.

Currently, he is an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School. He teaches classes of MBA and executive MBA students on strategic issues facing investment banks and the European financial crisis. In addition, Mandis is a PhD candidate and an honorary Paul F. Lazarsfeld Fellow in the Department of Sociology at Columbia University. He focuses on economic sociology as well as organizational culture and innovation. This book is based on work for his PhD dissertation.

Mandis holds an AB from the University of Chicago and an MA and MPhil from Columbia University.

He was awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honor, given to children of immigrants who exemplify a life dedicated to community service.