Undervalued

I come in the morning and begin to work. I model and modify numbers in excel to make exhibits that illustrate what the client will want probably want to see, remembering that I'm ultimately, working for them. I generate charts and graphs and model scenarios and rarely think about the impact they will play on the people who work at the company where they will be implemented. I evaluate stock options and equity grants without thinking of the spit-out number besides to calm my fears that they are consistent with other parts of the report.

I don't usually think about the numbers that I look at. But sometimes, I'll look at the total compensation for the executives who request our work, and understand that those numbers represent more money than I will probably see in my entire lifetime. More money than my parents ever saw in their entire lifetimes. Yet, they always think it is never enough. Everyone's convinced that they are undervalued. They know they weren't born for nothing.



I know a lot of people for whom these numbers have a lot more meaning, and who watch them much more closely than I do. These numbers determine the details of their lives. They represent jealousy, inspiration, goals, and sometimes the future. And I get that. Money is supposed to mean something. In fact, it's supposed to mean and determine everything.

I had a teacher at Haas who taught economics that way. I mean, pretty much all of my teachers taught economics that way at Haas. One of my professors argued against anti-monopoly rules, saying if monopolies are outlawed, there is no ultimate motivation for businesses to grow. Another said that compensation should never be limited, because the people who earn the most money, for whatever reasons, are the "locomotives of society" and we are all merely the train cars.

Twelve years ago, however, I had very different teachers who taught me very different things. They taught me that I should never choose a career based on how much I'd get paid, that I should never do anything, in fact, anything for money. That my career and decisions should be based solely on my moral campus and internal happiness. That this is hard to do now, but only because we are living in the dark ages, that soon, very soon, every person will be able to do what they want, depending on what they are best at, to be able to live up to their absolute full potential without having to worry about making rent. That people will be judged not on how much they're worth, but on whether or not they are decent human beings.

I get that they were wrong. But they were idealists. They wanted to believe in something. And so are my Berkeley professors. They too believe in their own fantasy. So are my friends who obsess with my numbers. So are some of my clients who think they are undervalued.

And I don't know who is right and who is wrong.

But I don't think I want to determine my life by my numbers.