Intelligent investing is not complex, though that is far from saying that it is easy. What an investor needs is the ability to correctly evaluate selected businesses. Note that word "selected": You don't have to be an expert on every company, or even many. You only have to be able to evaluate companies within your circle of competence. The size of that circle is not very important; knowing its boundaries, however, is vital.
I really would impress upon people that your circle should grow, it should shrink, it should morph into different areas as you learn, and as you grow. The whole point is you need to be a continuous learner, and go down the rabbit hole on things that you’re excited about. [...] the reality is, life is dynamic. The world is dynamic, situations change. You need to be constantly learning and trying to grow your circle of competence over time. I think that’s point number one is the circle of competence should be dynamic, you should be striving to build it. The other point is you need to be absolutely ruthless in identifying the boundaries of it throughout. So, you can be striving to grow your circle of competence. But if you haven’t spent the time and really put in the energy and effort for it to have effectively grown, you need to be cognizant of that fact and not start reaching because you think you know everything that’s outside of it.
In basketball, they say, “You can’t coach height,” meaning all the coaching in the world won’t make a player taller. It’s almost as hard to teach insight.
A value proposition refers to the value a company promises to deliver to customers should they choose to buy their product. [...] The proposition is an easy-to-understand reason why a customer should buy a product or service from that particular business. A value proposition should clearly explain how a product fills a need, communicate the specifics of its added benefit, and state the reason why it's better than similar products on the market. [...] A successful value proposition should be persuasive and help turn a prospect into a paying customer.