If you want to be a successful trader you better be highly intelligent and have an inspiring work ethic. You also need to have a certain personality – strong, fearless…

I am struck by the business-culture differences of executives from the midwest and West-coast. Some say it’s subtle, yea… like a jack hammer.

After our meetings ended last week in Newport Beach California,  Kathy (see pic. below) and I mingled with some executives in their 30s and 40s at the Balboa Bay Resort (pic. above). To these coastal business execs our Midwest earnestness, optimism and you-betcha moral compass was either charming, disarming or uncool.

A the end of the night, at a private party, a young gaming executive came up to me and asked if I was from the Midwest.

How the hell did he know?  (more…)