A powerful new approach for giving up the ghost of alpha―and building an investing portfolio that meets your objectives The concept of beating markets is just a lot of hype. Successful investors don’t find “alpha,” they find value―and that’s what this book helps you do. Better Than Alpha provides the perspective, insights, and tools you need to retrain your focus away from searching for alpha and toward actions that produce superior investment outcomes. Chris Schelling explains why strategies based on “beating the markets” are doomed to failure and provides a simple three-step framework for making better investment decisions: Behavior (smart thinking), Process (smart habits), Organization (smart governance) . He explains why the search for alpha is destined to fail, the major role behavioral finance plays in so much wasted time, effort, and money, and, most important, how to avoid common mistakes and maximize your efforts. You’ll gain a deeper understanding of what drives investment returns, how superstar investment managers generated excess returns in the past, and why strategies that worked in the past don’t necessarily make sense today. Whether you’re responsible for generating revenue streams for pensions, endowments, or foundations; mitigating insurance losses; serving as an investment consultant; or any other institutional-level investing, Better Than Alpha walks you through the process of minimizing the impacts of behavioral biases and making decisions that create a higher probability of meeting your objectives―whatever they may be. Christopher M. Schelling runs Windmuehle Funds, an investment firm located in Austin. Previously, he was Director of Private Equity investing for the Texas Municipal Retirement System. He also worked as Deputy CIO and Director of Absolute Returns at the Kentucky Retirement Systems. “Chris Schelling is a rare breed in the word of investing: A true investor who can actually put pen to paper and make the complex simple, the technical interesting, and the frequently mundane jump off the page. With Better Than Alpha , he’s done that once again. For anyone who’s interested in the vast changes that are occurring in markets, and how to avoid being crushed by those changes, this is a must read.” —Kip McDaniel , Editor-in-Chief & Chief Content Officer, Institutional Investor "Chris Schelling has provided an insightful, illuminating, and informative look into the erosion of the alpha component of investment returns.  Better Than Alpha is a must read for veteran asset allocators or any aspiring practitioner seeking to improve her or his skills as an evaluator of institutional asset managers." —Mansco Perry , III,  Executive Director and Chief Investment Officer, Minnesota State Board of Investment  “Search for the needle or buy the haystack? Active versus passive? Schelling’s book helps investors define the challenges of generating alpha, that elusive ‘excess return' all investors seek and few achieve. This is a well-written, accessible survey on alpha and beta, filled with clearly presented, relevant data along with interesting, humorous, and historical anecdotes. I found it informative and engaging—a must read for every investor." —Gailen Krug , Retired CIO of Waycrosse, a family office for owners of Cargill, Inc., and Partner Emeritus at Albourne Partners, Ltd, an alternative investment advisory firm “Chris Schelling has written a fantastic and practical guide to delivering dramatic outperformance through painstaking and well-crafted investment routines and methods. The book shows why a focus on alpha is pointless without all the boring bits in place first, including culture, process, and governance.” — Ashby H. B. Monk , PhD, Executive Director, Global Projects Center Stanford University, and author of The Technologized Investor: Innovation through Reorientation and Reframing Finance: New Models of Long-Term Investment Management “Chris Schelling, when he graced the ranks of asset-owners, was a rare bird--inquisitive, open-minded, approachable, receptive to new ideas, and seemingly immune to the prevailing characteristic of always picking the ‘safe’ option--and his writing is similarly refreshing. His insightful analysis of alpha and how best to find it should be required reading for anyone tasked with managing assets.” —Charlie Ruffel , Founder and managing partner of Kudu Investment Management; member of the Board of Directors at Charles Schwab; and former CEO and Founder of Asset International, parent company of aiCIO Magazine “If I have learned one thing in almost three decades of institutional investing, it is that true “alpha” is much more elusive than most investors would like to admit, if it exists at all. Many investors want to “prove” they are smart by beating some market benchmark. Chris Schelling’s book shows that there is a better way to invest, for all types of investors. He specifically demonstrates that what investors should really