The world's most successful hedge fund just made a big change - here's what you need to know about how it's managed

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ray dalio

Thos Robinson/Getty

Bridgewater Associates founder Ray Dalio.

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Bridgewater Associates, the world's largest hedge fund with $169 billion in assets, just had a big shake-up in leadership.

It hired former Apple executive Jon Rubinstein as co-CEO to replace Greg Jensen, who will now function as co-CIO. The move is part of a plan unfolding over the next several years to transfer management responsibilities away from the fund's founder Ray Dalio, according to a new client note.

Nothing about the way Dalio has run Bridgewater is conventional.

He operates Bridgewater according to an intense and unusual management philosophy that values "radical transparency." At the firm's isolated Westport, Connecticut headquarters, all meetings and interviews are recorded and logged.

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He demands that no employee withhold criticisms from each other, and encourages anyone to call him out, as well.

Every employee has a copy of Dalio's exhaustive management guide, "Principles," which contains 210 lessons. The 2011 edition has been available on Bridgewater's site for a few years and has been downloaded more than two million times, according to The Journal.

We've highlighted 20 of the most representative principles.