Most Popular getAbstracts
1 |
The Ultimate QuestionFred Reichheld |
2 |
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective PeopleStephen R. Covey |
3 |
How to Win Friends and Influence PeopleDale Carnegie |
4 |
Make Every Second CountRobert W. Bly |
5 |
Carrots and SticksIan Ayres |
6 |
Blue Ocean StrategyW. Chan Kim & Renée Mauborgne |
7 |
CIO Best PracticesJoseph P. Stenzel, Gary Cokins, Karl D. Schubert & Michael H. Hugos |
8 |
On ChinaHenry Kissinger |
9 |
Think and Grow RichNapoleon Hill |
10 |
NegotiationHarvard Business Essentials |
Book Collections
- New Arrivals
- Leadership
- New Classics
- Business Development
- Market Identity
- Presentation Skills
- Cross Cultural
- Maximizing Performance
- Service Excellence
- General CRE
- Negotiating
- Sustainability
New Arrivals
Have a Nice Conflict: How to Find Success and Satisfaction in the Most Unlikely Places
Tim Scudder, Michael Patterson & Kent MitchellHave a Nice Conflict helps to make sense of the dynamics between different types of people and then details a five-step framework to prevent potential conflict and effectively manage conflict.
It's Not Just Who You Know: Transform Your Life (and Your Organization) by Turning Colleagues and Contacts into Lasting, Genuine Relationships
Tommy SpauldingIn the bestselling tradition of Dale Carnegie’s classic, It’s Not Just Who You Know shows how each and every one of us can use the power of netgiving—of helping others—to expand our world and achieve our goals, and make a difference in our job, our career, and our community.
Uncertainty: Turning Fear and Doubt into Fuel for Brilliance
Jonathan FieldsDrawing on extensive case studies and research, Fields shares a set of detailed personal practices and environmental changes that can not only humanize the creative process, but also allow individuals and teams to stay more open to opportunity and play a bigger creative game.
Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard
Chip Heath & Dan HeathIn a compelling, story-driven narrative, the Heaths bring together decades of counterintuitive research in psychology, sociology, and other fields to shed new light on how we can effect transformative change. Switch shows that successful changes follow a pattern, a pattern you can use to make the changes that matter to you, whether your interest is in changing the world or changing your waistline.
Selling Change: 101+ Secrets for Growing Sales by Leading Change
Brett ClayChange happens fast in today's global, Internet-driven economy. Learn how to get ahead of these changes—and your competitors—by creating irresistible value for your customers and stakeholders.
Rainmaking Conversations: Influence, Persuade, and Sell in Any Situation
Mike Schultz & John E. DoerrConversations make or break everything in sales. Every conversation you have is an opportunity to find new prospects, win new customers, and increase sales. Rainmaking Conversations provides a proven system for leading masterful conversations that fill the pipeline, secure new deals, and maximize the potential of your account.
The Social Media Sales Revolution: The New Rules for Finding Customers, Building Relationships, and Closing More Sales Through Online Networking
Landy Chase & Kevin KneblTraditional sales methods like cold calling are no longer effective. Social media platforms are now your best tools. The Social Media Sales Revolution reveals the enormous opportunities now available for developing relationships and gaining new customers by leveraging the power of social media marketing. It provides a groundbreaking method for dominating markets by using the Internet to reverse the client acquisition process: instead of outbound marketing to generate leads, the entire process will “flip” to one of inbound attraction.
Pitch Anything: An Innovative Method for Presenting, Persuading, and Winning the Deal
Oren KlaffWhether you're selling ideas to investors, pitching a client for new business, or even negotiating for a higher salary, Pitch Anything will transform the way you position your ideas. According to Klaff, creating and presenting a great pitch isn't an art—it's a simple science. Applying the latest findings in the field of neuroeconomics, while sharing eye-opening stories of his method in action, Klaff describes how the brain makes decisions and responds to pitches. With this information, you'll remain in complete control of every stage of the pitch process.
The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation
Matthew Dixon & Brent AdamsonWhat's the secret to sales success? If you're like most business leaders, you'd say it's fundamentally about relationships-and you'd be wrong. The best salespeople don't just build relationships with customers. They challenge them.
The Opportunity Magnet: Attract Success in Every Aspect of Your Life
Jeffrey W. MeshelNo matter what your goals are, knowing how to build your relationships is the key to making your dreams a reality. When you know how to maximize your connections with friends, family, acquaintances, and coworkers—even people you’ve just met—others will bring opportunities to you, transforming you into an “opportunity magnet.”
Business Development
How to Talk to Anyone: 92 Little Tricks for Big Success in Relationships
Leil LowndesWhat is that magic quality makes some people instantly loved and respected? In this book, Lowndes offers easy and effective techniques to creating relationships. From making a first impression to establishing a rapport with anyone to working a room, these tips are sure to enhance your people skills.
Selling Change: 101+ Secrets for Growing Sales by Leading Change
Brett ClayChange happens fast in today's global, Internet-driven economy. Learn how to get ahead of these changes—and your competitors—by creating irresistible value for your customers and stakeholders.
Rainmaking Conversations: Influence, Persuade, and Sell in Any Situation
Mike Schultz & John E. DoerrConversations make or break everything in sales. Every conversation you have is an opportunity to find new prospects, win new customers, and increase sales. Rainmaking Conversations provides a proven system for leading masterful conversations that fill the pipeline, secure new deals, and maximize the potential of your account.
The Social Media Sales Revolution: The New Rules for Finding Customers, Building Relationships, and Closing More Sales Through Online Networking
Landy Chase & Kevin KneblTraditional sales methods like cold calling are no longer effective. Social media platforms are now your best tools. The Social Media Sales Revolution reveals the enormous opportunities now available for developing relationships and gaining new customers by leveraging the power of social media marketing. It provides a groundbreaking method for dominating markets by using the Internet to reverse the client acquisition process: instead of outbound marketing to generate leads, the entire process will “flip” to one of inbound attraction.
Pitch Anything: An Innovative Method for Presenting, Persuading, and Winning the Deal
Oren KlaffWhether you're selling ideas to investors, pitching a client for new business, or even negotiating for a higher salary, Pitch Anything will transform the way you position your ideas. According to Klaff, creating and presenting a great pitch isn't an art—it's a simple science. Applying the latest findings in the field of neuroeconomics, while sharing eye-opening stories of his method in action, Klaff describes how the brain makes decisions and responds to pitches. With this information, you'll remain in complete control of every stage of the pitch process.
The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation
Matthew Dixon & Brent AdamsonWhat's the secret to sales success? If you're like most business leaders, you'd say it's fundamentally about relationships-and you'd be wrong. The best salespeople don't just build relationships with customers. They challenge them.
The Opportunity Magnet: Attract Success in Every Aspect of Your Life
Jeffrey W. MeshelNo matter what your goals are, knowing how to build your relationships is the key to making your dreams a reality. When you know how to maximize your connections with friends, family, acquaintances, and coworkers—even people you’ve just met—others will bring opportunities to you, transforming you into an “opportunity magnet.”
The Power Formula for LinkedIn Success: Kick-Start Your Business, Brand, and Job Search
Wayne BreitbarthThis simple, user-friendly guide explains how you can access the full power of LinkedIn—including advice on making lasting business connections, building a unique personal brand, and generating significant business opportunities.
We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World
Simon MainwaringA social media expert with global experience with many of the world’s biggest brands—including Nike, Toyota and Motorola—Simon Mainwaring offers a visionary new practice in which brands leverage social media to earn consumer goodwill, loyalty and profit, while creating a third pillar of sustainable social change through conscious contributions from customer purchases.
Sales Autopsy: 50 Postmortems Reveal What Killed the Sale (and what might have saved it)
Dan SeidmanTop sales coach Dan Seidman reveals stories of sales gone horribly, embarrassingly wrong, and what—if anything—can be learned from them.
Selling 101
Zig ZiglarSelling 101 introduces a four-step selling process designed to assess a prospect's needs. Learn how to overcome "call reluctance", gain insight on how to offer your service as a solution, and more.
Trust-Based Selling
Charles H. GreenThis book not only dives into the importance of trust in a buyer-seller relationship, it tells you how to create this trust. And, best of all, Green underscores his teaching with a variety practical examples and tips you can implement to grow and succeed in your business.
Selling the Invisible: A Field Guide to Modern Marketing
Harry BeckwithThis book comes to you from the suggested reading list of Research and Marketing's Business Pursuit Conference. Selling the Invisible presents crucial marketing concepts for service providers, like many of you, in the business of the intangible. How can you help clients buy something that they can't touch or try first? This book provides you with dozens of practical examples and mini lessons for selling the invisible.
No More Cold Calling: The Breakthrough System That Will Leave Your Competition in the Dust
Joanne BlackThis breakthrough system will transform your sales practice into a referral generating machine. Increase your production, create long-term customer relationships, and leave your competition in the dust.
Endless Referrals: Network Your Everyday Contacts Into Sales
Bob BurgNetworking is general practice these days, but the process of building a network can vary drastically across the board. In this book, Bob Burg offers easy to apply, straightforward strategies to get you working by referral. Burg's proven relationship-building system will help you stop simply exchanging information and start making valuable connections.
The SPEED of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything
Stephen M.R. CoveyTrust, says Stephen M.R. Covey, is the very basis of the new global economy, and he shows how trust—and the speed at which it is established with clients, employees and constituents—is the essential ingredient for any high-performance, successful business. Covey outlines 13 behaviors of trust-inspiring leaders, such as demonstrating respect, creating transparency, righting wrongs, delivering results and practicing accountability. The Speed of Trust offers a practical look at exactly how trust functions in our every transaction and relationship—from the most personal to the broadest, most indirect interaction—and how to establish trust immediately so that you can forego the time-killing, bureaucratic check-and-balance processes so often deployed in lieu of actual trust.
Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships: Leadership in Professional Services
Ross DawsonLead your key clients into lasting, profitable, high-value relationships. Ross Dawson provides clear and extremely practical approaches for all professional and knowledge-based firms on how to create unique value for both clients and themselves.
Never Eat Alone: and Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time
Keith Ferrazzi & Tahl RazAccording to Keith, what distinguishes highly successful people from everyone else is the way they leverage the power of relationships to help everyone win. In Never Eat Alone, Keith shares his system for building a network of contacts and reaching out to people using practical, proven principles.
The Inner Game of Work: Focus, Learning, Pleasure, and Mobility in the Workplace
Timothy GallweyTimothy Gallwey's response to the perennial search for success and happiness on the job will revolutionize your approach to work. In this innovative book, Gallwey will challenge you to reexamine your notions of work and why you do it—and will teach you to look at it all in a drastically different way. With its vivid insights and applicable advice, this book is a great choice for those wanting to overcome the barriers that keep them from being their best at work.
Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive
Noah J. Goldstein, Steve J. Martin & Robert B. CialdiniWritten with humor and wisdom, Yes! is as entertaining as it is informative. Authors Goldstein, Martin and Cialdini blend research, real-life examples and straightforward advice to give readers an understanding of the science behind the art of persuasion. Because we all engage in persuasion every day—with friends and family, at work, at home, at school—this book is one you just shouldn't miss.
Customer Centered Selling: Eight Steps to Success from the World's Best Sales Force
Rob JollesFocus first on your customer's needs and decision-making process, instead of on the selling process. Jolles provides a systematic, repeatable, predictable approach that teaches you to anticipate and influence behavior as the customer moves through an eight-stage "decision cycle" and ultimately discovers his or her needs.
Relationship Economics: Transform Your Most Valuable Business Contacts into Personal and Professional Success
David NourThere is one element of your business you can't afford not to invest in. Relationships. Author and social networking strategist David Nour asserts that relationships are not just something to develop because of a successful business exchange—relationships are at the foundation of building and growing a successful business. As Nour puts it, "Relationship Economics isn't about networking. It's about learning how to invest in people for an extraordinary return." This book goes beyond merely explaining concepts to act as a practical guide for readers—a truly valuable combination.
Selling Real Estate Services: Third-Level Secrets of Top Producers
Robert A. PotterWhether you're a real estate broker, lender, manager, builder, or designer, Selling Real Estate Services will show you how to join the ranks of the top producers. Author Robert Potter shows you how to get chosen over your best competitors and stop competing on price. The secret is called Third-Level Selling. It's the technique that the most successful real estate service providers use to build strategic partnerships, win new business, and retain committed clients. If you want to grow your business, improve your reputation, and gain loyal long-term clients, Selling Real Estate Services is the resource you need.
Winning In The Invisible Market: A Guide To Selling Professional Services In Turbulent Times
Robert A. PotterSell less and win more. The more you know about how and why the service buyer makes the decision to use a certain service, or the decision to choose a particular service provider, the more you can align your message and service solution to fit the client's need, situation and decision-making process.
Loyalty Rules: How Today's Leaders Build Lasting Relationships
Frederick F. ReichheldIn a business environment that thrives on networks of mutually beneficial relationships, says Reichheld, it is the ability to build strong bonds of loyalty—not short-term profits—that has become the "acid test" of leadership. Providing tools for implementing the timeless principles of loyalty in a volatile economy, Loyalty Rules is a practical guidebook for taking the high road in business—the only road that leads to lasting success.
The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing: Violate Them at Your Own Risk!
Al Ries & Jack TroutThe premise behind this book is that in order for marketing strategies to work, they must be in tune with some quintessential force in the marketplace. Just as the laws of physics define the workings of the universe, so do successful marketing programs conform to the "22 Laws."
Getting to 'Closed': A Proven Program to Accelerate the Sales Cycle and Increase Commissions
Stephen SchiffmanDon't waste your time on prospects that aren't viable! This book presents effective strategies to turn prospects into revenue.
The Art of Speedreading People: How to Size People Up and Speak Their Language
Paul Tieger & Barbara Barron-TiegerYou've heard of speed-reading text—now you can learn to "speed read" personalities. Paul Tieger and Barbara Barron-Tieger show how easy it is to identify key personality characteristics and how you can use this knowledge to communicate more effectively and achieve faster results. Whether your goal is to deal more successfully with coworkers or employees, friends or family members, prospective customers or clients, The Art of Speed Reading People will give you a powerful advantage in communicating with all types of people.
Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age
Duncan J. WattsThink you're not part of a network of people that could support the shift to a fully referral-based business? Think again! When the power goes out, when we find that a stranger knows someone we know, when dot-com stocks soar in price, networks are evident. In Six Degrees, sociologist Duncan Watts examines networks like these: what they are, how they're being studied, and what we can use them for.
Cross Cultural
Redefining Global Strategy: Crossing Borders in a World Where Differences Still Matter
Pankaj GhemawatCross-border differences are larger than we often assume, and in this "semiglobalized" world, one-size-fits-all strategies don't stand a chance. Crucial for any business competing across borders, this book will transform the way you approach global strategy.
When Cultures Collide: Leading Across Cultures
Lewis D. RichardRichard Lewis provides a rich and enlightening global guide to working and communicating across cultures and countries. From India to Ireland, Mexico to Malaysia, Belgium to Brazil, this classic look at what it takes to succeed in international business examines in-depth how our own culture and language affect the ways in which we organize our world, think, feel, and respond.
Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands: How to Do Business in Sixty Countries
Terri MorrisonIn a global economy, it is crucial for business people to be sensitive to cultural differences. And although the best reason for doing so may be ethical, it's great for business as well! This is an invaluable book for "doing well while doing good" in your intercultural relations, covering the protocols of appointments, business entertaining, greetings, forms of address, gestures, dress, and gifts in 60 of the nations you're most likely to be doing business.
General Commercial Real Estate
Systems for Success: The Complete Guide to Selling, Leasing, Presenting, Negotiating & Serving in Commercial Real Estate [Free E-Book]
Mike LipseyMike Lipsey's Systems for Success: The Complete Guide to Selling, Leasing, Presenting, Negotiating & Serving in Commercial Real Estate is the comprehensive “cookbook” on sales and leasing.
Tenants or Guests: Revolutionary Changes in Customer Service for the Commercial Real Estate Industry [Free E-Book]
Mike LipseyMike Lipsey's Tenants or Guests: Revolutionary Changes in Customer Service for the Commercial Real Estate Industry addresses service delivery in commercial real estate, specifically targeting property managers and asset managers.
Leadership in Commercial Real Estate: The Ethical Leadership of Robert E. Lee [Free E-Book]
Mike LipseyMike Lipsey's fiction/non-fiction Leadership in Commercial Real Estate: The Ethical Leadership of Robert E. Lee is spoken from the view of a top-performing tenant rep broker, receiving lessons in leadership from Robert E. Lee.
Brokers Who Dominate: 8 Traits of Top Producers
Rod SantomassimoTop producers share how they prospect with less effort, consistently win more business, leverage technology, secure top-of-mind position over competitors, and more. Use their strategies, tactics, marketing approaches, and support structures to achieve exceptional growth and performance, no matter your current level of experience.
How to Succeed in Commercial Real Estate
John L. BowmanThis practical book is valuable for those new to the business as well as experienced brokers and managers who want to evaluate and strengthen their current strategies. Areas of focus include listings, negotiations, contracts and sales, including coverage of the four main speicalty areas—retail, office, industrial, and investment—as well as crossovers and emerging specialties.
The Handbook of Commercial Real Estate Investing: State of the Art Standards for Investment Transactions, asset Management, and Financial Reporting
John McMahanThis reference, authored by real estate veteran John McMahan, offers readers a comprehensive and easy-to-use guide to the essential aspects of managing and investing in commercial real estate. Here, McMahan delves into the primary elements of the real estate industry—investment transactions, asset management, and enterprise management—and provides readers with practical methods and procedures to apply for each.
The Commercial Lease Guidebook: Learn How to Win the Leasing Game!
Thomas G. MitchellThe book's step-by-step review system makes reading the commercial lease a snap for anyone. Most of the commonly included provision in retail, office, industrial, and ground leases are explained from both the landlord's and tenant's points of view. Humorous illustrations and plain language make this something both producers and support professionals can understand and enjoy.
Commercial Real Estate Workouts
Stuart M. SaftCommercial Real Estate Workouts gives readers a broad range of guidance to the structure and maintenance of real estate workouts. Topics include: contracts, environmental considerations, reacting to real estate defaults, commercial loan workouts, and foreclosure and other lender remedies—to name just a few of the issues covered.
Value Added: Successful Strategies for Listing & Selling Investment Real Estate
Brad UmanskyValue Added is a book for brokers, by a broker. This step-by-step guide for growing your commercial real estate investment business teaches you the details of the business, from getting the listing to closing the deal.
Maximizing Performance
Uncertainty: Turning Fear and Doubt into Fuel for Brilliance
Jonathan FieldsDrawing on extensive case studies and research, Fields shares a set of detailed personal practices and environmental changes that can not only humanize the creative process, but also allow individuals and teams to stay more open to opportunity and play a bigger creative game.
Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard
Chip Heath & Dan HeathIn a compelling, story-driven narrative, the Heaths bring together decades of counterintuitive research in psychology, sociology, and other fields to shed new light on how we can effect transformative change. Switch shows that successful changes follow a pattern, a pattern you can use to make the changes that matter to you, whether your interest is in changing the world or changing your waistline.
Take Your iPad to Work
Brian ProffittTake Your iPad to Work is for anyone who wants to get started using the iPad in a professional environment. By demonstrating the different types of business apps available for the iPad, this book will show you how using an iPad in many situations is actually more convenient and productive than using a laptop or a PC. You'll also be able to make a stronger case for using the iPad effectively in your place of business.
The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness
Dave RamseyThe success stories speak for themselves in this book from money maestro Dave Ramsey. Instead of promising the normal dose of quick fixes, Ramsey offers a bold, no-nonsense approach to money matters, providing not only the how-to but also a grounded and uplifting hope for getting out of debt and achieving total financial health. Ramsey debunks the many myths of money (exposing the dangers of cash advance, rent-to-own, debt consolidation) and attacks the illusions and downright deceptions of the American dream, which encourages nothing but overspending and massive amounts of debt. The Total Money Makeover isn't theory. It works every single time. It works because it is simple. It works because it gets to the heart of the money problems: you.
Make Every Second Count: Time Management Tips and Techniques for More Success with Less Stress
Robert W. BlyToday, few people have the time to manage their multiple responsibilities and tasks. People need to learn how to use their time more efficiently. Business author Robert W. Bly teaches you how. This book is recommended for its abundant useful tips and techniques for optimizing your productivity, enhancing your performance and becoming more efficient.
18 Minutes: Find Your Focus, Master Distraction, and Get the Right Things Done
Peter BregmanBased upon his weekly Harvard Business Review columns, 18 Minutes clearly shows how busy people can cut through all the daily clutter and distractions and find a way to focus on those key items which are truly the top priorities in our lives. Bregman works from the premise that the best way to combat constant and distracting interruptions is to create productive distractions of one's own.
Breaking the Rules: Removing the Obstacles to Effortless High Performance
Kurt WrightBreaking the Rules is both an intensely personal self-improvement book and a business management book. On the self-improvement side it is a personal guide for discovering what you are like at your very best and how to be that way more often. It offers a complete system of self-understanding based on the premise that being at your best is your natural state, and one you could be enjoying more often if you weren't doing so much to interfere with it. The author invites readers to join him in a discovery learning process that reveals how to stop interfering and learn to tap into and begin to work with the natural guidance that is readily available through your inner intuitive knowing.
Napoleon Hill's Keys to Success: The 17 Principles of Personal Achievement
Napoleon HillCompiled from Hill's teaching materials, lectures, and articles, Napoleon Hill's Keys to Success provides mental exercises, self-analysis techniques, powerful encouragement, and straightforward advice to anyone seeking personal and financial improvement. In addition to Hill's many personal true-life examples of the principles in action, there are also contemporary illustrations featuring dynamos like Bill Gates, Peter Lynch, and Donna Karan.
Nice Girls Just Don't Get It
Lois P. Frankel, Ph.D. & Carol Frohlinger, J.D.Offering the same brand of practical, no-holds-barred, expert advice that made Nice Girls Don't Get the Corner Office an international million-copy bestseller, Nice Girls Just Don't Get It teaches us the skills we need to turn from a nice girl into a winning woman, not just in our careers but in our relationships, families, and everyday lives.
Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
David AllenManagement consultant and trainer David Allen shares his secrets and strategies for being more productive in the workplace with less stress.
Recommended by Gregg Wassmansdorf
How to Manage Meetings (The Sunday Time Creating Success)
Alan BarkerStop holding meaningless meetings. Let communication expert Alan Barker show you how to make your meetings matter. This easy-to-read book sheds light on what you need to know so you can hold a meaningful meeting—from preparation to follow-up, group dynamics and problem solving. If you want meetings that produce results, this book is a must read.
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Steven R. CoveyStephen Covey, an internationally respected leadership authority, realizes that true success encompasses a balance of personal and professional effectiveness, so this book is a manual for performing better in both arenas.
The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness
Stephen R. CoveyThe original seven habits of highly successful people are still relevant, but the new Information/Knowledge Worker Age calls for an eighth habit to achieve excellence.
First Things First: To Live, to Love, to Learn, to Leave a Legacy
Steven R. Covey, A. Roger Merrill & Rebecca R. MerrillUsing this book will help you create balance between your personal and professional responsibilities by putting first things first and acting on them. Covey teaches an organizing process that helps you categorize tasks so you focus on what is important, not merely what is urgent.
What Got You Here Won't Get You There in Sales: How Successful Salespeople Take it to the Next Level
Marshall Goldsmith, Bill Hawkins & Don BrownWhat Got You Here Won’t Get You There in Sales! provides simple-to-use tools for maintaining and leveraging quality personal connections by doing something much easier than learning new behaviors: simply stopping old ones.
What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful
Marshall Goldsmith with Mark ReiterAre you ready to make an already thriving career even more so? Take some advice from renowned executive coach Marshall Goldsmith—look in the mirror. Some of those habits and character traits that may have helped you on your path to success might just present a road block to further achievement now that you are a leader. Goldsmith highlights specific behaviors that can keep you from further success and offers straightforward, effective advice on how to make positive changes so you can keep moving forward. What's holding you back?
Think and Grow Rich
Napoleon HillInspired by Andrew Carnegie's own formula for success, Napoleon Hill offers you insight into the mind and the role it plays in your success. And he deftly complements this with practical tips and steps to get you where you want to be. This classic book remains a pertinent must-read.
Cut to the Chase: and 99 Other Rules to Liberate Yourself and Gain Back the Gift of Time
Stuart R. LevineLevine reveals 100 no-nonsense rules on how to be more effective at work and make the best use of your most precious resource: your time.
Recommended by Gregg Wassmansdorf
The Time Trap: The Classic Book on Time Management
Alec MacKenzieNot enough hours in your day? This book is for you. In this straightforward and authoritative work, author Alec MacKenzie doesn't tiptoe around what causes your time management issues, the problem is clear: It's you. It's human nature. According to MacKenzie, self-management is at the root of effectively controlling your time. And in this book, you'll get tools, tips and tactics that will help you recognize your role in your time crunch, change your behaviors and avoid falling into the trap of time wasters. The subtitle really says it all: This is the classic book on time management—a definite must read.
Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School
John MedinaHave you ever wondered if multi-tasking is a myth? If men and women do have different brains? Or if you can teach an old dog new tricks? This humorous, insightful, and surprisingly accessible read answers these questions and more. Join developmental molecular scientist John Medina as he discusses twelve brain rules (how the human brain really functions) and shares transformative methods to apply each of these in daily life. Start really using your head!
Time Management from the Inside Out: The Foolproof System for Taking Control of Your Schedule—and Your Life
Julie MorgensternYou can't make more hours in a day, but you can make the hours you have count for more. Uncover what keeps you from successfully managing your time and learn to develop your strengths to create a time-management system that will work for you. Morgenstern shows you how to analyze, strategize, and then attack the problem of a cluttered calendar.
Leadership
Have a Nice Conflict: How to Find Success and Satisfaction in the Most Unlikely Places
Tim Scudder, Michael Patterson & Kent MitchellHave a Nice Conflict helps to make sense of the dynamics between different types of people and then details a five-step framework to prevent potential conflict and effectively manage conflict.
It's Not Just Who You Know: Transform Your Life (and Your Organization) by Turning Colleagues and Contacts into Lasting, Genuine Relationships
Tommy SpauldingIn the bestselling tradition of Dale Carnegie’s classic, It’s Not Just Who You Know shows how each and every one of us can use the power of netgiving—of helping others—to expand our world and achieve our goals, and make a difference in our job, our career, and our community.
Taking People With You: The Only Way to Make Big Things Happen
David NovakDavid Novak learned long ago that you can't lead a great organization of any size without getting your people aligned, enthusiastic, and focused relentlessly on the mission. But how do you do that? There are countless leadership books, but how many will actually help a Taco Bell shift manager, a Fortune 500 CEO, a new entrepreneur, or anyone in between? This book has specific tools at the end of each chapter that will challenge you to reflect on how you're really doing on key aspects of leadership. Get ready to change the way you think about leadership-and more important, the way you practice it every day.
The Next Convergence: The Future of Economic Growth in a Multispeed World
Michael SpenceSpence clearly and boldly describes what’s at stake for all of us as he looks ahead to how the global economy will develop over the next fifty years. The Next Convergence is certain to spark a heated debate how best to move forward in the post-crisis period and reset the balance between national and international economic interests, and short-term fixes and long-term sustainability.
Fixing the Game: Bubbles, Crashes, and What Capitalism Can Learn from the NFL
Roger L. MartinIn Fixing the Game, Roger Martin reveals the culprit behind the sorry state of American capitalism: our deep and abiding commitment to the idea that the purpose of the firm is to maximize shareholder value. This theory has led to a massive growth in stock-based compensation for executives and, through this, to a naïve and wrongheaded linking of the real market—the business of designing, making, and selling products and services—with the expectations market—the business of trading stocks, options, and complex derivatives. Martin shows how this tight coupling has been engineered and lays out its results: a single-minded focus on the expectations market that will continue driving us from crisis to crisis—unless we act now.
Good Strategy Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It Matters
Richard RumeltDeveloping and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader, whether the CEO at a Fortune 100 company, an entrepreneur, a church pastor, the head of a school, or a government official. Richard Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with “strategy.” He debunks these elements of “bad strategy” and awakens an understanding of the power of a “good strategy.”
Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul
Howard Schultz & Joanne GordonIn 2008, Howard Schultz, the president and chairman of Starbucks, made the unprecedented decision to return as the CEO eight years after he stepped down from daily oversight of the company and became chairman. Concerned that Starbucks had lost its way, Schultz was determined to help it return to its core values and restore not only its financial health, but also its soul. In Onward, he shares the remarkable story of his return and the company's ongoing transformation under his leadership, revealing how, during one of the most tumultuous economic times in history, Starbucks again achieved profitability and sustainability without sacrificing humanity.
Wooden on Leadership
John Wooden & Steve JamisonThis month's recommendation comes from apriori International's Travis Carson, best known as the coach of the Market Force series. Travis says, "I am reading Wooden on Leadership for the third time. It is terrific because it combines winning principles from a championship coach (Wooden himself) and stories from those who benefitted through implementing his ideas (his players)."
How to Be an Even Better Manager: A Complete A-Z of Proven Techniques and Essential Skills
Michael ArmstrongThink you're good now? No matter how good you are, there's room to grow. Dive into three areas crucial to excellent management: managing people, managing activities and processes, and managing and developing yourself. Clear, direct, and relevant, this book is great for both the already-established manager, who wants to brush up and learn some new skills, and the manager just starting out looking for some solid ground to stand on.
On Becoming A Leader: The Leadership Classic
Warren BennisBusiness consultant and University of Southern California professor of business administration, Bennis here deplores what he considers a dearth of leadership in the world. This philosophically and psychologically rich volume seeks primarily to define leadership. Leaders in widely diverse areas all share the ability to unite people in a common purpose. But while a leader may demonstrate talent, its fulfillment depends largely on organizational response to the challenge.
The Hybrid Leader: Blending the Best of the Male and Female Leadership Styles
Trudy BourgeoisThis insightful book describes how you can change your leadership approach and positively impact the bottom line by: 1) Achieving a diversity breakthrough 2) Learning to nurture and serve employees 3) Understanding what motivates employees beyond money 4) Forming collaborative teams 5) Teaching and not telling employees 5) Building authentic relationships.
Go Put Your Strengths to Work: 6 Powerful Steps to Achieve Outstanding Performance
Marcus BuckinghamList your weaknesses. Now your strengths. Which list is longer? Often it is far too easy to focus on your weaknesses and neglect your strengths. In Go Put Your Strengths to Work, Buckingham shows you why building on your strengths, rather than your weaknesses, will ultimately be what leads to your greatest success. Not only does Buckingham provide insight into the growing strengths movement, he provides a plan to be part of it. He gives you a six-week, six-step plan of reading and taking action—he also includes a fifteen-minute habit you can continue weekly, helping you build your strengths long after you finish the book.
Enlightened Power: How Women are Transforming the Practice of Leadership
Lin Coughlin, Ellen Wingard & Keith HollihanHow are women transforming the practice of leadership in the 21st century? Enlightened Power is a first-of-a-kind book that answers this question—and forever changes the traditional notions involving women in leadership. The book features the accumulated wisdom of 40 influential men and women who represent the most compelling voices in the field.
Light Their Fire: Using Internal Marketing to Ignite Employee Performance and Wow Your Customers
Susan M. Drake, Michelle J. Gulman & Sara M. RobertsBefore you can sell to a customer, you have to sell to your employees. You have to build an internal brand, which, as the authors of Light Their Fire put it, is "the sum total of a company's relationship with its employees." This fundamental book uses real-world examples to illustrate why creating an internal brand is valuable—for you and your employees. And not only that, it shows you how to do it. Start tapping into the tremendous power of a loyal, well-informed, and energized workforce!
The Canoe Theory: A Business Success Strategy for Leaders and Associates
Marhnelle Hibbard, Dave Hibbard & Jack StockmanToday, more than ever, employers and employees feel disconnected from one another. The Canoe Theory provides solutions to difficult challenges business leaders and employees alike face and details how to bridge the gap and "paddle" together.
Becoming a Manager: How New Managers Master the Challenges of Leadership
Linda A. HillNo book has captured the trials and traumas of the transition from star performer to competent manager better than Linda Hill's classic Becoming a Manager. In tracing and analyzing the experiences of nineteen new managers, Hill reveals the profound complexity and difficulty of the process of developing into a manager.
The Welch Way: 24 Lessons from the World's Greatest CEO
Jeffrey A. KramesJack Welch became one of history's most admired and successful CEOs by rewriting the rules of leadership and letting hands-on, frontline employees—instead of bureaucrats—tell him what needed to be done. The Welch Way distills Welch's management style into a fast-moving, hard-hitting plan for leadership success, one that will help anyone reach the top in virtually any professional setting.
Her Place at the Table: A Woman's Guide to Negotiating Five Key Challenges to Leadership Success
Deborah M. Kolb, Ph.D; Judith Williams, Ph.D.; & Carol Frohlinger, JDThis is a practical guide for any woman dealing with a demanding role. Drawing on extensive interviews with women leaders, the authors isolate key challenges women face in business and the high-impact strategies that can overcome them. Want a leadership edge? This book is a must-read!
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable
Patrick M. LencioniIn his leadership fable, Lencioni reveals the five dysfunctions that go to the very heart of why teams—even the best ones—often struggle. He outlines a powerful model and actionable steps that can be used to overcome these common hurdles and build a cohesive, effective team.
Tribal Leadership: Leveraging Natural Groups to Build a Thriving Organization
Dave Logan, John King & Halee Fischer-WrightIt's a fact of life: birds flock, fish school, people "tribe." The often counterintuitive findings of Tribal Leadership will help leaders at today's major corporations and small businesses learn how to take people from adequate to outstanding, to discover the secrets that have led the highest-level tribes (like the team at Apple that designed the iPod) to remarkable heights, and to find new ways to succeed where others have failed.
Fish! A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results
Stephen C. Lundin, Harry Paul and John ChristensenHere's another management parable that draws its lesson from an unlikely source—this time it's the fun-loving fishmongers at Seattle's Pike Place Market. In Fish! the heroine, Mary Jane Ramirez, recently widowed and mother of two, is asked to engineer a turnaround of her company's troubled operations department, a group that authors Stephen Lundin, Harry Paul, and John Christensen describe as a "toxic energy dump."
Everyone Communicates, Few Connect: What the Most Effective People Do Differently
John C. MaxwellYou communicate every day. But are you making it count—are you connecting? In Everyone Communicates, Few Connect, author and leadership expert John Maxwell illustrates five principles and five practices to help you communicate to connect. These principles and practices are simple, straightforward and artfully woven into an easy read. This book is one worth checking out, because, as Maxwell demonstrates, when you connect with others you are better able to create the results in life that you desire.
Meetings Made Easy
Frances A. MicaleEveryone who has ever attended a meeting has struggled at one time or another with how to make meetings more productive. Author and professional facilitator Frances A. Micale offers step-by-step instruction on how to determine when a meeting is needed, shortcuts to creating and sticking to a results-driven agenda, how to conduct an orderly conference call, and much more.
Quick Team-Building Activities for Busy Managers: 50 Exercises That Get Results in Just 15 Minutes
Brian Cole MillerNo matter the group, no matter the budget, whether you're building a team or developing an existing one—this book has something for you. This handy reference outlines brief, but engaging, team-building activities that people actually want to participate in. Find exercises for dealing with change, for facilitating conversation, for promoting the right kind of competition, and more.
Influencer: The Power to Change Anything
K. Patterson, J. Grenny, D. Maxfield, R. McMillan, and A. SwitzlerFrom the bestselling authors who taught the world how to have Crucial Conversations comes Influencer, a thought-provoking book that combines the remarkable insights of behavioral scientists and business leaders with the astonishing stories of high-powered influencers from all walks of life. You'll be taught each and every step of the influence process, including robust strategies for making change inevitable in your personal life, your business, and your world. Tap into the power of influence and change the way you change minds.
Quiet Leadership: Six Steps to Transforming Performance at Work
David RockThis transformative book offers an innovative method for bringing out the best in those you lead, without telling them what to do. Author David Rock effectively translates the latest in research on brain function into the idea of quiet leadership. The six practical steps Rock offers will not only help you improve your own thinking and performance, it will help you do the same for others. Quiet leadership: a whole new way to communicate.
Group Genius: The Creative Power of Collaboration
Keith SawyerStep aside necessity—collaboration is truly the mother of invention. Sawyer offers a series of illustrative stories about how creative sparks fly and innovations occur in relationship. Guidelines suggest how the culture and structures of collaboration promote creative genius among ordinary people...to achieve extraordinary results.
Innovation to the Core: A Blueprint for Transforming the Way Your Company Innovates
Peter Skarzynski & Rowan GibsonInnovation is becoming increasingly invaluable in businesses today. Not only does this book explain what it means to innovate, it clearly and compellingly shows you how to do so. Authors Skarzynski and Gibson bring together a wealth of information and real-world experience for this radical guide—and they give you hands-on tools to help you translate your learning into real-world action. Spend some time with these experts and learn how to instill innovation to the core of your business.
Jack Welch on Leadership
Robert SlaterJack Welch on Leadership distills the best selling Jack Welch and the GE Way into 23 of Welch's leadership secrets and traits, and provides Welch devotees across the nation and around the globe with a rare glimpse into the mind and methods of the man Tom Brokaw dubbed "the smartest boss I ever had."
The Extraordinary Leader: Turning Good Managers Into Great Leaders
John H. Zenger and Joseph FolkmanLearn to lead. Leadership is not just something a person has a knack for or doesn't: Leadership is a skill. And like other skills, it can be learned, refined, developed. In this essential read, The Extraordinary Leader, authors Zenger and Folkman offer a remarkably straightforward approach to leadership development. They provide a simple, actionable model of leadership that focuses on a growing a person's strengths rather than patching up weaknesses. The information here, backed by an unrivaled depth of market research, is insight you can apply to yourself or your organization.
Market Identity
Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant
W. Chan Kim and Renée MauborgneEngineer a business plan that no-one can compete with. Kim and Mauborgne's blue ocean metaphor summarizes the kind of expanding, competitor-free markets that innovative companies can navigate. Using dozens of examples—from Southwest Airlines and the Cirque du Soleil to Curves and Starbucks—they present the tools and frameworks they've developed specifically for the task of analyzing blue oceans. A precise, actionable plan for changing the way you do business: swim for open waters.
The Power of Personal Branding: Creating Celebrity Status with Your Target Audience
Tim O'BrienThere are two things which can catapult you and your business into the limelight over night. Technology is one and a compelling personal brand is the other. The Power of Personal Branding is a no nonsense, tell it like it is book which reveals exactly what we need to do to create the Lance Armstrong or Oprah Winfrey personal brand with our own target audiences. You will learn: 1) What exactly is a personal brand 2) Why having a great personal brand is essential for success today 3) The secret to avoiding commoditization by your target audience 4) How to differentiate yourself from the competition in seconds 5) How to select the right personal brand for you 6) Dozens of proven techniques for creating personal brand irresistibility.
Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind, 20th Anniversary Edition
Al Ries & Jack TroutIn a world supersaturated with information, the minds of consumers are already on overload. How do you cut through the noise and create a lasting impression? In their marketing classic, authors Al Ries and Jack Trout address the concept of creating your niche, of making your place in the minds of buyers—of product positioning—and its ultimate value in the market. Using real-world stories and a sense of humor, Ries and Trout illuminate the philosophy of positioning in an approachable way that leaves readers with principles they can apply to their own lives.
Negotiating
Everyday Negotiation: Navigating the Hidden Agendas in Bargaining
Deborah M. Kolb, Ph.D. & Judith Williams, Ph.D.This book shows how to recognize the "shadow negotiation"—where the unspoken attitudes, hidden assumptions, and conflicting agendas that drive the bargaining process play out—and how to put that knowledge to work. Originally titled The Shadow Negotiation and named by Harvard Business Review as one the Ten Best Books of 2000, this best-selling book reveals how women can master the hidden agendas that determine bargaining success.
Negotiating Commercial Real Estate Leases
Martin I. ZankelExamine the essential business issues underlying various lease clauses from both sides of the negotiating table—tenant and landlord alike. Look at what alternative clauses and solutions can be offered to create a deal that works for both parties. Wit and wisdom break down the confusing legalisms and offer basic negotiating strategies.
Win-Lose Negotiating Tactics
Secrets of Power Negotiating
Roger DawsonSecrets of Power Negotiating covers every aspect of the negotiating process with practical, proven advice: from beginning steps to critical final moves, how to recognize unethical tactics, key principles to the Power Negotiating strategy, why money is not as important as everyone thinks, negotiating pressure points, understanding the other party and gaining the upper hand, and analyses of different negotiating styles.
Win-Win Negotiating Tactics
Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In
Roger Fisher, William L. Ury & Bruce PattonWe're constantly negotiating in our lives, whether it's convincing the kids to do their homework or settling million-dollar lawsuits. For those who need help winning these battles, Roger Fisher has developed a simple and straightforward five-step system for how to behave in negotiations.
The Negotiation Fieldbook
Grande LumIn The Negotiation Fieldbook, distinguished expert Grande Lum shares his insight on the critical art of achieving win-win negotiations every time. Lum provides you with more than blanket theories—he equips you with the tools you'll need for success, and better yet, shows you how to use them. Step-by-step, Lum guides you through navigating the all-too-often choppy waters of a negotiation. Walk away from the table with everyone satisfied.
Getting Past No
William UryIn "Getting Past No" Ury discusses the nuances and niceties of negotiating using a joint problem solving approach which is "interest based" rather than being "rights based" or "power based."
The Power of a Positive No: How to Say No and Still Get to Yes
William UryTwenty-five years after the publication of the best-selling Getting to Yes, Ury addresses the other side of the coin, but his version of "No" is not a simple rejection. "A Positive No begins with Yes and ends with Yes," he says, because it defines the nay-sayer's self-interests and paves the way for a continued relationship. His reminders to consider the other person's perspective while asserting your own position create a clear, unambiguous path to win-win situations.
New Classics
What Technology Wants
Kevin KellyThis provocative book introduces a brand-new view of technology. It suggests that technology as a whole is not a jumble of wires and metal but a living, evolving organism that has its own unconscious needs and tendencies. Kevin Kelly looks out through the eyes of this global technological system to discover "what it wants." He uses vivid examples from the past to trace technology's long course and then follows a dozen trajectories of technology into the near future to project where technology is headed.
Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness
Richard H. Thaler & Cass R. SunsteinNudge is about choices—what influences them, how we make them and how to help people make better choices. Thaler and Sunstein demonstrate that sensible "choice architecture" can successfully nudge people towards the best decisions without restricting their freedom of choice.
The Starfish and the Spider
Ori Brafman & Rod A. BeckströmIn this compelling and entertaining read, authors Brafman and Beckström take a look at a critical change happing in business today: the emergence of the starfish. The starfish is the new animal in the business world: It's a decentralized, "leaderless organization." It doesn't have a head, and it doesn't need one. Brafman and Beckström compare this to the traditional hierarchical business—the spider—which will fail entirely without a leader. Here, explore the fundamental differences between the two structures and learn what the benefits are to you of incorporating starfish qualities into your business.
Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else
Geoff ColvinGreatness is not something you're born with. Greatness is something you achieve. It is something you work for, according to respected business journalist Geoff Colvin. In Talent is Overrated, Colvin lays out the argument that no matter the field, the best of the best did not get where they are because they entered the world gifted—they got where they are because they work hard and they practice. And, here's the key, they practice in a particular way. They practice deliberately. This book outlines the why and the how of deliberate practice. It is a call to action and a plan of attack all in one.
The World is Flat
Thomas L. FriedmanGlobalization is driven not by major corporations but by digitally connected individual innovators who increasingly compete for and win high-level work.
Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking
Malcolm GladwellBlink is a book about how we think without thinking, about choices that seem to made in an instant—in the blink of an eye—that actually aren't as simple as they seem. It is revealed that great decision makers aren't those who process the most information or spend the most time deliberating, but those who have perfected the art of "thin-slicing"—filtering the very few factors that matter from an overwhelming number of variables. The key is to rely on our "adaptive unconscious"—a 24/7 mental valet—that provides us with instant and sophisticated information to warn of danger, read a stranger, or react to a new idea. Drawing on cutting-edge neuroscience and psychology, Blink changes the way you understand every decision you and your clients make.
Outliers
Malcolm GladwellDid you know that most pro hockey players are born in January? Or that the most powerful and successful lawyers in New York City can trace their roots to the same place? In his newest release, Outliers: The Story of Success, Gladwell brings readers a provocative look into another seemingly-ordinary experience: personal success. Outliers searches the lives of successful people, comparing trends in culture, community, family, and more to show readers what lies behind their stories. While the book knocks down the idea of a self-made man, Gladwell asserts that personal success is still within reach, but it's more of a group effort.
The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
Malcolm GladwellLittle changes can have big effects; when small numbers of people start behaving differently, that behavior can ripple outward until a critical mass or "tipping point" is reached, changing the world.
Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ
Daniel GolemanBe smarter than your IQ. In this New York Times bestseller, psychologist Daniel Goleman defines emotional intelligence as a set of skills, like initiative and social competence, that people can—and should—work to develop. Goleman explores the importance of this often underrated form of intellect and offers compelling illustrations the role these skills play in success.
Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships
Daniel GolemanAs Daniel Goleman puts it, human beings are "wired to connect," and he's not talking about to the internet. This biological wiring means we are naturally social, and Goleman is here to show us why this matters. In Social Intelligence, Goleman illuminates the core concepts of social neuroscience and manages to make this topic interesting, accessible—and even applicable. He shows readers the numerous and varied ways that creating "I-You" connections (those where we treat people as people, not as things) positively and powerfully shapes our experiences and our biology. For a society smitten with technology that often isolates more than it unites, this book is a timely and commanding reminder of the necessity for human connection.
The Levity Effect: Why It Pays to Lighten Up
Adrian Gostick & Scott ChristopherJoin author Adrian Gostick and humorist Scott Christopher for an eye-opening look at the positive power of levity in the workplace. Drawing from ten years of research and extensive interviews and case studies, Gostick and Christopher weave together fact and fun as they show readers that good business doesn't have to be so serious after all.
Recommended by Gary Winkler
Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow's Big Changes
Mark Penn & E. Kinney ZalesneRelying on some of the best data available, Penn identifies more than 70 microtrends wielding great influence on business, politics, and our personal lives. Our cultures are no longer a melting pot. We are a collection of communities with many individual tastes and lifestyles. Those who recognize these emerging groups will prosper. Penn shows readers how to identify the microtrends that can transform a business enterprise, because in today's world, small groups can have the biggest impact.
The Four Agreements
Don Miguel RuizIn The Four Agreements shamanic teacher and healer Don Miguel Ruiz exposes self-limiting beliefs and presents a simple yet effective code of personal conduct learned from his Toltec ancestors.
How: Why HOW We Do Anything Means Everything...in Business (and in Life)
Dov SeidmanA good product, a great service—it's not enough. Not anymore. In this insightful and entertaining book, Dov Seidman shows readers why it's how you do things, not just what you do, that will lead to sustainable success in our increasingly transparent world. Seidman supports his innovative approach with amusing anecdotes and scientific research alike. The end result: a compelling argument that, today, success is built on openness, integrity, values and ethics—that how you do anything means everything.
The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable
Nassim Nicholas TalebWhat do you really know? At one time, people in Europe knew all swans were white—that is, until explorers found a black swan. Nassim Taleb builds beautifully on this story of an unexpected and highly impactful incident to create The Black Swan, a book that gives readers a chance to examine the Black Swans—rare, random and powerful events—that show up today. Not only does Taleb open the reader's eyes to see Black Swans, he illuminates why they are so significant, why they are so often overlooked, and how to interact with them.
Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Market
Nassim Nicholas TalebWhen accounting for success, the significance of random events is seldom considered and rarely understood. In this book, Taleb brings into focus the role of randomness in both life and business—how to recognize randomness, how to avoid confusing luck with skill, and how to take all this into consideration when making decisions. This eloquent and entertaining book is a wise choice for those looking to better understand the nature of success and failure.
Presentation Skills
The Exceptional Presenter: A Proven Formula to Open Up and Own the Room
Timothy J. KoegelThe Exceptional Presenter by Timothy J. Koegel is 187 direct-to-the-point pages using a simple process for dynamic presentations. Of the books I've read, this is easy to understand and duplicate the process. And it can be read in one cross-country plane flight. (The book contains practice and work sheets.)
Sales Presentations - Small Group Settings
Secrets of Power Presentations
Peter Urs BenderThis book shows simply and clearly how to become a strong and productive presenter: how to close a sale, move an idea to its next step, make an impression. Use his five-part method to reach your full potential.
Sales Presentations - One-on-One Settings
Selling to the Top: David Peoples' Executive Selling Skills
David PeoplesBased on real sales experience at the highest level, David Peoples' advice can increase sales well beyond any expectation. This book is must reading for everyone whose products or services involve big money, multiple decision makers, long sales cycles, and top management approval.
Close More Sales!: Persuasion Skills That Boost Your Selling Power
Michael StewartAs a professional sales trainer, Mike Stewart has targeted the most rampant selling errors. And he's developed a set of practical guidelines for overcoming the problems and achieving sales success.
Sales Presentations - Virtual
The Virtual Presenter's Handbook
Roger CourvilleVirtual presentation expert Roger Courville reveals his secrets for planning and delivering online presentations that get—and keep—remote attendees engaged. The first of its kind, The Virtual Presenter's Handbook provides practical guidance for presenters, whether amateur or professional, about how to approach, adapt, and succeed in this new presentation environment.
Service Excellence
The Ultimate Question: Driving Good Profits and True Growth
Fred ReichheldTreat your clients ethically and honestly and you'll build a dedicated base that leads to steady growth and “good profits.” Fred Reichheld explains the difference between “good” and “bad” profits and how they impact revenue, how to use the “Net Promoter Score” (NPS) to measure customer loyalty, and how to improve loyalty.
Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose
Tony HsiehHsieh, CEO of Zappos.com, shares his evolution as an entrepreneur; his company's commitment to brand, culture and pipeline talent development; and his philosophy for applying the science of happiness to business and life.
The Six Principles of Service Excellence
Theo Gilbert-JamisonA simple, yet comprehensive, step-by-step process that will lead any organization (small or large) to achieving and sustaining a work environment that will foster superior employee performance and service excellence. More than a theory or concept, it is about making sound decisions and implementing interventions that will create lasting results.
Nordstrom Way: The Inside Story of America's #1 Customer-service Company
Robert Spector & Patrick D. McCarthyIf you hear the name Nordstrom and think excellent customer service, you are certainly not alone. This department store has long been associated with superior service. In The Nordstrom Way, author Robert Spector and Nordstrom sales associate Patrick McCarthy give us the inside story of how Nordstrom earned (and keeps) this reputation. The customer service practices Nordstrom employs, which are shared here, are applicable beyond department store walls; this book, a blend of case studies, real life stories and Nordstrom history, is both enjoyable and applicable for anyone in customer service.
Sustainability
How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage
Daniel C. Esty & Andrew S. WinstonTwo experts from Yale tackle environmental responsibility from every angle in this thorough, earnest guidebook: pragmatically, passionately, financially and historically. The authors examine forward-thinking, green-friendly companies and set out to assess honestly their path toward environmental responsibility, and its impact on a company's bottom line, customers, suppliers and reputation.
Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution—and How It Can Renew America
Thomas L. FriedmanFriedman explains how global warming, rapidly growing populations, and the astonishing expansion of the world's middle class through globalization have produced a planet that is "hot, flat, and crowded." Already the earth is being affected in ways that threaten to make it dangerously unstable. In just a few years, it will be too late to fix things—unless we step up now and take the lead in a worldwide effort to replace our wasteful, inefficient energy practices with a strategy for clean energy, energy efficiency, and conservation that Friedman calls Code Green.
The Ecology of Commerce
Paul HawkenThis ecological analysis of business outlines the environmentally destructive aspects of many current practices, but offers the vision of businesses—large and small alike—adopting new practices to promote environmental restoration. Hawken proposes a culture of business in which the natural world is allowed to flourish as well, and calls for First World businesses to reduce their consumption of energy and resources by 80 percent in the next 50 years.
The Green Collar Economy: How One Solution Can Fix Our Two Biggest Problems
Van JonesThe Green Collar Economy is not a dire warning but rather a substantive and viable plan for solving the biggest issues facing the country—the failing economy and our devastated environment. From a distance, it appears that these two problems are separate, but when we look closer, the connection becomes unmistakable. Van Jones illustrates how we can invent and invest our way out of the pollution-based grey economy and into the healthy new green economy. Built by a broad coalition deeply rooted in the lives and struggles of ordinary people, this path has the practical benefit of both cutting energy prices and generating enough work to pull the U.S. economy out of its present death spiral.
Strategies for the Green Economy: Opportunities and Challenges in the New World of Business
Joel MakowerBusinesses are entering the green marketplace at breakneck speed to keep pace with customer and societal demands to reduce their environmental impacts. But greening one's business is no small feat. While clear opportunities abound in this new economy, business leaders pursuing a green strategy are finding few roadmaps and established rules and plenty of hidden twists and turns. Including groundbreaking data about customers' attitudes and behaviors regarding green products and services, Strategies for the Green Economy will lead you through the thicket of finicky customers, confusing research reports, and public cynicism regarding green marketing claims—and place you on solid footing in the growing green economy.
Green Recovery: Get Lean, Get Smart and Emerge from the Downturn on Top
Andrew S. WinstonWhile tough economic times are turning some companies away from green business initiatives, Andrew Winston argues that going green is a move you can't afford not to make in this economy. In Green Recovery, Winston explores the reasons behind—and the benefits of—green business. He calls on real world examples from leading companies such as Boeing, DuPont and Microsoft to illustrate the impact of going green: from upping employee motivation to boosting the bottom line. And, not only does Winston provide a compelling case for going green, he provides a guide for how to get there.