The Real Thing: Truth and Power at the Coca-Cola Company


Constance L. Hays - 2004
    With fresh insights and a penetrating eye, New York Times reporter Constance L. Hays examines a century of Coca-Cola history through deft portraits of the charismatic, driven men who used luck, spin, and the open door of enterprise to turn a beverage with no nutritional value into a remedy, a refreshment, and an international object of consumer desire. The rise of Coke is also a catalog of carbonation, soda fountains, dynastic bottling businesses, global expansion, and outsize promotional campaigns, not all of which succeeded. By examining relationships at every level of the company, Hays reveals the psyche of a great American corporation–and also tells a larger story about business and this nation’s culture.

Executive Power: Use the Greatest Collection of Psychological Strategies to Create an Automatic Advantage in Any Business Situation


David J. Lieberman - 2008
    This book contains specific, carefully formulated psychological tactics that can be applied to any business situation, with any person. This book offers readers the opportunity to use the most important psychological tools governing human behavior, not just to level the playing field, but to create an automatic advantage in today's business world. The book will arm the reader with the tactics to: * Get back any customer you've lost. * Find out who in your company is loyal to you and who is not. * Get any group of people to get along and work as a team. * Turn a lazy worker into an ambitious go-getter. * Fire anyone easily, without an argument or even a difficult conversation. * Dilute the impact of negative publicity quickly. * Collect money owed, no matter how long it's been overdue. * Inspire your client, colleague, or boss to go along with your idea or plan. * Manage the unmanageable-get any employee to fall in line with the company line.

Coach: The A. L. Williams Story


Art Williams - 2006
    Williams and it "ragtag army of part-timers" took on a Goliath-sezed insurance industry.

Lead from the Heart: Transformational Leadership for the 21st Century


Mark C. Crowley - 2011
    More than half of all workers hate their jobs. In fact, job satisfaction and employee engagement have been declining for twenty-two straight years.One hundred years ago, a job and a paycheck kept workers satisfied. Now, pay barely makes the list. Employees' needs have evolved dramatically. But our leadership practices have failed to keep up.In Lead From The Heart, Mark C. Crowley presents compelling new evidence that the solution leaders need lies in the last place traditional business would seek it: the human heart. Twenty-first-century employees need to feel... valued, respected, developed, and cared for. Their work has to matter. Recent scientific discoveries tell us that it's the heart, and not the mind, that drives human performance and achievement.Drawing on decades of experience as a senior leader for regional and national financial institutions, Mark C. Crowley offers proof that leaders who intentionally engage the hearts of their employees will be rewarded with uncommon (and highly sustainable) performance and achievement. We've seen centuries of evidence of what the heart can do in sports, art, and music. Business is next.Lead From The Heart, and your employees will follow

Reinvention: Changing Your Life, Your Career, Your Future


Arlene Dickinson - 2019
    Her company was on the brink of disaster. Her sense of herself as a strong, confident leader was in tatters. She was overwhelmed by feelings of loss, fear, and shame. Five years later, her business is booming, she’s never been happier or more excited about the future, and she’s raised tens of millions of dollars and built a whole ecosystem to help other entrepreneurs.How did she turn things around? By following the process she’s always used to transform underperforming companies—only this time, she used it to transform her own life. Applying business principles to her personal life helped her figure out very quickly where she wanted to go and how to get there. Having a clear set of practical steps to follow kept her on track when emotions threatened to derail her progress. In Reinvention, Dickinson shares this blueprint for locating your sense of purpose, realistically evaluating your strengths, assessing opportunities outside your comfort zone, and charting a bold new path. Whether you have a big career dream to achieve, or you need to rebuild after a personal setback, this step-by-step plan for reinvention will help you change your own life—for the better.

Blue Streak: Inside Jetblue, the Upstart That Rocked an Industry


Barbara Sturken Peterson - 2004
    Barbara S. Peterson has been reporting on JetBlue since the “Jet who?” days when few outsiders believed in the company. Drawing on exclusive interviews with more than seventy-five insiders, from mechanics on the tarmac to the CEO, she weaves together a dynamic story of how JetBlue has blended outstanding customer service, inspirational leadership, savvy marketing, and disciplined financial management to come out on top. “It’s fun to read about simple ideas that change the way we do things . . . and it’s always fun to watch the whoosh of good ideas hit the brick walls of habit and bureaucracy. . . .The smart, fast, little guy wins!” —Los Angeles Times “A quick, breezy read studded with mini-profiles, snippets of aviation history and amusing anecdotes.” —The Wall Street Journal “An engaging peek into the open cockpits of the airline industry, its foibles and pitfalls, written by someone who knows the industry, yet still loves to fly. This book is the chronicle of one little airline that could.” —Book Page “Peterson moves beyond personalities to detail how Neeleman crafted more of a branded travel experience than an airline.” —BusinessWeek “[Peterson] gets the inside scoop on JetBlue’s quirky corporate culture and Neeleman’s fresh approach to an antiquated business model.” —Advertising Age

Doing Action Research In Your Own Organization


David Coghlan - 2000
    In this brand new edition of the popular work, David Coghlan and Teresa Brannick provide an easy-to-follow, hands-on guide to every aspect of conducting an action research project in your own organization.Revised and updated, this Third Edition contains: An expanded discussion on politics and ethics of insider action researchAn expanded chapter on writing an action research dissertation and an action research report More case examples and reflective exercises taken from a wide variety of organizational settings

The Effective Hiring Manager


Mark Horstman - 2019
    The author's step-by-step approach makes the strategies easy to implement and help to ensure ongoing success.Hiring effectively is the single greatest long-term contribution to your organization. The only thing worse than having an open position is filling it with the wrong person. The Effective Hiring Manager offers a proven process for solving these problems and helping teams and organizations thrive.The fundamental principles of hiring and interviewing How to create criteria to hire by How to create excellent interview questions How to review resumes How to conduct phone screens How to structure an interview day How to conduct each interview How to capture interview results How to make an offer How to decline a candidate How to onboard candidates Written by Mark Horstman, co-founder of Manager Tools and an expert in training managers, The Effective Hiring Manager is an A to Z handbook to the successful hiring process. The book explores, in helpful detail, what it takes to hire the right person, for the right job, and the right team.

Single-Minded: My Life in Business


Claude Littner - 2016
    His abrupt style and zero-tolerance policy on nonsense have become the highlights of every series. But what is he like in real business?Single-Minded reveals the story of Claude's varied career and the turbulent years that shaped him. From being told at school that he would never amount to anything to his current status as a boardroom heavyweight both on-screen and off it, success has never come easy. Claude's complex, fascinating work has taken him into many different industries and countries, encompassing retail start-ups; knife-edge company rescue missions; the bruising rough-and-tumble of Premier League football; facing down French trade unions; taking on Texan oil barons in multi-million-dollar deals; and, in the private sphere, conquering life-threatening illness.Told with characteristic candour and disarming modesty, Single-Minded is an unflinching account of a remarkable career in the spotlight.

The Ten Principles Behind Great Customer Experiences (Financial Times Series)


Matt Watkinson - 2012
    They have a loud voice, a wealth of choice and their expectations are higher than ever. This book covers ten principles you can use to make real world improvements to your customers’ experiences, whatever your business does and whoever you are. For managers, leaders and those starting a new business, the book shows that making improvements customers will appreciate doesn’t need to be complicated or cost a fortune.

It's How We Play the Game: Build a Business. Take a Stand. Make a Difference.


Ed Stack - 2019
    A few years later, Dick expanded to a second location. In 1984, Ed bought the two stores from his father. Today DICK’s Sporting Goods is the largest sporting goods retailer in the country with over 800 locations and close to $9 billion in sales. It’s How We Play the Game tells the absorbing story of a complicated founder and an ambitious son—one who transformed a business by making it more than a business, conceiving it as a force for good in the communities it serves. The transformation Ed wrought wasn’t easy: economic headwinds nearly toppled the chain twice. But DICK’s support for embattled youth sports programs earned the stores surprising loyalty, and Ed was vocal in sounding the alarm about schools’ underfunding not just of sports but of other extracurriculars, which earned DICK’s even more respect. Ed’s toughest business decision came in the wake of yet another school shooting; this one at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in 2018. The senseless loss of life devastated Ed on many levels and he decided to take action. DICK’s became the first major retailer to pull all semi-automatic weapons from its shelves and raise the age of gun purchase to twenty-one. Despite being a gun owner himself who’d grown up around firearms, Ed’s strategy included destroying the $5 million of assault-style-type rifles then in DICK’s inventory. It was a profit-risking policy that would earn the outrage of some—even threats of harm—but turn Ed into a national hero. With vital lessons for anyone running a business and eye-opening reflections about what a company owes the people it serves, It’s How We Play the Game is the insightful story of a man who built one of America's most successful companies by following his heart.

Unleash the Warrior Within: Develop the Focus, Discipline, Confidence and Courage You Need to Achieve Unlimited Goals


Richard J. Machowicz - 2002
    A ten-year veteran of the Navy SEALs, he was trained to complete whatever mission was handed to him, under any condition, because failure was not an option. Now, in Unleash the Warrior Within, Machowicz takes the winning attitude and mental skills he mastered in service and shows readers how to use combat mentality to reach their goals in everyday life. Using his seven principles of combat—which include Create an Action Mind-Set, The Critical Keys to Conquering Anything, and Guarantee the Win—Machowicz shows readers how to master the arts of focus, discipline, and determination under any circumstances, giving them the tools they need to conquer fear and turn their ambitions and dreams into reality. A new preface is included in this paperback edition of this inspiring guide. "Machowicz gives you the tools necessary to ensure that you win in the battle of life."—Jim Rome, host of the nationally syndicated radio show, The Jungle, and FOX television's The Last Word

Too Many Bosses, Too Few Leaders: The Three Essential Principles You Need to Become an Extraordinary Leader


Rajeev Peshawaria - 2011
    He knows precisely what makes the difference between those who are simply bosses and those who are superior leaders, and between those who continue to rise to the top levels and those who get stuck along the way.In this lively and remarkably empowering book, Peshawaria offers readers the opportunity to experience the highest level of leadership training available in the world. Introducing the three core principles he has observed are the foundation of the best leadership––that great leaders clearly define their purpose and values; that nobody can motivate another person because everyone comes premotivated; and that a leader’s job is not to directly produce results but to create the conditions that will harness the energy of others—he details his unique and proven program for achieving leadership excellence. Sharing a wealth of illuminating stories, from those of Mulally’s achievement at Ford and Mack’s at Morgan Stanley, to how Harvey Golub and Ken Chenault successfully restored American Express to long-term sustainable growth, how Neville Isdell turned the Coca-Cola Company around, and the continuing prowess of Jeff Bezos in growing Amazon.com, he first reveals how extraordinary leaders marshal and sustain the level of energy in themselves that is required and how they enlist a core group of proficient co-leaders. He then outlines how to harness the energy and talents of those at all levels of an organization, igniting their motivation by following his RED guidelines for addressing their core needs concerning their Role, their work Environment, and their career Development. Finally, he introduces his unique Brains, Bones, and Nerves framework for: developing a clear strategy for competitive advantage (the Brains); crafting an optimal organizational structure (the Bones); and fostering a highly cooperative and motivated company culture (the Nerves). Filled with specific tips about the vital questions to ask and simple but powerful steps to follow, Too Many Bosses, Too Few Leaders is a manager’s essential tool kit for long-term superior performance.

The Mousedriver Chronicles: The True- Life Adventures Of Two First-time Entrepreneurs


John Lusk - 2002
    To the almost universal disdain of their friends and professors, these two turned down tempting job offers, borrowed money from friends and family, loaded up on credit card debt, and decided to start a single-product company to manufacture and market a computer mouse shaped like the head of a golf club. They watched enviously as nearly all of their friends became millionaires in the dot-com boom, but they persevered and forged their own path. To chart their progress and to keep themselves motivated against the odds, they kept a diary that recorded the realities of their everyday life as entrepreneurs. Out of their diary entries grew The MouseDriver Chronicles, an intimate, insightful, and often funny look into the minds of two entrepreneurs and how they brought a simple idea to market. From The MouseDriver Chronicles: "School was just about over, and the wondrous combination of brick-baking heat and relentless high humidity that defines summer in south Philadelphia wasn't too far off. We couldn't afford to wait around for it. We needed to blaze to San Francisco and get rolling. Fine. No problem. Except we didn't yet have an office in San Francisco. Or a place to live. Or MouseDrivers in stock. We had all our plans and ambition, but everything real about running a business was ahead of us. Immediately ahead."

Semper Fi: Business Leadership the Marine Corps Way


Dan Carrison - 1998
    Marine Corps has been a paragon of world-class leadership, excelling in the areas of motivation, training, and management. Semper Fi -- which since its hardcover publication has become a best-selling, business leadership classic -- shows readers how to adapt these proven practices for their own organizations. Semper Fi goes behind the scenes to pinpoint what works for the USMC, showing readers how to create a training and management culture that brings out the best in all their employees. The book gives readers tough, practical tips for: * inspiring individual initiative * rewarding hard work * encouraging loyalty * working with limited resources * dealing with change * "leading the troops"" at every level of the organization. "This is not," according to Dan Rather, "one of those mumbo-jumbo, pseudo-philosophical books on leadership. Semper Fi is a book you will actually USE, read, and refer to again and again."