In this step-by-step guide, he provides 50 1/2 answers drawn from his experience as an Amazon executive--and shows today's business leaders how to think like Amazon, strategize like Bezos, and beat the competition like nobody's business. Learn how to: Move forward to get back to Day 1--and change the status quo.Use the "working backwards" innovation and problem-solving approach to lead the way.Become a platform company--with the right platform strategy.Create customer obsession--and grant your customers superpowers.Experiment, fail, rinse, and repeat.Decentralize your way to digital greatness.Master the magic of small autonomous teams.Avoid the trap of past positions.Make better and faster decisions.Use metrics to create a culture of accountability and innovationUse AI and the Internet of Things to reinvent customer experiences.In addition to these targeted strategies, you'll receive a rare inside glimpse into how Jeff Bezos and Amazon take a remarkably consistent approach to innovate, explore new markets, and spark new growth. You'll understand the unique mindset and inner workings that drive Amazon's operational excellence, from its ground-up approach to new digital markets to its out-of-the-box attitudes on innovation. Along the way, you'll learn specific game-changing strategies that made Amazon stand out in a crowded digital world. These include actionable ideas that you can use to transform your culture, expand your business into digital, and become the kind of platform company that customers obsess over. Rossman also offers invaluable insights into the latest technologies, e-commerce marketing, online culture, and IoT disruptions that only an Amazon insider would know.If you want to compete and win in the digital era, you have to Think Like Amazon.

    A strategic plan helps crystalize the future of an organization--mapping a clear path from where the company stands today to where you wish it to be.It may sound complicated, but Brian Tracy knows how to make it simple. Throughout his career, he has shown countless leaders and organizations how to achieve stunning success. In this concise and practical book, he shares the most important lessons for strategic planning. Readers will discover how to:• Ask the five key questions vital to any strategic plan• Determine a corporate mission that lifts and inspires people• Gain valuable insight with market share/market growth and strategy/operations matrices• Define themselves in relation to their competition• Utilize the concept of "driving force"• Anticipate crises• Reposition their business with new products, services, and technologies• Measure success via clear financial objectives• And moreIncorporating examples ranging from Alexander the Great to IBM and General Electric, Tracy gives readers proven ideas for increasing their company's ROI and maximizing their strengths and opportunities. Powerful and portable, Business Strategy will help readers take control of their company's destiny.

    magazine's hugely popular columnists show how small-business people can deal with all kinds of tricky situations. People starting out in business tend to seek step-by-step formulas or specific rules, but in reality there are no magic bullets. Rather, says veteran entrepreneur Norm Brodsky, there's a mentality that helps street-smart people solve problems and pursue opportunities as they arise. He calls it 'the knack,' and it has made all the difference to the eight successful start-ups of his career. Brodsky explores this mind-set every month in Inc. magazine, in the hugely popular column he co-writes with journalist and author Bo Burlingham (best known for his acclaimed book Small Giants). In both their column and now their book, they tell stories about real companies facing real challenges, and show readers how to apply 'the knack' to their own businesses. Brodsky and Burlingham offer essential advice such as: -- Follow the numbers: that's the best way to spot problems before they become life threatening -- Keep focusing on your real goal--it's amazingly easy to get sidetracked by secondary concerns -- Don't get so close to the problem that you lose all perspective Brodsky and Burlingham prove that street smarts and business acumen can be within any entrepreneur's reach.

    Vaitheeswaran co-founded India’s first e-commerce company. Yet, years later, when e-commerce was exploding in India—despite enjoying first-mover advantage—Indiaplaza shut down. What went wrong? Lack of funding? Wrong strategies? Or was it ‘something else’?For the first time ever, Vaitheeswaran reveals that it was indeed something else—a set of inexplicable events that destroyed what could have been a profitable business (an extreme rarity among technology start-ups). He bares his extraordinary trials and tribulations while dealing with business failure and the impossible pressures that can threaten entrepreneurs in India. Coming at the back of stories of young start-ups raising billions of dollars in funding and creating unicorns in just a few years, as well as the recent setbacks in the e-commerce industry, Failing to Succeed delves deep into the dark side of starting up and its myriad pitfalls.Filled with interesting anecdotes, tongue-in-cheek observations, amazing customer insights, hard-hitting predictions and behind-the-scenes industry happenings, this book is an extraordinary unravelling of the challenges facing technology start-ups in India. It is a must-read for aspiring entrepreneurs, investors, industry professionals or business school students, and anyone interested in India’s start-up ecosystem.A powerful narration, Failing to Succeed is eventually about finding ways to move forward and succeed despite failures...

    We are on the threshold, say authors Pine and Gilmore, of the Experience Economy, a new economic era in which all businesses must orchestrate memorable events for their customers. The Experience Economy offers a creative, highly original, and yet eminently practical strategy for companies to script and stage the experiences that will transform the value of what they produce. From America Online to Walt Disney, the authors draw from a rich and varied mix of examples that showcase businesses in the midst of creating personal experiences for both consumers and businesses. The authors urge managers to look beyond traditional pricing factors like time and cost, and consider charging for the value of the transformation that an experience offers. Goods and services, say Pine and Gilmore, are no longer enough. Experiences and transformations are the basis for future economic growth, and The Experience Economy is the script from which managers can begin to direct their own transformations.

    Building on lessons learned by studying numerous entrepreneurs, the book details the author's seven domains model for assessing new business ideas. The model is comprised of four market and industry domains and three related to the entrepreneurial team. These seven domains address the central questions in the assessment of any market opportunity: Are the market and industry attractive? Does the opportunity offer compelling customer benefits as well as distinct advantage over othe solutions to the customer's needs? Can the team deliver the results they seek and promise to others?

    It tells in a short-easy-to-read way about what managers and investors can learn from Buffett. This is a selection of useful and timeless wisdom where Warren Buffett in his own words tells us how to think about business valuation, what is a good and bad business, acquisitions and their traps, yardsticks, compensation issues, how to reduce risk, corporate governance, the importance of trust and the right culture, learning from mistakes, and more.

    Tedlow, examines seven great CEOs who successfully managed cutting-edge technology and formed enduring corporate empires.With the depth and clarity of a master, Tedlow illuminates the minds, lives and strategies behind the legendary successes of our times:. George Eastman and his invention of the Kodak camera;. Thomas Watson of IBM;. Henry Ford and his automobile;. Charles Revson and his use of television advertising to drive massive sales for Revlon;. Robert N. Noyce, co-inventor of the integrated circuit and founder of Intel;. Andrew Carnegie and his steel empire;. Sam Walton and his unprecedented retail machine, Wal-Mart.

    In this updated and expanded 10th anniversary edition, internationally known leadership transition expert Michael D. Watkins gives you the keys to successfully negotiating your next move—whether you’re onboarding into a new company, being promoted internally, or embarking on an international assignment.In The First 90 Days, Watkins outlines proven strategies that will dramatically shorten the time it takes to reach what he calls the "breakeven point" when your organization needs you as much as you need the job. This new edition includes a substantial new preface by the author on the new definition of a career as a series of transitions; and notes the growing need for effective and repeatable skills for moving through these changes. As well, updated statistics and new tools make this book more reader-friendly and useful than ever.As hundreds of thousands of readers already know, The First 90 Days is a road map for taking charge quickly and effectively during critical career transition periods—whether you are a first-time manager, a mid-career professional on your way up, or a newly minted CEO.

    This claim is not only false, but its presence in the debate is an insult to science." With these words, the authors begin a detailed analysis of one of the most controversial topics of the day. The authors make a compelling case against claims of a scientific consensus. The purported proof of such a consensus consists of sloppy research by nonscientists, college students, and a highly partisan Australian blogger. Surveys of climate scientists, even those heavily biased in favor of climate alarmism, find extensive disagreement on the underlying science and doubts about its reliability. The authors point to four reasons why scientists disagree about global warming: a conflict among scientists in different and often competing disciplines; fundamental scientific uncertainties concerning how the global climate responds to the human presence; failure of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to provide objective guidance to the complex science; and bias among researchers. The authors offer a succinct summary of the real science of climate change based on their previously published comprehensive review of climate science in a volume titled Climate Change Reconsidered II: Physical Science. They recommend that policymakers resist pressure from lobby groups to silence scientists who question the authority of the IPCC to claim to speak for climate science. More than 50,000 copies of the first edition were sold or given away in five months to elected officials, civic and business leaders, scientists, and other opinion leaders. The response from the science community and experts on climate change has been overwhelmingly positive. To meet demand for more copies, we have produced this second revised edition. Changes include a foreword by Marita Noon, at the time executive director of Energy Makes America Great, Inc. Some of the discussion in Chapter 1 has been revised and expanded thanks to feedback from readers of the first edition. Graphs in Chapters 4, 5, and 6 are now full color, and new graphs have been added.

    A recent Wall Street Journal study revealed that the most sought-after executive skill is strategic thinking, but only three out of ten managers have this skill set. Author Rich Horwath explains the three keys to strategic thinking, breaks them down into simple, attainable skills, and gives you practical tools to apply them every day, providing managers with a clear path to mastery of the three disciplines: 1. Acumen-generate critical insights through a step-by-step evaluation of your business and its environment2. Allocation-focus your limited resources through strategic trade-offs 3. Action-implement a system to guarantee effective execution of strategy at all levels of your organization Based on new research with senior executives from 150 companies and the author's experience as a thought-leading strategist, Deep Dive is the first book to focus on the most important level of strategy-you. Armed with this knowledge and dozens of effective tools, you can become a truly strategic leader for your organization.

    You quickly create a strategic initiative in response and appoint your best people to make change happen. And it does—but not fast enough. Or effectively enough. Real value gets lost and, ultimately, things drift back to the default status.Why is this scenario so frequently repeated in industries and organizations across the world? In the groundbreaking new book Accelerate (XLR8), leadership and change management expert, and best-selling author, John Kotter provides a fascinating answer—and a powerful new framework for competing and winning in a world of constant turbulence and disruption.Kotter explains how traditional organizational hierarchies evolved to meet the daily demands of running an enterprise. For most companies, the hierarchy is the singular operating system at the heart of the firm. But the reality is, this system simply is not built for an environment where change has become the norm. Kotter advocates a new system—a second, more agile, network-like structure that operates in concert with the hierarchy to create what he calls a “dual operating system”—one that allows companies to capitalize on rapid-fire strategic challenges and still make their numbers.Accelerate (XLR8) vividly illustrates the five core principles underlying the new network system, the eight Accelerators that drive it, and how leaders must create urgency in others through role modeling. And perhaps most crucial, the book reveals how the best companies focus and align their people’s energy and urgency around what Kotter calls the big opportunity.If you’re a pioneer, a leader who knows that bold change is necessary to survive and thrive in an ever-changing world, this book will help you accelerate into a better, more profitable future.

    Then the way to fame was leading him toward a mistake that could send him straight to hell...She never looked back.Lies, drugs, too many men-- golden skinned singer Topaz Black would do anything to get a hit to the top of the charts, even walk away from her friends and family. But surrounded by greed and lust, the love the longed for seemed to be slipping away forever.He broke all the rules.Brought up in South Central L.A., movie producer Gunther Lawrence learned early how to get the wealth and women he wanted-- and to turn his back on his roots. Now, blinded by Hollywood's glitter, his illusions may shatter when he discovers who really controls his career.As their lives touch, ignite, and explode, three talented African-Americans pursue fame at any cost...and the price may be their happiness...or their lives..An alternate selection of the Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club

    Now we have a chance to read, chapter by chapter, how through four generations this family has established one of the finest retail institutions in the world."-Peter Strom, Former Vice Chairman Polo/Ralph Lauren According to David Glass, President and CEO of Wal-Mart, Nordstrom's customer service standards are "what we all shoot for." In his 60 Minutes profile on Nordstrom, Morley Safer raved that the much-acclaimed "Nordstrom Way" was "not service like it used to be, but service like it never was." What makes Nordstrom so special? What, exactly, does this retail giant do that so clearly distinguishes it from the competition? How does the Nordstrom customer service culture work? And, most important, what lessons can industry learn from Nordstrom's example? This updated Second Edition reveals the secrets behind the phenomenal success of this American customer-service legend. Written by veteran journalist Robert Spector and top Nordstrom salesman Patrick McCarthy, and based on exclusive, in-depth interviews with the Nordstrom family, senior executives, directors, and salespeople, this captivating book tells you how this much admired-and much feared-powerhouse retains its customer-service supremacy in the competitive world of bricks-and-mortar retail. In The Nordstrom Way, the authors isolate practical lessons that teach how to better respond to customers' needs so they'll keep coming back to you, including: * Valuing the nobility of good service * Finding and bonding with customers * Serving and keeping those customers * Giving frontline people the freedom to make decisions Packed with examples of excellent customer service, The Nordstrom Way offers a fresh behind-the-scenes look that provides lessons on how to find and focus on customer needs, follow-up, and customer satisfaction. Praise for The NORDSTROM Way "For anyone looking to understand customer service at its best, this book bubbles with insights."-Business Week "Nobody does it better than Nordstrom. And this is the first thorough, close-up look at its service secrets. A real winner."-Tom Peters, President, The Tom Peters Group "Outstanding customer service and Nordstrom are synonymous. Their innovative approach has allowed them to find out what the customers want and then do it. Their standards of service are what we all shoot for."-David D. Glass, President and CEO, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. "Nordstrom is a national model for outstanding customer service. American business should use this book as a primer to learn how to make and keep happy, satisfied customers."- J. Willard Marriott Jr. Chairman and President, Marriott International, Inc. "When you run a family business that includes your customers as extended family, you're unbeatable. This book outlines an American family saga that has become the admiration of the world."-Leonard A. Lauder Chairman and CEO, Estee Lauder Companies "Nordstrom's business is built on one-to-one communication with the customer. Their professional salespeople bridge the gap between the designer and the consumer."-Donna Karan, Chairman and Chief Designer, Donna Karan International, Inc. "Nordstrom is legendary for the way they take care of the people who walk through their doors. Spector and McCarthy have made The Nordstrom Way available for everyone to turn their ducks into eagles."-Ken Blanchard, Coauthor, The One Minute Manager

    military's Special Forces into a flexible and nimble force that could defeat Al-Qaeda's decentralized network in Iraq. They proved that the agility, adaptability, and cohesion of small teams could be scaled up to large organizations, while breaking down the silos that frequently cause problems.Since Team of Teams became a bestseller in 2015, business leaders have repeatedly asked Fussell the same questions: How can I transform my own organization into a team of teams? Is that kind of dramatic change even possible, outside of the urgency of a combat zone? If so, what are the practical steps to get there?Many Teams, One Mission answers those questions and many more. Drawing on his and consulting work with the McChrystal Group, Fussell shows how civilian organizations have transformed their way of doing business - becoming flatter, quicker, and much more collaborative across departments and divisions. Along with sharing his own experiences from the battlefield, he explores examples from industry titans like Intuit and Under Armour, which have adopted a similar model in order to unite everyone around single compelling mission. The result is a "shared consciousness" that drives consistently better results with less friction and inter-group rivalry.This book is for any leader who wishes he or she could get everyone to look beyond their narrow field of vision to understand -- and contribute to - the organization's one true mission.