1 comments about Hold On, You Lost Me! Use Learning Styles to Create Training that Sticks.

1. I have read many of Bernice McCarthy's books and this one is the most concise, concrete, and practical book she's published. The book's central message is simple - when we design training that honors the learning styles of our participants, we are most likely to create a learning experience that is engaging, practical, and applicable to their lives.
   
   Bernice and her co-author, Jeanine, explain the 4MAT learning model, left-brain and right-brain processing, and a simple and powerful process for designing effective training. They talk about the importance of figuring out the learning outcomes, organizing the content, and identifying/defining the concept that underlies the content. Even though they don't talk a lot about auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learning, these three approaches are implicitly captured in the 4MAT model.
   
   I have been using the 4MAT model to design professional training for many years and I am ecstatic to see that Bernice has published this book. Bernice's 4MAT model has been extremely influential in the work I do as a professional instructional designer and a workshop design coach that it's become one of the most valuable models I use to design and facilitate learning. I'm relieved that this book does not contain the flowery, poetic language of most of Bernice's previous books. This one is accessible, readable, and practical. Buy it and transform the way you think about how learning should be designed and experienced.
   
   [...]

1 comments about Nation branding: Concepts, Issues, Practice.

1. This is really a good mainstream destination marketing textbook for MBA students. It covers all important subjects in a concise and didactic way.
   It provides very clearly all the necessary concepts abour territorial marketing .

No comments about Trading Systems Explained: How to Build Reliable Technical Systems.

No comments about The Eight Constants of Change ... What Leaders Need to Know to Drive Change and Win.

5 comments about The New Corporate Finance.

1. An excellent compilation of articles by top academicians in the field of corporate finance. The articles are ideal for a person who wants to get a good grasp of any area of Corporate Finance. Warning: This is definitely not for the beginners. It is ideal for practitioners who are interested in learning more.



2. As the title of the book clearly indicates, the text advances corporate finance beyond the theory presented in texts like Brealy and Myers. Thus, the text is geared towards a more sophisticated reading audience. In a collection of articles, academics and finance practitioners discuss the real world impact of capital budgeting, dividend/share repurchase policy, financial innovations (e.g. convertibles, commodity-linked bonds, derivatives, etc.), and bankruptcy on firms. Do not be scared off by the "academic" nature of this text. Unlike academic journals, the long-winded discussions on hypothesis testing and experimentation are abandoned (along with the high-level mathematics). The articles are very readable and any empirical evidence is presented in relatively friendly charts and graphs, which do a great job at providing the proper intuition. More importantly, the authors usually include real world anecdotal evidence to support the conclusions, as well.



3. This book challenges you about what you really understand on finance. Before I read this I didn't like finance at all because it seemed too simplified. This book shows how the real world and people think. Especially, its chapter on risk is of a great help. Now I'm interested in some fields of finance such as internal corporate governance, real option, more refined and practical concepts than EVA, etc.



4. Chew's New Corporate Finance is a quite decent book on journal articles on finance issues from a corporate standpoint. Other than your professor's own choice of favourite articles, Chew's may be the next best thing you can get. I won't give it a higher rating (4 or 5 star) because it lacks ground-breaking yet still easy-to-read articles from the less technical journals like Harvard Business Review, etc.

   Most of the articles are too academic coming from more or less the same journals. Moreover, the more technical ones have difficult formulas and number-crunching statistics which are more appropriate for MBA and MSc in Finance students, or those in researchers in "high-level derivative work".

   I have the second edition (1999) of this book and used it sparingly for my MBA in Finance. And I've browsed through this new edition - what I found was there were not many changes made, only a few new articles have been added. Perhaps inclusion of some non-American articles would do justice to this book. Chew still keeps the classic ones though, which are always relevant. The roundtable discussion on EVA is interesting but Chew does not include criticisms on EVA shortfalls or problems.

   On the whole, this text should be a reasonable introduction to high-level Finance and also a good supplementary reading for those doing MBA in Finance. But the editor's selection between technical and easy-to-read-but-important articles still leaves much to be desired.....




5. This book is excellent reading. Foremost, it discusses clearly all of the major issues today in corporate finance - capital structure, "what investors want", incentives and performance measurement via Accounting versus Economic Value Added models, corporate architecture, etc. The author is extremely engaging, and I must admit, this is the first "text book" I've had that I wanted to keep reading. The author is sarcastic, opinionated, but objective all in one. An excellent purchase for a course or just if you're interested in understanding the way markets and corporate finance truly function.

5 comments about The One Minute Salesperson.

1. Compared with the monstrous success of "One Minute Manager", this sales version is kind of disappointed. The book still keeps the simple style to present main stages of sales with diagrams and big bold words. In each stage, it also tries its best to describe the process flow with necessary details.
   
   However, I found it's kind of awkward to navigate in those diagrams for fast comprehension. Furthermore, the extended connection with goal setting, reward, and punishment weakens the emphasis of some key factors of sales: finding customer needs, telling a compelling story, and winning the trust.
   
   Maybe salesmanship is the kind of art which is too hard to teach in a short book (just like the leadership). At this scenario, I would rather to read the big and great book for best descriptions (even as big as Michael Porter's giant volumes for competitive advantage). Otherwise, I'll just save the money to treat my sales mentor a Latte in the Starbucks (after browsing this book at the book store).



2. I think this is a worthwhile book for someone who is beginning a sales career or has an antagonist attitude toward the profession, but wants to change that maybe because they are starting a business, doing consulting, etc. It is particularly good for people who don't feel comfortable with the whole idea of selling, but realize it's an important skill and is even required in daily life e.g. to sell an idea, convince a child to do something in their best interests, etc.
   
   I have read some reviews of this book that sound harsh; I think that some of them may be overstated. While this book is short, simple and a quick read, it does a very good job of driving the basics home in a way that represents the sales profession well and honors an ethical approach to business. While the ideas themselves are simple, their application on a daily basis is not. If you read this book and embody the principles, it will make a big difference in your attitude toward sales as a profession, to your customers and to your personal income.
   
   I think almost everyone reading this has probably been on the receiving end of a bad or unscrupulous salesperson. They unfortunately are not rare and give the profession a bad name. Their tactics are coercive and manipulative. This is not the kind of sales that this book talks about.
   
   Personally, I think a good salesperson earns their money by helping a customer to understand their needs, asks powerful questions that bring out the implications of their customer's business situation and presents options that the customer will feel good about. They also build relationships based on trust, superior product knowledge and professionalism. They keep their commitments, follow through on promises and know the difference between persuasion and manipulation.
   
   This book is a book that uses story to demonstrate what makes a professional salesperson in the best sense of the word. In a nutshell, it's about mastering the basics and doing them from the heart, not with a desire to manipulate. I think this is a worthwhile message to get out there and it really does work, espeically in the long run.
   
   Golfers, bowlers and other athletes revisit the basics frequently, often practicing them on a daily basis. The same principle applies to sales and this book does a good job of driving home the importance of mastering fundamental sales skills.
   
   I agree with some reviews that this book is light on content. However, if a potential salesperson learns even one thing from this book that helps them to do their job better, they will easily pay for the cost of a new copy. If they form one good habit as a result of reading it, it will pay for itself many times over. With that said, why not buy it used if you are skeptical and worried that it will be a quick read? The words are the same and you might learn something. (I do agree that this book is overpriced, however.)
   
   Personally, I have read this book more than once and I have periodically reviewed the material throughout the years. I don't think it's as good as the "One Minute Manager," but it's good. It's difficult to be a GREAT salesperson. You need to study the principles, embody them and maintain your balance, integrity and ethical principles often in the face of tempting or difficult situations. Given this reality, I think a book like this that inspires is a worthwhile read. This is especially true in a profession where a lot of people slam doors in your face and you need to deal well with rejection every day.



3. I loved the one minute manager and I love the one minute sales Person. Sound principles in less than a minute. In the book he includes the most important thing that sales reps forget is to sell yourself first.



4. This book was suggested to me by my office manager and I was underwhelmed! The sing-songy writing and "story-telling" impressed me as juvenile and sophomoric. The "tips" were nothing more than the basics of common courtesy and commitment to customer service that anyone who has experienced a good degree of success in their profession would have already mastered or they would not be successful in the first place. Perhaps if you were clueless it might be helpful, but it left me cold.



5. I bought this book for one of my Call Center sales and service agents. His customer service skills were excellent but he was reluctant to "sell people on something they don't need or can't afford." If they didn't ask about a product, he didn't tell them about it. If he didn't increase his sales quickly, I would be forced to let him go. After reading this book, the employee realized that telling customers about the benefits of our products was merely an extension of good customer service. He said he learned to "visualize the sale" before he answered each call. Immediately his sales increased and he has been one of my most consistent performers in the three months since he read the book. He has increased his potential income from $26,000 to about $43,000 annually due to meeting pay-for-performance goals plus commission. Now my other employees want to read it too and I had to order 3 more copies for my 22 person team. A quick read even for those who don't normally think of themselves as book learners.

No comments about The Fieldstone Alliance Guide to Crafting Effective Mission and Vision Statements.

5 comments about Corporate Greening 2.0.

1. This author's earlier book -- Going Green -- that came out in 1993 was helpful to me in understanding what government rules were requiring and how other companies were getting their marketing and corporate messages out, so I was interested in this one, which gets into the changes because of global warming and carbon fuel/products/etc. He does a nice job laying out why the climate issues have changed the dynamics for government and companies and provides good practical guidance for companies to respond or, as he suggests, take charge of the situation. While the book is weak on exactly what the new rules are (partly because they are still developing at the federal level, which seems to be catching up to California), it is strong on the questions companies have to ask to come up with their specific strategies. I particularly liked the guide to positions of a number of leading (mostly large) companies; it's easy to get the gist of messages and buzz issues that are developing on sustainability. If you are in corporate communications (or marketing) you will find a lot of tips, examples and direct guidance, as that has been the author's specialty. If you want a good look into the book before you buy it, Harrison has posted the entire, long Preface (Harrison calls it his Cliff's notes) on his web site which is www.envirocomm.com.



2. Twenty years ago, "Going Green" was about minimizing risk: cleaning up decades of environmental hazards. Today, "Corporate Greening" is about maximizing reward: how to succeed and grow through sustainability.
   
   This book is not only a must read but a must do. It not only gives a clear view of the history of greening - over the last several decades and particularly since the Earth Summit of the `90s - but also a road map for navigating the carbon neutral/sustainability global marketplace. Where "green" was once only an activist's mantra, today it is mainstream and central to all business decisions. Governments require it. Employees want it. Shareholders encourage it. And now, increasingly, customers demand it.
   
   And what about the next generation coming along? This illustration is telling. My daughter just started her first semester of college. What is the most critical class to her? "Global Climate Change in the Past, Present and Future". It's an elective. She feels it will be at the heart of everything she does in the future.
   
   C-suite executives will find tangible guideposts to going sustainable and helpful best practices and benchmarks from leading global corporations.



3. There are few practitioners in corporate sustainability with the experience and vision of E. Bruce Harrison. His new book, Corporate Greening 2.0, reveals the DNA code of companies' sustainability strategies worldwide, providing a clear blueprint for what can be done and a comprehensive overview of what has been done to wrestle the global warming beast. Harrison asserts that the future of carbonomics -- managing cost and revenue factors related to climate change -- will introduce a complex balance of corporate responsibility, government participation, and global market implications. Corporate Greening 2.0 defines how through sustainability communication tomorrow's leading corporations will gain advantages in winning the carbon neutrality war in the hearts, minds and trust of their stakeholders. This new book is a C-suite handbook for how to manage tomorrow's carbon wars, and should be required reading for anyone navigating the changing winds of social, political and economic realities.



4. For Corporate Communications, Investor Relations, CSR and SRI executives, I highly recommend Corporate Greening 2.0. Whether you want to get the latest pulse on views of global warming, sustainability, climate change, carbon emmissions trading, or simply want a better understanding of this topical issue (Just what is Being Green mean for a company?) -- by one of the great Public Relations communicators, you should get a lot out from this, the second book/loose follow-up to "Going Green" by Harrison. I have to say that this book really made me think ... it helped me to clarify my own views on the subject. Harrison has a special ability to clearly and succinctly address the points that go right to the heart of an issue --- he neither "dumbs down" the text nor goes into the clouds with overly complex theory or mathematical models. I liked the fact that I could just pick up the book and read a chapter while sitting on the train. It will definitely be a reference tool on my office bookshelf.



5. This eagerly awaited book does not disappoint. In it, the author draws on his unsurpassed experience as an advisor on environmental issues to corporate senior executives. His advice, as in his earlier book Going Green, is judicious and nuanced. He sets forth a series of principles for companies to use in managing their response to the complex issue of climate change. Corporate executives, particularly those overseeing corporate communications and public affairs functions, will find much to hearten them as they seek to counsel senior management on a strategy that will build the relationships and positioning needed for future survivability and success.
   
   Full disclosure: I have known and worked alongside Bruce Harrison for a decade, and I know from firsthand experience how highly his insights are valued by organizations who are seeking to stay ahead of the curve on environmental strategy. His wisdom, which has enabled many companies to turn potential perceptual liabilities into significant marketplace assets, is on full display here.

1 comments about Fundamentals of The Bond Market.

1. The title says it all but it does goes into a bit more depth than almost all other books that are trying to cater to the novice.

1 comments about Building Wealth: Achieving Personal and Financial Success in Real Estate and Business Without Money, Credit, or Luck.

1. This book gives the new investor alot of insights on some basic points in real estate and he also outlines a step by step formula on how to build your real estate fortune.