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Effective Project Management: How to Plan, Manage, and Deliver Projects on Time and Within Budget- Includes CD Review

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(More customer reviews)This book has project management examples for use with MS Project 4.0 included. The macros don't work in the current version of MS Project. The macros are written in Visual Basic and I was able to debug through them, so I could at least install the material.
The book was not well written, the narrators came across too stuffy. There is good material here, but I am having a hard time forcing myself past the middle of the book.
I enjoyed the AMA Handbook of Project Management much better.

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This tutorial on the management of software projects includes an accompanying diskette which guides the user through the project management process. It provides a simulated environment that helps to teach management skills.

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The Pursuit of Wow Every Person's Guide to Topsy-Turvy Times Review

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(More customer reviews)Here's Tom Peters' advice: hire "zany" people who don't know how to dress professionally (because they have a lot of energy); throw out every idea, concept, and system that has ever WORKED for your firm (because you don't want to grow stale); and forget any and all conventional measures of success (because they're wrong, and Tom Peters is right). We are not in business to make money or even to provide a great product/service --we're in business to be different at all costs (proof: Peters pooh-pooh's McDonald's as "McOrdinary's"). Although some of his ideas might prove useful to some readers, I found myself increasingly annoyed with Peters' own infatuation with himself ("aren't I crazy? aren't I just rocking your world?"). His tone conveys the sense that he'll say anything to be shocking--hardly a good motivation for writing a business book.

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StraightLine Leadership: Tools for Living with Velocity and Power in Turbulent Times Review

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(More customer reviews)I bought this book mainly for the wide range of superstars from several industries who endorsed the book. This book is endorsed by United States Army Generals, NFL football players, corporate CEO's and New York Times best selling authors. I was not disappointed. This is my second reading and certainly not my last. It is packed with practical information most of which is totally new to me and I have been in the business world for over 30 years.

The book is about how people can build or train themselves to be much more effective in their personal and professional lives. This book is not just for CEO's or high level executives. Anyone wanting to be more effective and or solve a challenge will benefit immensely from this book if they apply the information.

There is a very useful chapter on "Stop Stopping." That's right many people in life stop before they get to their intended goals or objectives. The tools or "distinctions" as the author refers to them are effective in breaking through a lot of the self-sabotaging activities people engage in. I have been working with this material with my own staff at work and we have all found this material extremely useful in dealing with challenges that we have been struggling with for some time.

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Straight-Line Leadership: Tools for Living with Velocity and Power in Turbulent Times is Dusan Djukich's highly anticipated introduction to his potent world of straight-line coaching. Within these pages he dramatically unveils exactly what it takes to live a powerful and effective life both personally and professionally. Regardless if you are a CEO, small business owner, parent, or someone who simply wants to make a difference, you will learn to master powerful distinctions that you can apply immediately to resolve the challenges that you are presently up against. You will also become adept at assisting others in solving their most pressing problems with precision and grace."This book boldly demonstrates why Djukich is regarded as the ultimate performance catalyst to business. He simply kicks the hell out of the sacred cows that keep individuals and businesses stuck." Brandon Craig, CEO, BiltRite Corporation

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Warren Buffett on Business: Principles from the Sage of Omaha Review

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(More customer reviews)With the main exception of a relatively small textile producer known as Berkshire Hathaway, which Warren Buffett bought outright and which became the springboard for his investing career, the earlier part of Buffett's long and successful career was mainly devoted to non-controlling investments in companies, versus buying whole companies. Thus, today many people think of Buffett as "the world's most successful investor." However, Buffett's investing skills are not the primary topic of this relatively brief and easy reading book (although there is one chapter on personal investing). This book, written by Richard Connors and based on a class he taught about Buffett at the Washington University in St. Louis Lifelong Learning Institute, is devoted to describing Buffett's management activities as CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. That's not a bad idea at all, given that over the years Buffett has gradually placed comparatively less emphasis on Berkshire's investments (which today include the likes of American Express, Coca-Cola and Wells Fargo) and greater emphasis on Berkshire's growing stable of wholly-owned subsidiaries. Indeed, the list of owned companies, like GEICO, International Dairy Queen, Shaw Industries, FlightSafety, Borsheim's Fine Jewelry, Nebraska Furniture Mart and The Pampered Chef, among numerous others, has grown quite large.
The prime source for this book--by far--is Buffett's annual letters to Berkshire's shareholders, written over the last 40 years. Indeed, if you were to count words, my guess is that 95% or more of this book is simply the reproduction of Buffett's comments in his various letters, organized by Connors, the book's author. So if you have read Buffett's letters over the years (an exercise I would recommend to almost anyone interested in business or investing), then you won't find much new material in this book, save for excerpts from occasional interviews with Charlie Rose or excerpts from some of Buffett's other interviews or comments.
Connors has organized Buffett's shareholder commentaries into chapters that address the various important issues of corporate management: executive compensation, time management, assessment of risk, corporate governance and culture, crisis management, capital allocation and shareholder communication, among others. Buffett's comments are interesting, valuable and candid, and he is a very clear and entertaining writer. There is some human interest material, such as an account of Buffett's 1951 Saturday trip to Washington, DC to visit the offices of GEICO (because his mentor, Benjamin Graham, was the chairman of the company). As the somewhat well-known story goes, Buffett pounded on the door to GEICO's locked building, until a custodian finally led him to meet Lorimer Davidson, an assistant to GEICO's president at the time. Davidson, who would go on to become CEO of GEICO, took the time to educate young Buffett on the power of direct marketing of insurance, and years later Buffett would go on to buy the whole company.
In short, although there is precious little new material provided here (hence the four-star rating, not five), this is a very interesting book, and it is interesting primarily because it was essentially written by Warren Buffett, one of the most successful investors--and corporate managers--of all time.

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How to Manage in Times of Crisis (And How to Avoid a Crisis in the First Place) Review

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(More customer reviews)I thought Dr. Adizes's book was filled with sensible, easy to follow information. I found it particularly useful given the current economic situation. I would recommend this book to anyone trying to keep a business afloat during these difficult financial times.

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Remarkable Leadership: Unleashing Your Leadership Potential One Skill at a Time (J-B US non-Franchise Leadership) Review

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(More customer reviews)Kevin Eikenberry has experience in the real world. It makes this book better. He is an avid learner and experienced trainer. They make this book better. And he's worked with real people one-on-one to help them improve their leadership. That, too, makes this book better.
If you're looking for an informed, practical and effective way to accelerate your own leadership development, you should buy, read, and use Remarkable Leadership. This will also be a good book for you if you're responsible for the leadership development program in a company or for the development of a protégé.
Like the experienced trainer he is, Kevin states his goal at the beginning of the book. "This book is designed to help you identify the parts of your personal leadership package working in your favor and help you develop those parts, and any others you wish to work on, to become the leader you are capable of becoming."
He moves directly from that statement to setting up the material that will fill the rest of the book. He has you do an exercise I've done with groups in training for years: identify a great leader you know and define why you rate them as great or remarkable. Then he shares the core competencies as he sees them. Here's the list.
Remarkable leaders ...
Learn continually
Champion change
Communicate powerfully
Build relationships
Develop others
Focus on customers
Influence with impact
Think and act innovatively
Value collaboration and teamwork
Solve problems and make decisions
Take responsibility and have accountability
Manage projects and processes successfully
Set goals and support goal achievement.
After anchoring his thinking in the principle of building on strength, Eikenberry moves to the next chapter where he discusses leadership development in the real world. His model matches my Apprenticeship Model in all important respects.
The three most important are that most leadership development happens on the job, not in the classroom, good leadership development makes extensive use of feedback, and your boss and other more experienced leaders play a crucial role in your development.
Chapter 3 tells you how to get the most out of the book. Then comes the real meat of the book, a chapter on each of the competencies.
Each chapter includes examples and stories to help you get the concept. There are resources to help you develop. And there are two features that make this book stand out. "Now Steps" offer you suggestions for immediate ways to apply the principle of the chapter. And "Bonus Bytes" give you a link to a web site where more resources and ideas await.
This book is for you if you want a guided way to take charge of your own personal development. You'll get solid information and insight, coupled with learning tools and suggestions for action.
This is also a book for you if you're responsible for the development of leaders in a smaller company or for a protégé. The structure of the material and learning tools should make you more effective at that task.
If you support leadership development in a larger corporation you'll find many good ideas here that you'll be able to incorporate. You should also consider buying multiple copies to share with the working managers in your company to help them assume a mentor role.
Now, who should not buy the book? If you expect to learn leadership from simply reading this or any other book, save your money. Leadership is an apprentice trade and learning it takes work on the job. Remarkable Leadership can help you do it better.

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Get Rid of the Performance Review: How Companies Can Stop Intimidating, Start Managing--and Focus on What Really Matters (Business Plus) Review

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(More customer reviews)Ah, the business/career advice book, that calm appeal to mature rumination in favor of some innovative approach! That is NOT this book. This is a would-be inflammatory polemic looking to send mobs of its readers, pitchforks and torches in hand, to overturn the oppressive and inefficient old regime and bring in a new and happier age.
Okay, I exaggerate a bit. The book is full of rational arguments establishing the dysfunctionality of the performance review ("PR""). The tone, however, is wholly unlike that of most such books. Culbert writes with the zeal of a righteous preacher, who knows sin when he sees it and strives to extirpate it root and branch. And he wants the reader to join him. He hammers away (sometimes repetitiously, as in all good sermons) at the evil and promotes a remedy at once more effective and virtuous, what Culbert calls a performance preview ("PP").
Other reviewers outlined Culbert's strictures against the PR, so I will not repeat them at length. My own experience has been that Culbert is spot on. The PR is irremediably one-sided, subjective, boss-serving, dishonest, counter-productive and backward looking. It leaves employees demoralized and concerned more about personal "faults" than business objectives.
The PP, as Culbert describes it, at least has a chance to create true teams, with everyone (including the boss) jointly accountable for achieving team goals that reflect business objectives. To work, the PP requires trust and honesty between and among subordinates and boss. Culbert recognizes that this can be difficult both to establish and to sustain and must be worked at. Without trust and honesty the PP approach will fail.
Culbert's views are anchored in his deep belief that a desire for useful work is a central part of our humanity. The work experience, he thinks, should thus be satisfying as well as efficient; and fulfilling as well as profitable. He believes that the PR makes attaining these goals impossible. He may well be right.
This is an interesting and passionately argued book, well worth the reading.

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Selling Your Business: How to Sell a Business in Good and Bad Times Review

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(More customer reviews)Very helpful book! Book has great examples and great explanations! It is very easy to understand so that someone who knows little to nothing about how to sell a business can be much more confident and understand the entire process of selling a business.

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A guide for owners and their advisors about the sale of small-cap and mid-cap businesses. If you are the seller of a large business, droves of investment bankers are available to assist you. If you are the seller of a small or mid-sized business, investment banking advice is scarce. This book is a highly readable guide to the complex process of selling the smaller company. Two practicing mergers and acquisition attorneys walk you through the complexities of the small business sale. You'll learn:' The basics of business valuation' How to find buyers and how NOT to' How to prepare for a sale' How to hire the right advisors' How to avoid four mistakes that can destroy a deal, or worse, destroy your business' How to make your business as marketable as possible' How to structure a deal' How to decode the complicated agreements used in business sales' The elements of seller financing

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Guts: 8 Laws of Business from One of the Most Innovative Business Leaders of Our Time Review

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(More customer reviews)This book is a refreshing collection of straightforward thoughts and observations about business and leadership from one of the most seasoned, creative, colorful, and highly successful executives of our time-Robert A. Lutz, Chairman of General Motors North America. This revised and updated book contains the blunt, honest wisdom of an authentic maverick leader in the form of his laws of business that have stood the test of time over his thirty years in the car industry, and his rise to the top of Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler.
Organized into three parts, the book opens with the story of Chrysler's second turnaround in the early 1990s. Lutz was part of the executive team that conceived and brought to life one of the most famous and successful muscle cars of all-time: the Viper. Part Two is an in-depth review and validation of Lutz's eight immutable laws of business. The final part is Lutz's corollaries to his laws, or, as he calls them, "The Rest of the Story!"
A former Marine with an ongoing, life-long love affair with the Marine Corps and its leadership practices, Lutz presented many business and leadership concepts and personal anecdotes that reflected and blended his business and Marine Corps backgrounds. From his beliefs about the need for attention to detail and critical performance evaluations, to his emphasis on holistic, empowered, cross-functional teams and the value of a culture that nurtures middle-management dissent of conventional wisdom in open forums, Lutz's insights and experiences were both entertaining and informative.
If the following lists of Lutz's business laws and corollaries even sound remotely appealing to you, read this book - you will not be disappointed.
Lutz's Immutable Laws of Business:
LAW #1: The Customer Isn't Always Right
LAW #2: The Primary Purpose of Business Is Not to Make Money
LAW #3: When Everybody Else Is Doing It, Don't!
LAW #4: Too Much Quality Can Ruin You
LAW #5: Financial Controls Are Bad!
LAW #6: Disruptive People Are an Asset
LAW #7: Teamwork Isn't Always Good
LAW #8: When You Inherit a Really Big Rat's Nest, Don't Try to Lure Them Out With Food. Use a Flamethrower
Lutz's Corollaries
*It's Okay to Be Anal Sometimes
*A Little Fear, in Reality, Ain't All That Bad
*Leadership Is All About Common Sense, Which, Unfortunately, Is Not All That Common
*Some Squeaky Wheels Don't Get the Grease, or Pros and Cons of Being a Change Agent

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"Read it for no other reason than to learn Bob's Seven Immutable Laws of Business. . . . This is vintage Bob-contrarian, thoughtful, and he's really fun to read."—Forbes
In this edition of Bob Lutz's bestselling account of the business philosophy with which he revolutionized Chrysler and much of the automotive industry, Lutz reveals his unique brand of creative management. Readers will learn many lessons herein, including why the key to success in any business is maintaining a positive tension between the creative minds and the buttoned-up financial minds, and how to attract, motivate, and strategically deploy each type throughout an organization. This book features a new introduction and an epilogue in which Lutz introduces an eighth law that helps today's business leaders put his famed Seven Immutable Laws of Business into sharper perspective.
Robert A. Lutz (Scarsdale, NY) is General Motor's Vice Chairman of Product Development and Chairman of GM North America.

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Beans: Four Principles for Running a Business in Good Times or Bad Review

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(More customer reviews)Elegantly simple! I usually loathe fables, preferring gritty text in business writing. It was recommended by a friend and I found it to be entertaining, engaging, and beautifully written. Its unique way of conveying the reassuring message that "the basics mean as much as ever in this chaotic world" is one we all need to be reminded of. This is a cautionary tale for consulting types (like yours truly) who tend to turn business problems into nuclear physics.
Even your most reading avoidant client or friend will love this. Buy a supply, I keep handing them out to people. Apparently there is another book in the works . . . I've pre-ordered it.
You will never look at another cup of coffee again in quite the same way . . . likewise, you will never approach a business challenge again in quite the same way.

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What Lucy Taught Us: A Management Fable about Improving Your Business One Process at a Time Review

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(More customer reviews)With internet, technology, social media and how they revolutionize the way we manage business dominating business headlines in the recent decade, we often forgot that the fundamental of a well run business is sound business process. What Lucy Taught Us is a timely, well written and easy to read book on the importance of focusing on business process improvement in order to reduce cost, improve customer and employee satisfaction, and ultimately business bottom line.
This is a book should be on the desk of every CEO and COO of any size company.

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Small Business, Big Vision: Lessons on How to Dominate Your Market from Self-Made Entrepreneurs Who Did it Right Review

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(More customer reviews)I received a pre-release copy of this book to review, and loved it! I've been an entrepreneur for a long time and am always looking for better ways to build and improve my businesses. This book provides practical advice that anyone can put into use to "dominate their market" as the book says.
I'd strongly recommend this book to anyone who is or wants to be a business owner. Whether you're thinking of starting a business or have been in business for 30 years, there's something for everyone to learn here.
My favorite parts: The chapter on social media marketing, the "Pulling a 180" chapter on turning your business around, and the section on social entrepreneurship. Good stuff!

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Lessons in applying passion and perseverance from prominent entrepreneurs
In the world of entrepreneurship, your vision solidifies your resolve when things get tough, and it reminds you why you went into business in the first place. Authors, brothers, and serial entrepreneurs, Matthew and Adam Toren have compiled a wealth of valuable information on the passionate and pragmatic realities of starting your own business. They've also gathered insights from some of the world's most successful entrepreneurs. This book delivers the information that both established and budding entrepreneurs need, explains how to implement that information, and validates each lesson with real-world examples.
Small Business, Big Vision provides inspiration and practical advice on everything from creating a one-page business plan to setting up an advisory board, and also delivers a call to social entrepreneurship and sustainable business practices. This powerful book:
Offers instruction in whether and how to seek investors
Outlines the pros and cons of hiring employees and provides guidance on how to find the best outsourced workers
Presents a comprehensive action plan for effective social media marketing
Explains how to build an information empire and become an expert

Small Business, Big Vision proves that with a flexible mindset, practical skills, and the passion to keep pushing forward, entrepreneurs can find success, even in today's ever-changing business landscape.

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