Best Business Planning & Forecasting

One of Wall Street Journal 's. Best Ten Works of Nonfiction in 2012 New York Times Bestseller “Not so different in spirit from the way public intellectuals like John Kenneth Galbraith once shaped discussions of economic policy and public figures like Walter Cronkite helped sway opinion on the Vietnam War…could turn out to be one of the more momentous books of the decade .”. — New York Times Book Review "Nate Silver's The Signal and the Noise is The Soul of a New Machine for the 21st century ." Drawing on his own groundbreaking work, Silver examines the world of prediction, investigating how we can distinguish a true signal from a universe of noisy data. Most predictions fail, often at great cost to society, because most of us have a poor understanding of probability and uncertainty. In keeping with his own aim to seek truth from data, Silver visits the most successful forecasters in a range of areas, from hurricanes to baseball, from the poker table to the stock market, from Capitol Hill to the NBA. With everything from the health of the global economy to our ability to fight terrorism dependent on the quality of our predictions, Nate Silver’s insights are an essential read. Baseball, weather forecasting, earthquake prediction, economics, and polling: In all of these areas, Silver finds predictions gone bad thanks to biases, vested interests, and overconfidence.

Half of all Americans have money in the stock market, yet economists can't agree on whether investors and markets are rational and efficient, as modern financial theory assumes, or irrational and inefficient, as behavioral economists believe—and as financial bubbles, crashes, and crises suggest. Lo’s book will be read and read widely. "This new book will become another essential read for anybody interested in financial markets. "Andrew Lo’s Adaptive Markets is a masterly synthesis of the traditional, rationality-based approach and new approaches based on psychology and neuroscience, evolutionary theory, and techniques such as computer simulations and artificial intelligence." "Andrew Lo’s ambitious book offers a welcome, fresh look at how financial markets work and why they sometimes fail. Adaptive Markets makes a valuable and welcome contribution, rewarding the reader by broadening and improving our understanding of finance and markets--in stable and unstable times." "The financial markets we create similarly reflect 'principles of evolution--competition, innovation, reproduction and adaptation'. In this important book, Lo of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology demonstrates the radical implications of this insight." "[ Adaptive Markets ] is a summation of developments in fields ranging from economics and behavioral finance to neuroscience and artificial intelligence--all influences on the adaptive markets hypothesis Lo proposes as a framework for finance that considers both rational and irrational behavior." "By reading Adaptive Markets , investors and their advisors will benefit from a better understanding of the reasons, based in biology and human nature, that the market is not efficient." "Lo’s new book is a fascinating exploration of the evolution of financial innovation. "[ Adaptive Markets ] doubles as a kind of intellectual history of the global financial system and the innovations that have shaped it. "Andrew Lo combines wonderfully broad scholarship and a delightfully instructive style to present dramatically new perspectives on how markets work and how they can be regulated more effectively. Andrew Lo integrates a deep understanding of finance with a broad knowledge of biology, psychology, and ethics to offer a tantalizing vision of how financial engineering could become a powerful force for a more just, healthy, and prosperous world." In this magnificent book, Andrew Lo explains how our attraction to stories drives markets, explains past catastrophes, and suggests future opportunities for world-saving financial engineering. These traits are evident in this wonderful book, which traces the ‘evolutionary explosion of financial innovation' that began with Vanguard's creation of the first index mutual fund in 1974, tracking the S&P 500 Index. Andrew Lo traces a journey in which he reconsiders rationality in economics, moving from the efficient market hypothesis to his own Adaptive Markets Hypothesis through psychology, neuroscience, biology, and studies of financial innovations and crises.

In this combination of memoir, business strategy guide, and call to action, Tim O'Reilly, Silicon Valley’s leading intellectual and the founder of O’Reilly Media, explores the upside and the potential downsides of today's WTF? His genius over the past four decades has been to identify and to help shape our response to emerging technologies with world shaking potential—the World Wide Web, Open Source Software, Web 2.0, Open Government data, the Maker Movement, Big Data, and now AI. O’Reilly shares the techniques he's used at O’Reilly Media to make sense of and predict past innovation waves and applies those same techniques to provide a framework for thinking about how today’s world-spanning platforms and networks, on-demand services, and artificial intelligence are changing the nature of business, education, government, financial markets, and the economy as a whole. The core of the book's call to action is an exhortation to businesses to DO MORE with technology rather than just using it to cut costs and enrich their shareholders. Entrepreneurs need to set their sights on how they can use big data, sensors, and AI to create amazing human experiences and the economy of the future, making us all richer in the same way the tools of the first industrial revolution did. “the act of reading WTF clarified certain foggy notions with which I’ve been wrestling, distilling them into more concise reckonings….O’Reilly’s book has a way of nudging things into the light: He takes sincere offense with the way our tech-driven capitalistic system has developed, and spends a lot of his book laying out a case for why we have to change our approach to how we run our companies and our governments.” (John Battelle, NewCo Shift). “Tim O’Reilly’s creative insights and moral clarity have made him the trusted guide to waves of technology now sweeping the planet. “So many insights, so much history, so much of our future by the consummate insider who is as much a part of the story as the people and ideas he writes about - I was learning something on more or less every page.” (Dr. James Manyika, director, McKinsey Global Institute). “[a] punchy and provocative book… What’s the Future is an insightful and heartfelt plea, daring us to reimagine a better economy and society… a jaunty read with a compelling narrative of how technology interweaves with the real world. O’Reilly applies techniques his pioneering company has used to predict and make sense of past innovation waves to provide a framework for thinking about what he calls the “WTF technologies” of the twenty-first century. In this powerful combination of memoir, business-strategy guide, and rallying cry, O’Reilly draws on lessons from networked platforms, including Amazon, Google, Facebook, Airbnb, Uber, and Lyft, to show how our economy and financial markets have become increasingly managed by algorithms. O’Reilly makes the case that income inequality, declining upward mobility, and job loss due to technology are all the result of design choices we have made in the algorithms that manage our markets and our companies.

Start with Why analyses leaders like Martin Luther King Jr and Steve Jobs and discovers that they all think in the same way - they all started with why. Simon Sinek explains the framework needed for businesses to move past knowing what they do to how they do it, and then to ask the more important question- WHY ? A perspective that is nothing short of the truth.” -MOKHTAR LAMANI, former ambassador, special envoy to Iraq SIMON SINEK , the bestselling author of LEADERS EAT LAST and TOGETHER IS BETTER, is an optimist who believes in a brighter future for humanity.

Students preparing to take this exam need a chance to practice the analogy skills necessary to score well on this test, which MAT For Dummies provides with its six full-length practice tests and plethora of other test preparation suggestions. Intro to the MAT — get general info about the MAT, including how to register for it, analogy content and structure, analogy-solving methods, and analogy categories A word to the wise — get the scoop on the most important concepts tested in words and language, the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and math Practice makes perfect — take six full-length MAT practice exams — complete with answer keys and explanations — that mimic the actual MAT exam Breathe easy — discover tips to keep in mind on test day, along with some ways to help reduce test anxiety. Planning advice, study strategies, and time- management tactics Six sample tests with answer keys A comprehensive appendix of MAT vocabulary Tips for analyzing and solving analogies How to work with words and language What you need to know about natural sciences, math, and the humanities Top ten tips for test day.

Freakonomics is a groundbreaking collaboration between Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, an award-winning author and journalist. Thus the new field of study contained in this book: freakonomics.Through forceful storytelling and wry insight, Levitt and Dubner show that economics is, at root, the study of incentives—how people get what they want, or need, especially when other people want or need the same thing. What unites all these stories is a belief that the modern world, despite a great deal of complexity and downright deceit, is not impenetrable, is not unknowable, and—if the right questions are asked—is even more intriguing than we think. Freakonomics establishes this unconventional premise: If morality represents how we would like the world to work, then economics represents how it actually does work. It will literally redefine the way we view the modern world.Bonus material added to the revised and expanded 2006 edition.The original New York Times Magazine article about Steven D. Levitt by Stephen J. Dubner, which led to the creation of this book.Seven “Freakonomics” columns written for the New York Times Magazine, published between August 2005 and April 2006. “Levitt dissects complex real-world phenomena, e.g. baby-naming patterns and Sumo wrestling, with an economist’s laser.” (San Diego Union-Tribune). This is bracing fun of the highest order.” (Kurt Andersen, host of public radio's Studio 360 and author of Turn of the Century). “Freakonomics challenges conventional wisdom and makes for fun reading.” (Book Sense Picks and Notables). Steven D. Levitt, a professor of economics at the University of Chicago, was awarded the John Bates Clark Medal, given to the most influential American economist under forty. Stephen J. Dubner, an award-winning journalist and radio and TV personality, has worked for the New York Times and published three non- Freakonomics books.

To help people uncover their talents, Gallup introduced the first version of its online assessment, StrengthsFinder, in the 2001 management book Now, Discover Your Strengths. The book spent more than five years on the bestseller lists and ignited a global conversation, while StrengthsFinder helped millions to discover their top five talents. * The more user-friendly StrengthsFinder 2.0 companion website, with a strengths community area, library of downloadable discussion guides and activities, a strengths screensaver, and a program for creating display cards of your top five themes. In the six years since the release of Now, Discover Your Strengths, more than 2 million people have taken the Clifton StrengthsFinder assessment, which means billions of people have not yet had the opportunity. Those who are familiar with the StrengthsFinder assessment know that it is designed to uncover certain key talents -- patterns of thought, feeling, and behavior that can be productively applied. In this interview, Tom Rath, author of StrengthsFinder 2.0, discusses what Gallup scientists have learned since the publication of the first book, what more there is to discover about your talents, and why it's bad to focus on your employees' weaknesses, but simply cruel to ignore them completely. More than two million people have taken the StrengthsFinder assessment, and each month, the number of people learning about their talents goes up. This book helps readers apply strengths theory to any type of role and gives them ideas to help them apply their talents in their daily life. Have you discovered anything new about talents and strengths? We found that if your manager focuses on your strengths, your chances of being actively disengaged go down to one in one hundred. I always thought there were some people who were just destined to be disengaged in their jobs because that was their personality, and no matter how hard managers tried, there wasn't much they could do with some of those people. GMJ: So is that the business case to be made for putting people in roles that play to their strengths? The main business case is that people have a lot more fun and get a lot more done if they're able to spend time in areas where they have some natural talent. Rath: While hundreds of people in our organization continue to research this topic each year, our greatest challenge might be incorporating the new research while making the message even more succinct and applicable to a wider audience. GMJ: The Clifton StrengthsFinder assessment has always categorized talents into thirty-four themes. ABOUT STRENGTHSFINDER. In 1998, the Father of Strengths Psychology, Donald O. Clifton, Ph.D. (1924-2003), along with Tom Rath and a team of scientists at The Gallup Organization, created the online StrengthsFinder assessment. In 2007, building on the initial assessment and language from StrengthsFinder 1.0, Rath and Gallup scientists released a new edition of the assessment, program, and website, dubbed "StrengthsFinder 2.0." Rooted in more than 40 years of research, this assessment has helped millions discover and develop their natural talents.

A former international hostage negotiator for the FBI offers a new, field-tested approach to high-stakes negotiations—whether in the boardroom or at home. Whether for your business or your personal life, his techniques work.” (Joe Navarro, FBI Special Agent (Ret.). Those who have benefited from these techniques include business clients generating millions in additional profits, MBA students getting better jobs, and even parents dealing with their kids. Never Split the Difference provides a gripping, behind-the-scenes recounting of dramatic scenarios from the gang-infested streets of Haiti to a Brooklyn bank robbery gone horribly wrong, revealing the negotiation strategies that helped Voss and his colleagues succeed where it mattered most: saving lives. It’s a riveting read, full of instantly actionable advice—not just for high-stakes negotiations, but also for handling everyday conflicts at work and at home.”—Adam Grant, Wharton Professor and New York Times bestselling author of originals and give and take. .It’s required reading for my employees because I use the lessons in this book every single day, and I want them to, too.”—Jason McCarthy, CEO of GORUCK.

With the clock ticking, Bill must organize work flow streamline interdepartmental communications, and effectively serve the other business functions at Parts Unlimited. Today, our constraints aren't robots inside our factories, but it's how we manage technologies like Tomcat and Java that power our most critical projects and applications. This book continues the journey that began with Shewhart, Deming, Ohno and Dr. Goldratt, and shows us how to diminish our modern constraints to help the business win." "This insightful walk through the pain and success of business will trigger deja vu for anyone who has ever run afoul of their complete reliance in their IT organization. Kevin Behr is the founder of the Information Technology Process Institute (ITPI) and the general manager and chief science officer of Praxis Flow LLC. George Spafford i s a research director for Gartner, covering DevOps, technical change, and release management, in addition to the use of bimodal IT and the pace-layered application strategy.

Prepare for high-stakes situations Transform anger and hurt feelings into powerful dialogue Make it safe to talk about almost anything Be persuasive, not abrasive. KERRY PATTERSON, JOSEPH GRENNY, DAVID MAXFIELD, RON MCMILLAN, and AL SWITZLER are the cofounders and leaders of VitalSmarts, an innovator in corporate training and organizational performance that has taught more than two million people worldwide and worked with more than 300 of the Fortune 500 companies.

Major New York Times bestseller. Winner of the National Academy of Sciences Best Book Award in 2012. Selected by the New York Times Book Review as one of the ten best books of 2011. A Globe and Mail Best Books of the Year 2011 Title. One of The Economist 's 2011 Books of the Year. One of The Wall Street Journal 's Best Nonfiction Books of the Year 2011. 2013 Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient. Kahneman's work with Amos Tversky is the subject of Michael Lewis's The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds. Amazon Best Books of the Month, November 2011 : Drawing on decades of research in psychology that resulted in a Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences, Daniel Kahneman takes readers on an exploration of what influences thought example by example, sometimes with unlikely word pairs like "vomit and banana." My main problem in doing this review was preventing family members and friends from stealing my copy of the book to read it for themselves...this is one of the greatest and most engaging collections of insights into the human mind I have read -- William Easterly * Financial Times * Absorbing, intriguing...By making us aware of our minds' tricks, Kahneman hopes to inspire individuals and organisations to identify strategies to outwit them -- Jenni Russell * Sunday Times * Profound . As Copernicus removed the Earth from the centre of the universe and Darwin knocked humans off their biological perch, Mr. Kahneman has shown that we are not the paragons of reason we assume ourselves to be * The Economist * [Thinking, Fast and Slow] is wonderful, of course. So impressive is its vision of flawed human reason that the New York Times columnist David Brooks recently declared that Kahneman and Tversky's work 'will be remembered hundreds of years from now,' and that it is 'a crucial pivot point in the way we see ourselves.'. But Mr. Kahneman's simple experiments reveal a very different mind, stuffed full of habits that, in most situations, lead us astray -- Jonah Lehrer * The Wall Street Journal * This is a landmark book in social thought, in the same league as The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith and The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud -- Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of 'The Black Swan' Daniel Kahneman is among the most influential psychologists in history and certainly the most important psychologist alive today...The appearance of Thinking, Fast and Slow is a major event -- Steven Pinker, author of * The Language Instinct * Daniel Kahneman is one of the most original and interesting thinkers of our time. It will change the way you think, on the job, about the world, and in your own life -- Richard Thaler, co-author of 'Nudge' [A] tour de force of psychological insight, research explication and compelling narrative that brings together in one volume the high points of Mr. Kahneman's notable contributions, over five decades, to the study of human judgment, decision-making and choice . Thanks to the elegance and force of his ideas, and the robustness of the evidence he offers for them, he has helped us to a new understanding of our divided minds-and our whole selves -- Christoper F. Chabris * The Wall Street Journal * Thinking, Fast and Slow is a masterpiece - a brilliant and engaging intellectual saga by one of the greatest psychologists and deepest thinkers of our time. Kahneman should be parking a Pulitzer next to his Nobel Prize -- Daniel Gilbert, Professor of Psychology, Harvard University, author of 'Stumbling on Happiness', host of the award-winning PBS television series 'This Emotional Life' A major intellectual event . Daniel Kahneman has discovered a path to make it possible -- Jaron Lanier, author of You Are Not a Gadget For anyone interested in economics, cognitive science, psychology, and, in short, human behavior, this is the book of the year. Kahnemann is the godfather of behavioural economics, and this distillation of a lifetime's thinking about why we make bad decisions - about everything from money to love - is full of brilliant anecdote and wisdom.

Voted one of Top 100 Business Books of All Time on Goodreads. People are using this simple, powerful concept to focus on what matters most in their personal and work lives. By focusing their energy on one thing at a time people are living more rewarding lives by building their careers, strengthening their finances, losing weight and getting in shape, deepening their faith, and nurturing stronger marriages and personal relationships. In. The ONE Thing. , you. '. ll learn to. *. cut through the clutter. *. achieve better results in less time. *. build momentum toward your goal. *. dial down the stress. *. overcome that overwhelmed feeling. *. revive your energy. *. stay on track. *. master what matters to you. The ONE Thing. delivers extraordinary results in every area of your life. --. work, personal, family, and spiritual. Gary Keller is chairman of the board and cofounder of Keller Williams Realty, Inc., which holds the #1 position as the largest real estate company in the world.

Sent to the most violent battlefield in Iraq, Jocko Willink and Leif Babin’s SEAL task unit faced a seemingly impossible mission: help U.S. forces secure Ramadi, a city deemed “all but lost.” In gripping firsthand accounts of heroism, tragic loss, and hard-won victories in SEAL Team Three’s Task Unit Bruiser, they learned that leadership—at every level—is the most important factor in whether a team succeeds or fails. JOCKO WILLINK is author of Extreme Ownership , a decorated retired Navy SEAL officer, and co-founder of Echelon Front, where he is a leadership instructor, speaker, and executive coach. Jocko spent 20 years in the U.S. Navy SEAL Teams, starting as an enlisted SEAL and rising through the ranks to become a SEAL officer. As commander of SEAL Team Three's Task Unit Bruiser during the battle of Ramadi, he orchestrated SEAL operations that helped the "Ready First" Brigade of the US Army's First Armored Division bring stability to the violent, war-torn city. LEIF BABIN is author of Extreme Ownership , a decorated former Navy SEAL officer, and co-founder of Echelon Front, where he serves as leadership instructor, speaker, and executive coach. As a SEAL platoon commander in SEAL Team Three's Task Unit Bruiser, he planned and led major combat operations in the Battle of Ramadi that helped the "Ready First" Brigade of the US Army's 1st Armored Division bring stability to the violent, war-torn city. There, he reshaped SEAL leadership training to better prepare SEAL officers for the immense challenges of combat. During his last tour, Leif served as Operations Officer and Executive Officer at a SEAL Team where he again deployed to Iraq with a Special Operations Task Force.

-Six ways to make people like you. -Twelve ways to win people to your way of thinking. -Nine ways to change people without arousing resentment. Financial success, Carnegie believed, is due 15 percent to professional knowledge and 85 percent to "the ability to express ideas, to assume leadership, and to arouse enthusiasm among people." You learn how to make people like you, win people over to your way of thinking, and change people without causing offense or arousing resentment.

Eliminating wasted time and resources Building quality into workplace systems Finding low-cost but reliable alternatives to expensive new technology Producing in small quantities Turning every employee into a qualitycontrol inspector. Dr. Jeffrey Liker, a renowned authority on Toyota's Lean methods, explains how you can adopt these principles--known as the "Toyota Production System" or "Lean Production"--to improve the speed of your business processes, improve product and service quality, and cut costs, no matter what your industry. You'll learn how Toyota fosters employee involvement at all levels, discover the difference between traditional process improvement and Toyota's Lean improvement, and learn why companies often think they are Lean--but aren't. Dr. Liker explains each key principle with detailed, examples from Toyota and other Lean companies on how to: Foster an atmosphere of continuous improvement and learning Create continuous process "flow" to unearth problems Satisfy customers (and eliminate waste at the same time) Grow your leaders rather than purchase them Get quality right the first time Grow together with your suppliers and partners for mutual benefit. Dr. Liker shows the Toyota Way in action, then outlines how to apply the Toyota Way in your organization, with examples of how other companies have rebuilt their culture to create a Lean, learning enterprise. The Toyota Way, explain's Toyota's unique approach to Lean--the 14 management principles and philosophy that drive Toyota's quality and efficiency-obsessed culture.

With the release of Investment Banking, Second Edition: Valuation, Leveraged Buyouts, and Mergers & Acquisitions , Rosenbaum and Pearl once again have written the definitive book that they wish had existed when they were trying to break into Wall Street. From the Foreword “Rosenbaum and Pearl succeed in providing a systematic approach to addressing a critical issue in any M&A, IPO, or investment situation—namely, how much is a business or transaction worth. They also put forth the framework for helping approach more nuanced questions such as how much to pay for the business and how to get the deal done. Due to the lack of a comprehensive written reference material on valuation, the fundamentals and subtlety of the trade are often passed on orally from banker-to-banker on a case-by-case basis. In codifying the art and science of investment banking, the authors convert this oral history into an accessible framework by bridging the theoretical to the practical with user-friendly, step-by-step approaches to performing primary valuation methodologies.” –Joseph R. Perella, Chairman and CEO, Perella Weinberg Partners. Rosenbaum and Pearl have created a comprehensive and thoughtfully written guide covering the core skills of the successful investment professional with particular emphasis on valuation analysis." Investment Banking provides specific step-by-step valuation procedures for LBO and M&A transactions, with lots of diagrams and numerical examples." — Roger G. Ibbotson, Professor in the Practice of Finance, Yale School of Management Chairman & CIO, Zebra Capital Management, LLC Founder & Advisor, Ibbotson Associates , a Morningstar Company. While numerous textbooks provide students with the core principles of financial economics, the rich institutional considerations that are essential on Wall Street are not well documented. — Josh Lerner , Jacob H. Schiff Professor of Investment Banking, Harvard Business School , Coauthor, Venture Capital and Private Equity: A Casebook. "Rosenbaum and Pearl have written the ultimate nuts and bolts guide for valuation.

The 10th-anniversary edition of the New York Times business bestseller-now updated with "Answers to Ten Questions People Ask" We attempt or avoid difficult conversations every day-whether dealing with an underperforming employee, disagreeing with a spouse, or negotiating with a client. It does.” —The New York Times “These talented communicators blend a daunting array of disciplines into highly readable and practical advice.” —Booklist. “ Difficult Conversations will be appreciated by readers who wish to improve oral communication in all aspects of their daily lives.” —Library Journal. “Stone, Patton, and Heen illustrate their points with anecdotes, scripted conversations and familiar examples in a clear, easy-to-browse format.” —Publishers Weekly. “The central insights of Difficult Conversations so resonate with common sense that it is easy to overlook just how remarkable of a book it is . “Stone, Patton, and Heen have written an extremely clear and unpretentious exposition of how to develop effective communication skills and a guide to achieving openness and constructive outcomes in dialogue . They have been consultants to businesspeople, governments, organizations, communities, and individuals around the world, and have written on negotiation and communication in publications ranging from the New York Times to Parents magazine.

Written in a fast-paced thriller style, The Goal, a gripping novel, is transforming management thinking throughout the world. Alex Rogo is a harried plant manager working ever more desperately to try improve performance. He has ninety days to save his plant - or it will be closed by corporate HQ, with hundreds of job losses. It takes a chance meeting with a professor from student days - Jonah - to help him break out of conventional ways of thinking to see what needs to be done. It contains a serious message for all managers in industry and explains the ideas, which underline the Theory of Constraints (TOC), developed by Eli Goldratt. The Economist 'Goldratt's system, in essence, forces production managers and workers alike to coordinate their work-with an underlying principle in mind: that 'bottlenecks'...are what ultimately constrain the manufacturing environment.'. Definitely a book to read...' The Hairdresser Eliyahu M. Goldratt was an internationally recognized leader in the development of new business management concepts and systems, and acted as an educator to many of the world's corporations.

Recognized as one of the most iconic and impactful strategy books ever written, Blue Ocean Strategy , now updated with fresh content from the authors, argues that cutthroat competition results in nothing but a bloody red ocean of rivals fighting over a shrinking profit pool. Blue Ocean Strategy presents a systematic approach to making the competition irrelevant and outlines principles and tools any organization can use to create and capture their own blue oceans. Praise for Blue Ocean Strategy : A bestseller across 5 continents More than 3.6 million copies sold worldwide Translated into 44 languages A Wall Street Journal , BusinessWeek , and Fast Company bestseller Thinkers50 Strategy Award for Best Business Book of the decade The Fast Company Leadership Hall of Fame Winner of the Carl S. Sloane Award for Excellence in Management Consulting.

From the author: “For the last two years, I’ve interviewed more than 200 world-class performers for my podcast, The Tim Ferriss Show. This unusual depth has helped make The Tim Ferriss Show the first business/interview podcast to pass 100 million downloads. I’ve used dozens of the tactics and philosophies in high-stakes negotiations, high-risk environments, or large business dealings. The lessons have made me millions of dollars and saved me years of wasted effort and frustration. The Observer and other media have named him “the Oprah of audio” due to the influence of his podcast, The Tim Ferriss Show , which has exceeded 200 million downloads and been selected for “Best of iTunes” three years running.

Virtual Freedom: How to Work with Virtual Staff to Buy More Time, Become More Productive, and Build Your Dream Business is the step-by-step guide every entrepreneur needs to build his or her business with the asset of working with virtual employees. This is the field guide for building a team, outsourcing, and taking back control of your life.” —Jay Baer, New York Times bestselling author of Youtility “Chris Ducker explains exactly how to get more done in less time—and, as a bonus, get back the life you gave up when you decided to go into business for yourself. Virtual assistants are the key, and Virtual Freedom gives you everything you need to know.” —Michael Hyatt, New York Times bestselling author of Platform. He takes the fear out of virtualizing your business and shows you how to live your life, while your business works for YOU!” —Peter Shankman, bestselling author of Nice Companies Finish First. “In Virtual Freedom , Ducker gives incredibly practical, proven advice for getting our time back so we can live a life of true freedom with the most luxurious of luxuries: choice over what we do with our time. Virtual Freedom did that for me because what Chris has produced in this book will literally change your business, and your life!” —Pat Flynn, bestselling author of Let Go. Chris C. Ducker has helped thousands of entrepreneurs around the world implement successful virtual staffing strategies into their businesses, releasing them from the shackles of the over-worked, over-stressed lifestyle that most business owners endure on a daily basis.

This book de-mystifies the COO role and breaks it into 16 core elements; the three fundamental pillars of Culture, Strategy and Change, plus 13 technical areas. Drawing on industry standards and enriched with expert insight and real-life current examples, it condenses a vast range of knowledge and experience into one accessible read. Packed with practical insights and based on real life experiences, it gives a clear and powerful road map for this transformational organizational role.’. Justin Forsyth, Deputy Executive Director, UNICEF. This is a consequence of the superb clarity of Jennifer’s writing, and the fact that she has earned her expertise – and the scars that come with it – from working on the business end of the stick for over twenty years.’. Mark Waddington, CEO, Hope and Homes for Children. This nifty handbook provides a shortcut to understand the critical skills required, and is filled with nuggets of practical and accessible advice.’. Sinead Mahon, Banking COO. Packed with practical insights and based on real life experiences, it gives a clear and powerful roadmap for this transformational organizational role' Justin Forsyth, Deputy Executive Director, UNICEF 'It is rare for a single book to command such breadth of expertise, practical insight and advice that is so easy to put into action.This is a consequence of the superb clarity of Jennifer's writing, and the fact that she has earned her expertise - and the scars that come with it - from working on the business end of the stick for over twenty years.'. De-codes the very tricky role of COO and inspires you on how to be a great one' Niamh O'Keeffe, Author of "Your First 100 days" and founder of CEOAssist 'The defining text on the role of the COO and its component parts. This is what prompted me to write this book - it is the book I wish I had had at the outset.

For those who believe that there must be a more agile and efficient way for people to get things done, here is a brilliantly discursive, thought-provoking book about the leadership and management process that is changing the way we live. In the future, historians may look back on human progress and draw a sharp line designating “ before Scrum ” and “ after Scrum .” Scrum is that ground-breaking. It already drives most of the world’s top technology companies. On a mission to put this tool into the hands of the broader business world for the first time, Jeff Sutherland succeeds brilliantly.” --Eric Ries, New York Times bestselling author of The Lean Startup "Engaging, persuasive and extremely practical... Scrum provides a simple framework for solving what seem like intractable and complicated work problems. In other words success requires Scrum.” --General Barry McCaffrey “Jeff Sutherland has written the essence of Scrum for the masses. This book elevates Scrum from a fix-it tool to a way of life.” --Hirotaka Takeuchi, Professor of Management Practice, Harvard Business School “Jeff Sutherland's book masterfully speaks truth to the political complexities that easily stand in the way of getting a lot of work done in the least amount of time. The busy professionals who’ll likely be drawn to this book will find not only an effective manual for getting things done but, also, a how-to guide for living a meaningful life.” --John Maeda, Design Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers “This extraordinary book shows a new way to simplify your life and work, increase your focus, and get more done in less time than you ever thought possible.” --Brian Tracy, bestselling author of Eat that Frog and Time Power. If you don’t get three times the results in one-third the time, you aren’t doing it right!” --Scott Maxwell, Founder & Senior Managing Director, OpenView Venture Partners “Jeff Sutherland used the common-sense but seldom-applied principles of the quality movement, user-centered design, and lean development to come up with a process that dramatically increases productivity while reducing employees’ frustrations with the typical corporate nonsense. Senior leaders should not just read the book—they should do what Sutherland recommends.” --Jeffrey Pfeffer, Professor, Stanford Business School and c-author of The Knowing-Doing Gap “Groundbreaking…Will upend people’s assumptions about how productive they can actually be…Here Jeff Sutherland discloses to the non-tech world the elegantly simple process that programmers and Web developers have been using since he invented Scrum, showing how a small, empowered, and dedicated team can deliver significantly higher quality work at a faster pace through introspection, iteration, and adaptation.” --Michael Mangi, Senior V.P. Jeff Sutherland is currently the CEO of Scrum, Inc. and Senior Adviser to OpenView Venture Partners where he coaches venture-funded companies.

Eliminating wasted time and resources Building quality into workplace systems Finding low-cost but reliable alternatives to expensive new technology Producing in small quantities Turning every employee into a qualitycontrol inspector. Dr. Jeffrey Liker, a renowned authority on Toyota's Lean methods, explains how you can adopt these principles--known as the "Toyota Production System" or "Lean Production"--to improve the speed of your business processes, improve product and service quality, and cut costs, no matter what your industry. You'll learn how Toyota fosters employee involvement at all levels, discover the difference between traditional process improvement and Toyota's Lean improvement, and learn why companies often think they are Lean--but aren't. Dr. Liker explains each key principle with detailed, examples from Toyota and other Lean companies on how to: Foster an atmosphere of continuous improvement and learning Create continuous process "flow" to unearth problems Satisfy customers (and eliminate waste at the same time) Grow your leaders rather than purchase them Get quality right the first time Grow together with your suppliers and partners for mutual benefit. Dr. Liker shows the Toyota Way in action, then outlines how to apply the Toyota Way in your organization, with examples of how other companies have rebuilt their culture to create a Lean, learning enterprise. The Toyota Way, explain's Toyota's unique approach to Lean--the 14 management principles and philosophy that drive Toyota's quality and efficiency-obsessed culture.

Karen Martin is principal consultant for Karen Martin & Associates, LLC, instructor for the University of California, San Diego's Lean Enterprise program, and industry advisor to the University of San Diego's Industrial and Systems Engineering program. She's also the author of the Shingo Research Award–winning The Outstanding Organization , an instructor in the University of California, San Diego's Lean Enterprise program, and an industry advisor to the University of San Diego's Industrial and Systems Engineering program.