There are only twenty-four hours in a day, but you can make them count. Time Management, a comprehensive and essential resource for any manager on the run, shows you how.Learn to: Set and prioritize goals, objectives, and tasks Create an effective schedule Avoid distractions and interruptions Respect other people's time Build a time-conscious organization The Collins Best Practices guides offer new and seasoned managers the essential information they need to achieve more, both personally and professionally. Designed to provide tried-and-true advice from the world's most influential business minds, they feature practical strategies and tips to help you get ahead.

In today's high-pressure workplace, motivating all employees to consistently contribute their best can mean the difference between success and failure. Motivating Employees, a comprehensive and essential resource for any manager on the run, shows you how.Learn to: Inspire employees to succeed Improve performance through coaching Minimize the impact of common de-motivators Create a fair and consistent reward system Turn negative experiences into positive, motivational opportunities The Collins Best Practices guides offer new and seasoned managers the essential information they need to achieve more, both personally and professionally. Designed to provide tried-and-true advice from the world's most influential business minds, they feature practical strategies and tips to help you get ahead.

Beat the Pros at Their Own Game All too often, you learn about good stocks far too late to profit from the information. By the time you actually buy a stock, professional investors have already been there, bought the stock, driven up the price, and are just waiting to unload it at an inflated price.All That's About to Change. . . .In Ahead of the Market, Mitch Zacks shows investors how they can spot stocks that are poised to take off long before the rest of the crowd learns about them. HowBy unlocking the gems of priceless information buried in Wall Street's often self-serving research. Ahead of the Market is the first book, ever, that enables you to profitably use the analyst stock research for which Wall Street firms pay more than one billion dollars annually. Many investors have rightly felt misled in the past by analysts who continued to hype stocks as prices plummeted. You may have even concluded that Wall Street research is totally worthless. But it's not.In Ahead of the Market, Mitch Zacks shows that analysts actually provide a wealth of market-moving information that can generate exceptional returns if interpreted correctly.The key is to use the research produced by Wall Street analysts the same way the professional money managers do.Pioneered by the firm Zacks Investment Research and based on more than twenty years of intensive analysis, the investment strategies revealed in this book are indeed the same ones used by successful professional investors everywhere.In these pages you will learn how to form an investment plan by locating stocks that are poised for price appreciation and avoiding stocks heading for a fall. Zacks shows how you could have prevented being burned when the recent bubble burst, if you had known how to use analyst research correctly and teaches you the rules of the research game so you will not fall victim the next time around. In sum, this book is your guide to picking the right stock at the right time.Mitch Zacks's groundbreaking research provides new insights and new strategies to: Use revisions to analysts' earnings estimates to predict the rise and fall of stock prices Interpret the real meaning behind analysts' stock recommendations Employ the "cockroach" phenomenon and other methodologies to predict earnings surprises before they occur Determine how to react when a company reports earnings and how to profit from "post-earnings announcement drift" Understand and profit from "analyst creep" the reason that earnings estimate revisions occur incrementally over time Avoid being duped by the games that companies play with their earnings reportsWhether the economy is healthy or stalled, whether the market is up or down, by focusing on the strategies contained in this book you will always come out ahead. Well-picked individual stocks will always carry the day. Now with Ahead of the Market, you will finally have the same tools institutional investors have and will be able to find great stocks in any market environment.

Take an ordinary business. A bike shop. An auction company. An ice cream parlor. A sock manufacturer. In thoroughly mundane businesses like these, an entrepreneur must outsmart the multitudes of competitors, leap to the head of the pack, and become a dominant Alpha Dog.Exactly how does an everyday company distinguish itself in the marketplace, generate much higher sales than its competitors, and earn the lasting loyalty of customers and employeesIs it cutting-edge productsBrilliant serviceIngenious branding?Donna Fenn, a twenty-year veteran of Inc. magazine, has discovered the people who have the answers. In a personal and probing style, she introduces you to eight Alpha Dogs. These men and women share their solutions and insights on how to rise to the top, despite multiple competitors, from Chinese manufacturers to Wal-Mart.Readers will meet: Chris Zane, an intense, ambitious father of three boys. His Branford, Connecticut, retail bike shop has flourished among Wal-Mart, Sports Authority, and independent bike stores. He's done it by seeking out new markets and perfecting the art of customer service. Deb Weidenhamer, a tough woman in a male-dominated industry who transformed a traditional auction company with cutting-edge technology. While her competitors were still fretting about eBay, she was using the online auction giant as a training ground for her own innovative Web site. Amy Simmons, a former premed student who fell in love with the ice cream business in Boston and then founded her own ice cream parlor in Austin, Texas. With twelve Amy's Ice Creams stores in Austin, Amy's is the Austin hometown favorite, despite her deep-pocketed rivals, Ben Jerry's and Cold Stone Creamery. In accessible, conversational style, Donna Fenn tells each entrepreneur's personal story, shares their winning formulas, and offers nuts-and-bolts advice and practical tips. Alpha Dogs is a lively handbook for every current and aspiring entrepreneur.

You know there is a novel locked inside of you chock-full of conflict, humor, irony, enthralling events and fascinating characters. What you don't know is how to set it free.Practical Advice, Hands-On HelpRespected author and professional writing instructor Lou Willett Stanek's New York workshops have enabled scores of aspiring novelists to realize their dreams of completing credible and compelling manu*s. Here, in a positive, user-friendly format, she offers not only encouragement and motivation, but Clear, Step-By-Step Instructions To Accomplish Your Goal from original conception through final draft.Learn How To: Set up and stick to a writing schedule Create unforgettable characters Follow strong plotting and solid structure guidelines Choose a viewpoint and develop conflict Handle flashbacks and transitions Not Just Philosophy Or A Simple Motivational Tool, This Is The Book That Tells You How To Succeed

Everything you ever wanted and needed to know about capitalism . . . but were afraid to ask. What is capitalism, and will it surviveWhat does globalization really mean and how does it affect your bank accountIf capitalism, left unchecked, has caused disasters like the Great Depression and the financial crisis of 2008–09, why has it been the economic system of choice for centuriesTo many people, the complex, jargon-rich world of capitalism can be intimidating, raising more questions than it answers. However, as the excesses and failures of free-market capitalism continue to hold sway over the daily news and our daily lives, understanding our economic system including where it has succeeded and where it has not is more important than ever. Edited by New York Times business journalist Gretchen Morgenson, The Capitalist's Bible is the essential reference on capitalism and how it works from the people who champion it to the mechanisms and institutions that uphold it to the terms and laws that define it. Whether you seek a more well-rounded understanding of the ideology that underwrites America's and, increasingly, the world's economy, or simply wish to be able to speak more knowledgeably on the subject in conversation, this book is an invaluable tool for understanding capitalism.

Welcome to the world of Martin "Buzzy" Schwartz, Champion Trader--the man whose nerves of steel and killer instinct in the canyons of Wall Street earned him the well-deserved name "Pit Bull." This is the true story of how Schwartz became the best of the best, of the people and places he discovered along the way and of the trader's tricks and techniques he used to make his millions.

With The E-Myth Contractor, Michael E. Gerber launches a series of books that apply the E-Myth to specific types of small businesses. The first is aimed at contractors.This book reveals a radical new mind-set that will free contractors from the tyranny of an unprofitable, unproductive routine. With specific tips on topics as crucial as planning, money and personnel management, The E-Myth Contractor teaches readers how to: Implement the ingenious turnkey system of management a means of creating a business prototype that reflects the business owner's unique set of talents and replicating and distributing them among employees and customers. Recognise and manage the four forms of money income, profit, flow and equity. Harness the power of change to expand the company. The book also provides help on a larger level, leading readers towards becoming business visionaries by relinquishing tactical work and embracing strategic work, by letting go to gain control. Once put into action, Gerber's revolutionary ideas promise not only to help contractors build successful businesses, but successful lives as well.

Who's really driving oil and gas pricesHow much oil is leftHow far will Big Oil go to get it, and at what cost to the environment, human rights, the economy, worker safety, public health, and democracy?Here, at last, are the answers we've been looking for and the inside story on Big Oil.In The Tyranny of Oil, Antonia Juhasz investigates the true state of the companies collectively known as "Big Oil," uncovering their unparalleled global financial power, their political dominance, and their increasingly destructive plans for the future. And she tells us what we can do about it.A tool for meaningful change that blends history, original investigative research and reporting, candid interviews with key insiders, and a unique focus on activism, The Tyranny of Oil is required reading for every concerned global citizen.

How to afford kids and teach them about moneyWe all want to raise smart children. But somewhere between the reading, writing, and arithmetic, one of life's most important lessons is too often overlooked: personal finances. As adults, we interact with money every day, whether by saving, investing, spending, or giving it, but we often forget that kids also face these same decisions from their own unique perspective as they mature. How do we teach today what kids really need to know tomorrow to thrive as financially savvy adultsIn Piggybanking, veteran Wall Street Journal personal-finance writer Jeff D. Opdyke provides a clear and effective plan to help parents raise children to be comfortable and confident managing the daily finances of life.But even before kids arrive, parents face a rash of financial decisions. Accordingly, Piggybanking also deals with the essential problems every struggling young family must face, including how to prepare your budget for a child's arrival, how to choose between single- and dual-income lifestyles, and how to plan for funding a college education.With Opdyke's valuable advice, and with his 15 Rules of Kids Money in hand, parents will be well equipped to create a sound financial foundation for their family and a successful financial life for their kids.

The classic #1 New York Times bestseller that answers the age-old questionWhy is incompetence so maddeningly rampant and so vexingly triumphantThe Peter Principle, the eponymous law Dr. Laurence J. Peter coined, explains that everyone in a hierarchy from the office intern to the CEO, from the low-level civil servant to a nation's president will inevitably rise to his or her level of incompetence. Dr. Peter explains why incompetence is at the root of everything we endeavor to do why schools bestow ignorance, why governments condone anarchy, why courts dispense injustice, why prosperity causes unhappiness, and why utopian plans never generate utopias.With the wit of Mark Twain, the psychological acuity of Sigmund Freud, and the theoretical impact of Isaac Newton, Dr. Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull's The Peter Principle brilliantly explains how incompetence and its accompanying symptoms, syndromes, and remedies define the world and the work we do in it.

For most people, the Great Crash of 2008 has meant troubling times. Not so for those in the flourishing poverty industry, for whom the economic woes spell an opportunity to expand and grow. These mercenary entrepreneurs have taken advantage of an era of deregulation to devise high-priced products to sell to the credit-hungry working poor, including the instant tax refund and the payday loan. In the process they've created an industry larger than the casino business and have proved that pawnbrokers and check cashers, if they dream big enough, can grow very rich off those with thin wallets.Broke, USA is Gary Rivlin's riveting report from the economic fringes. From the annual meeting of the national check cashers association in Las Vegas to a tour of the foreclosure-riddled neighborhoods of Dayton, Ohio, here is a subprime Fast Food Nation featuring an unforgettable cast of characters and memorable scenes. Rivlin profiles players like a former small-town Tennessee debt collector whose business offering cash advances to the working poor has earned him a net worth in the hundreds of millions, and legendary Wall Street dealmaker Sandy Weill, who rode a subprime loan business into control of the nation's largest bank. Rivlin parallels their stories with the tale of those committed souls fighting back against the major corporations, chain franchises, and newly hatched enterprises that fleece the country's hardworking waitresses, warehouse workers, and mall clerks.Timely, shocking, and powerful, Broke, USA offers a much-needed look at why our country is in a financial mess and gives a voice to the millions of ordinary Americans left devastated in the wake of the economic collapse.

What triggers fascination, and how do companies, people, and ideas put those triggers to useWhy are you captivated by some people but not by othersWhy do you recall some brands yet forget the restIn a distracted, overcrowded world, how do certain leaders, friends, and family members convince you to change your behaviorFascination: the most powerful way to influence decision making. It's more persuasive than marketing, advertising, or any other form of communication. And it all starts with seven universal triggers: lust, mystique, alarm, prestige, power, vice, and trust. Fascination plays a role in every type of decision making, from the brands you choose to the songs you remember, from the person you marry to the employees you hire. And by activating the right triggers, you can make anything become fascinating.To explore and explain fascination's irresistible influence, Sally Hogshead looks beyond marketing, delving into behavioral and social studies, historical precedents, neurobiology and evolutionary anthropology, as well as conducting in-depth interviews and a national study of a thousand consumers, to emerge with deeply rooted patterns for why, and how, we become captivated.Hogshead reveals why the Salem witch trials began with the same fixations as those in Sex and the City. How Olympic athletes are subject to obsessions similar to those of fetishists. How a 1636 frenzy over Dutch tulip bulbs perfectly mirrors the 2006 real estate bubble. And why a billion-dollar "Just Say No" program actually increased drug use among teens, by activating the same "forbidden fruit" syndrome as a Victoria's Secret catalog.Whether you realize it or not, you're already using the seven triggers. The question is, are you using the right triggers, in the right way, to get your desired resultThis book will show you.

Time is not money.Time is more important than money. Today's customers are overwhelmed, overworked, and overstressed, and it seems that everyone from CEOs to soccer moms is short on time and inundated with information. As a result, despite the availability of 24/7 commerce and countless ways of engaging people in our multiscreen (mobile, TV, and PC) economy, companies find it more difficult than ever to claim even a fraction of the 1,440 minutes in their customers' precious 24 hours. In The 24-Hour Customer, Adrian C. Ott, CEO of a successful Silicon Valley consultancy, argues that companies need to strategically harness the ebbs and flows of customer time and attention in order to win in today's competitive landscape. She explores the economics of time and attention, including why customers will devote hours addicted to social networks, yet will say "I have no time!" to other offerings. Based on extensive research and real-world results with market-leading companies, this book provides tools, such as Time-Value Tradeoffs and Time-ographics, that pinpoint opportunities to increase revenue and gain market traction. Filled with fascinating case studies from companies like Johnson Johnson, Amazon, and iPhone app start-ups, The 24-Hour Customer offers fresh ideas for capitalizing on the elements of time, attention, and value to innovate never-before-considered products, services, and programs for today's ber-connected, multitasking customer. Readers will discover how: Zipcar utilized time-slicing to redefine automobile ownership and grew by 70 percent, while the auto industry struggled in 2009; Netflix, Hulu, and others time-shifted to movies on-demand, ultimately restructuring the entertainment industry; P&G leveraged inattention by enabling habit-formation for some of its most successful brands. This book shares the latest strategic weapons for achieving market leadership and will change the way executives think about their businesses and their customers.

Award-winning journalist and leading consumer advocate William J. McGee offers a shocking, essential exposé that reveals the real state of the "friendly skies."From outsourced call centers in India to the Alabama location where all lost baggage ends up, William J. McGee crisscrossed the country and traveled around the globe immersing himself deep into the world of commercial airlines. And what he found was shocking.McGee interviewed countless industry insiders pilots, TSA security screeners, FAA inspectors, legislators, the CEOs of the major carriers, and even Ralph Nader and Steven Slater, the disgruntled flight attendant who famously jettisoned a JetBlue flight. Here he reveals how airline executives are cutting costs in "a mad race to the bottom" by delegating flights to second-tier regional airlines and outsourcing critical aircraft maintenance and repairs to unlicensed "mechanics" in China, Singapore, Mexico, and El Salvador. And while the U.S. airlines have raked in tens of billions of dollars for checked baggage alone in recent years, our skies (and our airports) are not getting any safer. What's more, McGee explains how both political parties and all branches of the U.S. government have conspired to place corporate interests above the interests of consumers, workers, the nation's economy, and even the planet itself. Attention All Passengers will change the way you view the airline industry and make you think twice the next time you see the fasten seat belts sign.

The Second City has launched the careers of celebrated comic performers such as Tina Fey and Stephen Colbert and produced award-winning content. But it's the actual improvisational process developed and honed over the years by The Second City that has become its legacy. Players master an ability to co-create in ensembles, using philosophies that celebrate a "Yes, And" approach. They embrace authenticity and failure, and espouse the idea of "following the follower," which allows any member of the team to assume a leadership role. For more than two decades, The Second City has taken these same principles in thousands of corporate clients, showing leaders how to apply the tools of improv to common business challenges. Here, for the first time, Second City executives Kelly Leonard and Tom Yorton describe how you can use the same skills that thrill audiences around the world to improve your emotional intelligence, increase creativity, and learn to pivot out of tight and uncomfortable situations. In this engaging, often humorous, and highly practical book, you will learn how to become a more compelling leader and a more collaborative follower by employing the seven elements of improv: Yes, And, by which you give every idea a chance to be acted on; Ensemble, reconciling the needs of individuals with those of the broader team; Co-creation, which highlights the importance of dialogue in creating new products, processes, and relationships; Authenticity, or being unafraid to speak truth to power, challenge convention, and break the rules; Failure, teaching us that not only is it okay to fail, but we should always include it as part of our process; Follow the Follower, which gives any member of the group the chance to assume a leadership role; Listening, in which you learn to stay in the moment, and know the difference between listening to understand and listening merely to respond. When we are fiercely following the tenets of improvisation, we generate ideas both quickly and efficiently, we weather storms with more aplomb, and we don't work burdened by a fear of failure. Even better, these qualities are fully transferable to our lives outside the office. More people are beginning to recognize what The Second City has known for a long time: In the midst of a revolution in how we learn, communicate, and work, professional success often rests on the same pillars that form the foundation of great comedy: Creativity, Communication, and Collaboration. That's where improvisation comes in.

The fault line -- that dangerous, unstable seam in the economy where powerful innovations and savage competition meet and create market-shattering tremors. Every company lives on it; no manager can control it. In the original edition of Living on the Fault Line, Geoffrey Moore presented a compelling argument for using shareholder value (or share price) as the key driver in management decisions. Moore now revisits his argument in the post-Internet bubble world, proving that the methods he espouses are more germane than ever and showing companies how to use them to survive and thrive in today's demanding economy. Extending the themes of Crossing the Chasm and Inside the Tornado, his first two books on the dynamics of the high-tech markets, Moore shows why sensitivity to stock price is the single most important lever for managing in the future, both as a leading indicator of shifts in competitive advantage and as an employee motivator for making necessary changes in organizations heretofore impervious to change. This revised and updated edition includes: A deeper emphasis on core versus context, which has emerged as the key distinction in allocating resources to improve shareholder value A new Competitive Advantage Grid that will aid managers in achieving and sustaining competitive advantage, the most important component in managing for shareholder value An expanded Value Discipline Model as it relates to the Competitive Advantage Grid Analysis of the powerful new trend toward core/context analysis and outsourcing production duties Updated models of organizational change for each stage of market development As disruptive forces continue to buffet the marketplace and rattle the staid practices of the past, Moore offers a brilliant set of navigational tools to help meet today's most compelling management challenges.

From New York Times bestselling financial guru Julie Stav comes The Money in You!, a spot-on primer that pinpoints your financial personality, thus helping you to overcome the self-imposed hurdles that keep you from living the rich life of your dreams. Socrates' guiding rule was "Know thyself." These words are of eternal significance, and, arguably, no better advice has ever been given to man or woman. Yet, what would Socrates have said if he had to dispense practical financial advice in today's hyper-spending, debt-saturated climateWith the myriad pressures involved in building wealth, instilling practical spending habits in ourselves and our kids, and ultimately establishing a life in which money is abundant and our fiscal future secure, undoubtedly he would tell us, "Know thy financial self." In The Money In You!, Julie Stav introduces us to five different financial personality types. According to Julie, it is our financial nature—the way we handle money matters—that forecasts our financial future. Julie shows readers that no amount of data or market expertise trumps the fundamental truth we all forget—that building wealth, attaining security, and establishing personal success can only be achieved when we recognize our strengths and weaknesses. If we are in touch with our motivations, our desires, and our innate tendencies, we can shed the guilt of making the same mistakes over and over; we can halt the vicious cycle of overspending, debt, and ruined relationships. It is then that we are able to restructure our lives to fit our individual goals, whether it's learning to play the stock market or just saving for shoes. Finally, Julie shows us how to establish healthy relationships with the people who are affected by our financial decisions, and who affect us with theirs. Endlessly entertaining, this book will initiate feisty discussions over just who we are and how we interact with others. Julie Stav will both delight and inform.

Serial entrepreneur and journalist Shane Snow delves into the reasons why some people and some organizations are able to achieve incredible things in implausibly short time frames, showing how each of us can use these "smartcuts" to rethink convention and accelerate success.Why do some companies attract millions of customers in mere months while others flopHow did Alexander the Great, YouTube phenom Michelle Phan, and Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon dash to the top in less time than it takes most of us to get a midlevel promotionHow do high-growth businesses, world-class heart surgeons, and underdog marketers beat the norm?Like computer hackers, a handful of innovators in every era use lateral thinking to find better routes to stunning accomplishments. Throughout history, the world's biggest successes have been achieved by those who refuse to follow the expected course and buck the norm.Smartcuts is about bucking the norm. In it, Snow shatters common wisdom about success, revealing how conventions like "paying dues" prevent progress, why kids shouldn't learn multiplication tables, and how, paradoxically, it's easier to build a huge business than a small one.Smartcuts tells the stories of innovators who dared to work differently and lays out practical takeaways for the rest of us. It's about applying entrepreneurial and technological concepts to success, and how, by emulation, we too can leapfrog competitors, grow businesses, and fix society's problems faster than we think.

Haven't women gotten everything they wantEconomic powerSocial influenceBusiness cloutYes, but it turns out that these fantastic gains have come at a heavy price, as consumer goods experts Michael J. Silverstein and Kate Sayre discovered in an unprecedented study of 12,000 women in forty countries.That relentless upward climb has left women feeling stressed out, time starved, and overburdened. As a result, they look to products and services that will help them claw back time, juggle multiple roles, and capture a few moments of enjoyment.Women want more much more, in every category of goods and services. And no matter what their age or economic situation or where they live in the world, women will spend trillions of dollars over the next decade on the brands that truly deliver: Home-cleaning products that enable women to do in an hour what used to take a day Financial-services products that recognize that women control half the United States' wealth Food products that help keep the whole family happy and healthy Health care services designed for working-women's hectic schedules In the coming years, women's influence will be so enormous that it will not only help bring us out of the economic downturn but also create one of the most dramatic market opportunities of our lifetime bigger than the rise of China and India; more sustainable than any bailout package.Through quantitative data, profiles of individual women, and stories of winning companies, Women Want More provides business leaders with the understanding and practices they need to capture their share of the rising "female economy."

Every general manager today all the way up to the CEO is expected by his or her stakeholders to achieve new breakthroughs in performance and fast. Those who don't make visible progress toward that goal within the first year or two will likely find themselves looking for another job. It is precisely because of this growing breakthrough imperative that managers today, whether in corporations or nonprofits, need to get off to a fast start. They don't have time for mistakes or for going back and redoing what they should have done right in the first place. But, despite the intensity of these pressures, despite the high expectations and short time frames, a number of CEOs and general managers turn in truly exceptional results. How do they meet and exceed the breakthrough imperativeTo answer this question, consultants and former managers Mark Gottfredson and Steve Schaubert interviewed more than forty CEOs from both industry and the nonprofit sector, conducted an intensive study of what successful managers do right and what some do wrong and drew on their own combined fifty-plus years of experience at Bain & Company, where their insights have consistently been found in the pages of the Harvard Business Review. Together they came up with the four straightforward principles deceptively simple yet remarkably powerful that everyone must follow to succeed at achieving breakthrough results: 1. Costs and prices always decline2. Competitive position determines options3. Customers and profit pools don't stand still4. Simplicity gets results Although seemingly simplistic, mastering these four laws means mastering the basics of great management a foundation on which to build the rest of one's management strategy. Whether you're managing a small work group or a multinational corporation, a single division or an entire nonprofit, The Breakthrough Imperative presents these core laws of business to help you determine where you are, just how far you can go, and how to get there with stellar results.