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Posted Feb. 11, 2011 1:53 p.m. by dylan
In - 800 CEO Read Blog
➻ McSweeney's offered Some Good News from the World of Books this week:
The good news is that there isn't as much bad news as popularly assumed. In fact, almost all of the news is good, and most of it is very good. Book sales are up, way up, from twenty years ago. Young adult readership is far wider and deeper than ever before. Library membership and circulation is at all-time high. The good news goes on and on.
And the good news does indeed go on and on, with reports on the state of libraries, the state of book production, and the state of global literacy, and more reports planned.
➻ As is evidenced once again in his story of When Irish Eyes Are Crying in Vanity Fair, nobody distills in writing the sweeping economic history involved in a moment better than Michael Lewis:
Ireland’s regress is especially unsettling because of the questions it raises about Ireland’s former progress: even now no one is quite sure why the Irish suddenly did so well for themselves in the first place. Between 1845 and 1852, during the Great Potato Famine, the country experienced the greatest loss of population in world history—in a nation of eight million, a million and a half people left. Another million starved to death or died from the effects of hunger. Inside of a decade the nation went from being among the most densely populated in Europe to the least. The founding of the Irish state, in 1922, might have offered some economic hope—they could now have their own central bank, their own economic policies—but right up until the end of the 1980s the Irish failed to do what economists expected them to: catch up with their neighbors’ standard of living. As recently as the 1980s one million Irish people—a third of the population—lived below the poverty line.
What has occurred in Ireland since then is without precedent in economic history. By the start of the new millennium, the Irish poverty rate was under 6 percent and by 2006 Ireland was one of the richest countries in the world. How did that happen? A bright young Irishman who got himself hired by Bear Stearns in the late 1990s and went off to New York or London for five years returned feeling poor. For the better part of a decade there has been quicker money to be made in Irish real estate than in investment banking. How did that happen?
For the first time in history, people and money longed to get into Ireland rather than out of it.
I really wish he would write a book about baseball.
➻ So, I don't know if any of you out there watched the Super Bowl last Sunday (I know Americans aren't that into it), but Wisconsin's own Green Bay Packers football squadron won the contest. Now, I was raised a Bear fan in Packer territory, so this didn't feel like as much like a personal triumph to me as it did to so many others in our fine state, but I was definitely pulling for them (sorry, Dad). And I was pulling for them not only because I knew that many of my friends and coworkers would have been devastated by a loss, but also (and maybe more importantly) because, with the prospect of an impending NFL owner's lockout of its players, Green Bay offers a different way to do business. You see, Green Bay doesn't have an owner, they have 112,158 owners—people who own at least one share of Green Bay Packers Inc., the nonprofit behind the team. Commenting on Those Non-Profit Packers in The New Yorker on January 25th, Dave Zirin wrote:
The Packers’ unique setup has created a relationship between team and community unlike any in the N.F.L. Wisconsin fans get to enjoy the team with the confidence that their owner won’t threaten to move to Los Angeles unless the team gets a new mega-dome. Volunteers work concessions, with sixty per cent of the proceeds going to local charities. Even the beer is cheaper than at a typical N.F.L. stadium. Not only has home field been sold out for two decades, but during snowstorms, the team routinely puts out calls for volunteers to help shovel and is never disappointed by the response. It doesn’t matter how beloved the Cowboys are in Dallas; if Jerry Jones ever put out a call for free labor, he’d be laughed out of town.
Here are the Packers: financially solvent, competitive, and deeply connected to the hundred thousand person city of Green Bay. It’s a beautiful story ...
It certainly is, even to a Bear fan.
➻ Of course, being a Bear fan, I feel I should link to an interview from Weekend Edition on Scorecasting: Saying Sports Cliches Ain't So. The book was written by Tobias J. Moskowitz, behavioral economist and professor of finance at the University of Chicago, and L. Jon Werthem, senior writer for Sports Illustrated. The authors debunk some widely accepted sports myth, like "the hot hand," and talked in the interview about why the Bears shouldn't have punted the ball so much in their NFC Championship game against the Packers weeks ago:
[T]hey were ... in Green Bay territory around the 40-yard line or so—can't kick a field goal from there. Fourth, I think, and a couple of yards, three or four yards, and, of course, they punt. Now, what happens when they punt? The most likely outcome, which is exactly what did happen, is it went into the end zone and the Packers got it at the 20. So, they gained something like 15 yards for giving up on fourth down, versus going for it. Even if they had failed, they would have been only slightly worse off—15 yards. And they had a very good chance, perhaps, of making it and prolonging that drive. And those are things that can be difference makers.
Everybody's calling Scorecasting the Freakonomics of sports, including Freakonomics coauthor Steven D. Levitt, who calls it "the closest thing to Freakonomics ... since the original." If you can't, or don't feel like listening to the interview, you can find the transcript online.
➻ Also on NPR last week, on At Issue with Ben Merens, were 800-CEO-READ's Jo[h]ns—Covert and Mueller—discussing the best business books of 2010, why we chose Rework as the best, and taking questions from listeners. To my knowledge, there is no transcript of the interview, but you can listen to an MP3 file of the program.
➻ Grace Bonny of Design*Sponge has a really good take on online etiquette and ethics, and she's put her views into two very thoughtful posts recently: Part 1: Comments (Good and Bad), Copying/Stealing and Crediting and Part 2: Submissions, Sponsorship, Giveaways & Freebies. Called the "Martha Stewart Living for the Millennials" by the New York Times the site mostly covers DIY craft and design, but the issues discussed in the posts are universally relevant to anyone selling or promoting anything online. (Tip of the hat to Faythe Levine for pointing me to the story on Twitter.)
➻ You must give more than you take away.
The 2010 Business Book Awards
Posted Jan. 21, 2011 9:02 a.m. by jon
In - 800 CEO Read Blog
2010 was a fine year for business books. In fact, it was almost difficult to keep track of all the great books coming across our desks. Come late summer though, the entries for our Business Book Awards started to pour in, and before long, piled up around us. For months we read and talked, pondered and discussed, and narrowed down our choices for the books we thought were the best. In December, we posted those choices minus the overall Best Business Book in 2010.
Now, we just returned from our Awards celebration in NYC, where we announced the overall winner, and congratulated all the other winners and shortlist titles. It was a blast. Those in attendance were some of the people responsible for introducing big ideas to the world - business, and life, won't be the same because of them.
So who won?
The 2010 800-CEO-READ Business Book of the Year
Rework by Jason Fried & David Heinemeir Hansson Crown Business, 288 pages, $22.00 | This book created excitement around the office months before it came in, and the galley that we received before publication was passed around and beat up from use by the time the finished copies started to come in. Our conclusion: if you are an aspiring business book author or publisher and want to know what a truly exceptional business book looks like, Rework is the example.
The authors, Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson, created and run a company called 37signals, supplier of the Highrise, Basecamp and Backpack software that we at 800-CEO-READ use everyday. 37Signals is not large; in fact, it is intentionally small. Small, comfortable, and profitable. The business insights Fried and Hansson share in the book, written in contemporary language that is both accessible and exciting, is wisdom that our founder and president Jack Covert has said took him forty years to learn. And wonderfully illustrated throughout by Mike Rohde, that wisdom comes in an appealing visual package.
But beyond being the best-conceived and designed book of the year, what we really appreciate about Rework is its pragmatic nature—its emphasis on the problem at hand. As the economy continues its recovery, it encourages people in business to rethink some basic assumptions, offering logical ideas and solutions that are instantly applicable to the solo entrepreneur, the team leader, or the company owner.
Thanks again to everyone who contributed, by thinking how to make work better, writing it down, editing it, publishing it, and publicizing it. And special thanks to those who read those ideas, tell others about them, and importantly, put those ideas into practice.
Couldn't make the event? Here's a glimpse of what happened:
Inc's Best Books for Business Owners 2010
Posted Dec. 8, 2010 4:57 a.m. by sally-haldorson
In - 800 CEO Read Blog
Inc.com offers a wealth of information for business people, particularly small business owners. While many media outlets make end of year lists, Inc's list is particularly geared toward this group of readers. To create their list, they asked small business and business book experts to weigh in. Those experts were: "editor at large Leigh Buchanan, who writes Inc.'s monthly "Skimmer's Guide" book review; editor-at-large Bo Burlingham, the author of Small Giants; contributing writer John Warrillow, the author of Built to Sell; BrandAsset Consulting president John Gerzema, the co-author of Spend Shift; contributing writer Suzi Sosa, the founder and president of the MPOWER Foundation; and Jack Covert, founder of 800CEORead.com, an influential blog that tracks new releases."
Jack's recommendations include:
Switch by Chip and Dan Heath
Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
Bury My Heart at Conference Room B by Stan Slap
Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson
The Upside of Irrationality by Dan Ariely
Read more about Jack's picks and the other excellent books that Inc's chosen experts selected for their 2010 list of the Best Books for Business Owners.
Amazon's Best of 2010
Posted Nov. 4, 2010 9:28 a.m. by dylan
In - 800 CEO Read Blog
As they've done in previous years, Amazon has broken the books into separate categories and listed their editors' picks next to the customer favorites. I always enjoy seeing the differences between what editors choose and customers vote for with their pocket books. And I would enjoy it more if I were Michael Lewis, who topped both lists in the Business and Investing category.
The customer favorites were:
- The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis, W.W. Norton
- Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose by Tony Hsieh
- Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard by Chip Heath & Dan Heath, Broadway Business
- Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink, Riverhead
- Rework by Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson, Crown Business
- Linchpin: Are You Indispensable? by Seth Godin, Portfolio
- The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness by Dave Ramsey, Thomas Nelson Publishers
- On the Brink: Inside the Race to Stop the Collapse of the Global Financial System by Henry M. Paulson, Business Plus
- Doing Both: How Cisco Captures Today's Profit and Drives Tomorrow's Growth by Inder Sidhu, FT Press
- 13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown by Simon Johnson & James Kwak, Pantheon Books
The editors' picks were:
- The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis, W.W. Norton
- Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard by Chip Heath, Broadway Business
- The Art of Choosing by Sheena Iyengar
- The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires by Tim Wu, Knopf Publishing Group
- Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation by Steven Johnson, Riverhead
- Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy by Raghuram Rajan, Princeton University Press
- No One Would Listen: A True Financial Thriller by Harry Markopolos, John Wiley & Sons
- The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home by Dan Ariely, Harper
- When I Stop Talking, You'll Know I'm Dead: Useful Stories from a Persuasive Man by Jerry Weintraub, Twelve
- Appetite for America: How Visionary Businessman Fred Harvey Built a Railroad Hospitality Empire That Civilized the Wild West by Stephen Fried, Bantam
If you're interested in what's been listed in the past, I've linked to our post from previous years below.
Best of 2009 | Best of 2008 | Best of 2007 | Best of 2006 | Best of 2005 | Best of 2004
Brains on Fire
Posted Aug. 3, 2010 3:38 a.m. by jon
In - 800 CEO Read Blog
Hooray! The Brains on Fire book!
Ever since I first read their ChangeThis manifesto, and heard Spike Jones speak in Milwaukee about the incredible approach people should consider in marketing - creating movements, I was hooked. These Brains on Fire people are different, and now they have shared their experience and insight in a great book jammed with pages that will make you reconsider the ways you think about marketing and advertising - throwing most of them out the window. It's called: Brains on Fire: Igniting Powerful, Sustainable, Word of Mouth Movements.
Brains on Fire helped ignite a global fanaticism for scissors, they helped an electronics store become a hip music retailer, and so much more, and they did it by tapping people's passion and bringing them all together - not just the people at the companies, but the people who use their products. How do you do that? It's what marketers have been trying to figure out since the beginning of time.
Like a Seth Godin book, or Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson's Rework, you can literally feel your mind change when you read this. Here's a glimpse into the ideas within the book - a brief Q&A with Brains on Fire co-author (and company president) Robbin Phillips:
What does Brains on Fire mean?
Yes. There is a company named Brains on Fire, but we didn’t name our book after our company. For us, “brains on fire” is what happens when you ignite the passion within your employees and customers. It’s about people who are so excited and devoted that they want to share their passion with others. We also like to think Brains on Fire is a love story. It’s about creating real relationships with people who love you. It’s about trust and about lifting others up. It’s about celebrating and creating remarkable stories that people want to share. It’s about igniting powerful, sustainable word of mouth movements.
For a long, long time, business has been about convincing people of something's value. How do you see that changing?
Marketers have been trained to talk about product benefits and how much we care about our customers. Customer satisfaction ratings used to be golden. But in a world where the customer’s voice can be amplified at least as much as a company’s, talking AT your customers is outdated. Let’s face it; talking about yourself will not make others talk about you. No one talks about the precise angle on a pair of scissors, but they do talk about what they DO with those scissors – like crafting and sharing memories with friends and family. It’s not the product conversation anymore. Smart companies are learning to listen, reframe and support the passion conversation.
Who are the leaders, and how do we find them?
One of the lessons we learned in igniting movements and studying movements is this: Movements have inspirational leadership. Think about it. If everyone is expected to lead, no one will. When looking for leadership, we don’t look for the influencers; we look for regular, everyday people who just happen to have a deep passion for the category. Not the divas, the super-bloggers, or the supposed influencers that everyone else is trying to get hold of. We have seen first hand how these everyday people have more and greater credibility; because they are in fact, “just like me.” Influence can be built, passion cannot. Find your company’s passionate leaders and empower them with tools to spread their passion and their love.
New technology is all around us. What should companies do with it?
If there’s one thing you take away from our book let it be this: It’s about people. Period. Chris Sandoval, a kindred spirit, says it best: “When it comes to technology, what’s exciting and shiny today will be freakin’ dead tomorrow.” Ninety percent of word of mouth happens offline. So many companies jump into social media technology first -- with Twitter strategies and Facebook fans. Our advice is to engage people first. Observe how they communicate and connect, then the tools and tactics will be as plain as the nose on your face.
Here's a big question: How can a company become the center of the universe?
Big question. But there’s a simple answer. Take a look around your company. What do you have to offer that you take for granted? Perhaps you have experts who design your products who can share knowledge. Maybe your factories or offices are interesting to the people who love your products or services. Embrace the leaders and your fans, and give them access to the things you know. Share freely. Give freely without expecting anything in return. Treat your customers like your best friends. Forever.
And here's a little bit of Robbin talking about the book in person:
