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Hardcover
336 pages
ISBN 9781400064281 Published Jan. 2007
Random House
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Posted Jan. 15, 2007 8:00 a.m. by todd-sattersten
In Lists - 800 CEO Read Blog
January is a big month for business books. There are at least a dozen books that have come out in January (or late December) that are worthy of consideration. The list below is a starting point. Which ones you will end up reading will clearly depend on your time and preferences. We have covered some of these titles in Jack Covert Selects and I plan to write about others as the month progresses.
Business books for January 2007:
- Running With The Bulls Without Getting Trampled by Tim Irwin
- The Three Tensions: Winning the Struggle to Perform Without Compromise by Dominic Dodd and Ken Favaro
- Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Other Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
- 12: The Elements of Great Managing by Rodd and James Harter
- Know-How: The 8 Skills That Separate People Who Perform From Those Who Don't by Ram Charan
- Payback: Reaping The Reward of Innovation by James Andrew and Harold Sirkin
- Words That Work: It's Not What You Say, It's What People Hear by Frank Lutz
- Accelerants: 12 Strategies to Sell Faster, Close Deals and Grow Your Business Faster by Michael Boylan
- Ego Check: Why Executives Hubris is Wrecking Companies and Careers and How To Avoid The Trap by Matthew Hayward
- Greating Great Employees: Turning Ordinary People Into Extraordinary Performers by Erika Andersen
- Exceeding Customer Expectations: What Enterprise, America's #1 Car Rental Company, Can Teach You About Creating Lifetime Customers by Kirk Kazanjian
- A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder by Eric Abrahamson and David Freedman
- The Mormon Way of Doing Business: Leadership and Success Through Faith and Family by Jeff Benedict
- What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful by Marshall Goldsmith
- Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything by Don Tapscott and Anthony Williams
P.S. You can keep up with stuff like this on the 800ceoread New Releases Blog.
Must-Read: Made To Stick
Posted Jan. 12, 2007 8:06 a.m. by todd-sattersten
In Big Ideas - 800 CEO Read Blog
My friend Bob Sutton told me in March 2006 that I needed to watch out for the Heath brothers. Bob said they had a great book coming out and that Dan and Chip were going to be stars.
I saw a galley for Made To Stick the next month and I fell in love with it. This book is about how ideas stick with people. Dan and Chip have studied urban myths, public health scares, parables, and political speeches to see what these ideas have in common. What they found were six concepts:
- Simplicity
- Unexpectedness
- Concreteness
- Credibility
- Emotions
- Stories
Dan and Chip say a big problem is The Curse of Knowledge - if people think they already know something, then there is no incentive to pay attention to your idea. For example, many of you think you don't need to read this book.
One answer they say is to create curiosity gaps. Their sub-title is a curiosity gap, "Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die".
Let me give you another one - "What do Fortune 500 executives and PTA presidents have in common?" The answer is they are both selling ideas to their organizations and Made To Stick can help both improve the chances their ideas will stick. I know it isn't the strongest curiosity gap (you probably came up with many things they have in common), but the point I was trying to make is that a diverse set of people can benefit from this book.
***
At the beginning of Made To Stick, there is a story about Israeli researchers who wanted to see if there were common elements to successful advertising campaigns. They found successful ads were easily sorted and fell into one of six categories. Other ads from the same magazines where these award winners appeared could not be sorted the same way.
The researchers felt they were onto something. They took the six categories, turned them into concepts, and develop a course. The researchers wanted to see if the concepts could be taught. A random group of people were brought to the lab and split into three groups. The group were given varying levels of training and asked to produce ads for fictitious products. The group given the most training with the six concepts scored 50% better on their ads with creative directors than the other groups.
My point and the Heath brothers' point is that it is possible for a framework or recipe to improve what you do. They have got a pretty good one for making ideas stick. For all the authors, publishers, agents, publicists, and sales folks out there, this is required reading. For everyone else, Made To Stick is my first must-read for 2007.
Jack Covert Selects: Made to Stick
Posted Jan. 10, 2007 5:19 a.m. by jack
Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, Random House, January 2007, $24.95 Hardcover, 288 Pages, ISBN 1400064287
One of the perks about being in the book industry is meeting some really smart people. In November, at our Author Pow-Wow, I got to meet Dan Heath, one of the authors of Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die. Not only is Dan personable, interesting and cool, but he's also brilliant. You'll know that the instant you pick up Made to Stick.
Dan, a consultant at Duke, and his brother Chip, a professor at Stanford Business School, came to realize that while their professional work looked different, the core of the work was the same. They were each trying to get at what makes ideas successful once they’re out into the world. So they teamed up to write Made to Stick. Borrowing Malcolm Gladwell's concept of "sticky" ideas, the Brothers Heath examined everything from urban legends to public health scares to elementary school teaching strategies to political campaigns. Made to Stick is the kind of book that breaks out of the traditional business book market and offers solid, useful information to all types of readers.
Dan and Chip know that there's not a simple formula for making an idea stick. What they care about is identifying what's common among sticky ideas. They found six principles that apply to all sticky ideas: simplicity, unexpectedness, concreteness, credibility, emotions, and stories. (Cleverly, they form an acronym for "success.")
"No special expertise is needed to apply these principles. There are no licensed stickologists. Moreover, many of the principles have a commonsense ring to them: Didn’t most of us already know the intuition that we should be 'simple' and 'use stories'? It’s not as though there's a powerful constituency for overcomplicated, lifeless prose."
I love the Heaths' straightforward yet elegant writing style. And the book has substance too. As you read, you will experience tons of 'lightbulb' moments, when you instantly recognize their ideas as true and immediately applicable. Here’s an example:
"So why aren't we deluged with brilliantly designed sticky ideas? Why is our life filled with more process memos than proverbs? Sadly, there is a villain in our story. The villain is a natural psychological tendency that consistently confounds our ability to create ideas using these principles. It's called the Curse of Knowledge."
They explain that the more we know about a subject, the less we're actually able to craft it into an idea that will stick. The Heaths offer strategies for defeating the Curse of Knowledge and other roadblocks to creating sticky ideas. And you'll have fun while learning about Curiosity Gaps, the Velcro Theory of Memory, and the Sinatra Test
So, make room on your bookshelf. Much like the subject it tackles, Made to Stick is magnetic, sticky. You're going to start seeing this book everywhere.
Rebecca's Best of 2006
Posted Dec. 18, 2006 6:25 a.m. by 800-ceo-read
In Uncategorized - 800 CEO Read Blog
2006 was, by far, one of the "changiest" years for me. I changed addresses, changed jobs, changed Internet providers. I saw the Pacific Ocean for the first time. I bought an iPod. I spent a lot of time with my family and met a wonderful and hilarious new friend.
The most recent change was my move in November from the retail side of Dicken's Books Ltd. to the business division, 800-CEO-READ--a change that meant new and exciting opportunities for career growth, and also the chance to work with a great team of people.
One of the best perks of working for a bookseller is meeting lots and lots of authors. Through my adventures in the bookshops, I met a lot of interesting people this past year, including:
Paul Rusesabagina, Temple Grandin, Jonathan Safran Foer, Sara Gruen, Nando Parrado, Alan Alda, Lemony Snicket, Barack Obama, Anna Quindlen, Jamie Lee Curtis, Jerry Kramer, John Updike, Alice Hoffman, John Hodgman, Ann Patchett, Elizabeth George, Elinor Lipman, and many more who I can't even remember right now.
I also got to hang out with cool Milwaukee authors like John Gurda, CJ Hribal and Liam Callanan.
During my first week at 800-CEO-READ, I met 22 business book authors at our Author Pow-Wow in Chicago. I can't wait to see Dan Heath again for his Milwaukee event (coming up in February).
I'm excited to read these business books that came out in 2006:
The Walmart Effect (coming out in paperback next week)
And here are a few of my favorites from the bookshop side:
Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
The Thirteenth Tale by Dianne Setterfield
An Ordinary Man by Paul Rusesabagina
The Demon Under the Microscope by Thomas Hager
And, one of my favorite books in recent years came out in paperback (check it out--it's wonderful).
I hope 2007 is as great as 2006. It looks like it'll be off to a terrific start.
