800-CEO-READ - Blog posts: Think Big, ACT Small

I know we are getting into the New Year, but I thought I would share one more best of list. You have seen me quote Richard Pachter before. He writes reviews for the Miami Herald.

Here are his 2005 favorites:

Revolution in the Valley by Andy Hertzfeld

Blink by Malcolm Galdwell

A Whole New Mind by Dan Pink

Meet You in Hell by Les Standiford

Think Big, Act Small by Jason Jennings

Darknet by J.D. Lasica

Tom Peters Essentials (Design, Leadership, Talent, and Trends) by Tom Peters

The Search by John Battelle

The Game by Neil Strauss

The Untied States of America by Juan Enriquez

And you think we review alot of business books...
Posted Oct. 18, 2005 4:58 a.m. by todd-sattersten
In Lists - 800 CEO Read Blog

Robert Morris is a management consultant based out of Texas. He likes reading business books. He says he has read over 1500 management books. You will find 900 reviews of his all over Amazon, where he has been ranked a Top 10 reviewer.

Harvard Business Review has a Q&A with him in the current October 2005 issue. He says he spends time with books based on research like Jim Collins' Good to Great and Jason Jennings' Think Big Act Small. Morris says all the books he reads helps him see a big picture on how business works. The piece ends with his recommendations:

Big Insight Books

Knowing Doing Gap by Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert Sutton (HBSP, 2000)

Blink by Malcolm Gladwell (Little Brown, 2005)

Anatomy of Buzz by Emanuel Rosen (Doubleday, 2002)

Business Classic Morris re-reads every year

The Lever of Riches by Joel Mokyr (Oxford, 1992)

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn (University of Chicago, 1996)

On the Profession of Management by Peter Drucker (HBSP, 2003)

Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler (Random House, 1987)

Holding On to Reality by Albert Borgmann (University of Chicago, 1999)

Fiction for Leaders

The Illiad and The Odyssey by Homer

Antigone by Sophocles

The Four Gospels and St. Paul's letters to the Corinthians

Julius Casear by William Shakespeare

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller

The Crucible by Arthur Miller

The Heart Aroused by David Whyte

Jack Covert Selects--Think Big Act Small
Posted May 27, 2005 5:51 a.m. by jack

Think Big Act Small: How Americas Best Performing Companies Keep the Start-up Spirit Alive by Jason Jennings, Portfolio, 220 Pages, $24.95 Hardcover, May 2005, ISBN 1591840767

How do we learn? When you look at books like Good to Great and Its Not the Big that Eat the Small (Jason Jennings' first book which he co-wrote with Laurence Haughton), it is researching the heck out of what is a long term high performer. Then you research these companies to find out the secret of their success. It is especially exciting when you find companies that arent as big or well know as GE. What Jennings and his research team did was to look at 100,000 American companies and found nine companies that have increased revenue and profits by ten percent or more for ten consecutive years. The nine companies range from retailers like Petco and Cabelas, manufactures like Medline Industries, service companies like Sonic Drive-In, private education companies like Strayer and industrial giants like Koch Industries. Rounding out the nine are SAS, the software company, OReilly Automotive and DOT Foods.

What do all these companies have in common? You guessed it: they all Think big and act small.

In the book, each chapter focuses on a company and how that company handles one of the ten Building Blocks. The building blocks are:

1. Down to earth

2. Keep your hands dirty

3. Make short term goals and long term horizons

4. Let go

5. Have everyone think and act like an owner

6. Invent new businesses

7. Create win-win solutions

8. Choose your competition

9. Build communities

10. Grow future leaders.

The book is loaded with insight and easily applicable ideas for anybody interested in improving themselves and their company. I especially like the conclusion:

We live in interesting times. Complexity causes people to yearn for simple, profound ideas that can be readily related to diverse situations. People gravitate to confidence, decisiveness, and clear, powerful messages, searching for the ultimate metaphysical reference point. So we end as we begin, with this message: to guild an organization with balanced focus, camaraderie, and the ability to prosper over the long termthink big, act small.

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