800-CEO-READ New Releases

Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It

by Cali Ressler, Jody Thompson

(Portfolio, 256 Pages)

A groundbreaking way to be happier at work while also being more effective than ever

In a “Results-Only” company or department, employees can do whatever they want whenever they want as long as business objectives are achieved. No more pointless meetings, fighting traffic to get in at 9:00, or begging for permission to watch your kid play soccer. No more cramming errands into the weekend or waiting until retirement to take up your hobbies again. As long as the work gets done, you have complete control over your life.

It sounds like a fantasy, but Cali Ressler and Jody Thompson have already made it a reality at Best Buy, a Fortune 100 company that has embraced the Results-Only Work Environment. The authors have proven that ROWE not only makes employees happier, but also delivers better results. Their program has been so successful that it made the cover of BusinessWeek.

This book explores why most workplaces are so dysfunctional and offers a dramatic new way to stop the toxic behaviors and beliefs (“sludge”) that keep us from reaching our potential. It also shows readers how to start their own Results-Only Work Environment, even on a small scale, and help spread the revolution.

Filled with passion and common sense, Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It will change the way you think about your job, your company, and your quality of life.

Community

by Peter Block

(Berrett-Koehler Pub, 216 Pages)

Modern society is plagued by fragmentation. The various sectors of our communities--businesses, schools, social service organizations, churches, government--do not work together. They exist in their own worlds. As do so many individual citizens, who long for connection but end up marginalized, their gifts overlooked, their potential contributions lost. This disconnection and detachment makes it hard if not impossible to envision a common future and work towards it together. We know what healthy communities look like--there are many success stories out there, and they've been described in detail. What Block provides in this inspiring new book is an exploration of the exact way community can emerge from fragmentation: How is community built? How does the transformation occur? What fundamental shifts are involved? He explores a way of thinking about our places that creates an opening for authentic communities to exist and details what each of us can do to make that happen.

The Nonverbal Advantage

by Carol Kinsey Goman

(Berrett-Koehler Pub, 216 Pages)

The workplace is a "blink" worldstudies show we form opinions of one another within 7 seconds of meeting, and that 93% of the message people receive from us has nothing to do with what we actually say. So good nonverbal communication skills are a huge professional advantage. Carol Kinsey Goman combines the latest research and her 25 years of practical experience as a consultant, coach and therapist to offer a fun and practical guide to understanding what we and the people we work with are saying without speaking, Goman writes in an informal, conversational tone, illustrating her points with cartoons, photos and anecdotes, and she includes dozens of simple and enlightening exercises readers can practice to gain control over the message their body is sending. The Nonverbal Advantage will help readers communicate far more effectively, understand those around them more completely, and project a more accurate picture of who they really are to their colleagues, clients and partners.

Even Buffett Isn't Perfect

by Vahan Janjigian

(Portfolio, 256 Pages)

While America Aged

by Roger Lowenstein

(Penguin Press, 288 Pages)

Book Description

A Bestselling Author Explains, Via Three Fascinating Stories, How An Upcoming Pension Crisis Threatens to Upset the American Economy.

With his trademark narrative panache, Lowenstein unravels the truth about how pensions work in America and illuminates the impending crisis. While America Aged is comprised of three fascinating case studies, set in the Detroit auto industry, among New York City transit workers, and in the city of San Diego. Lowenstein warns that the pension wars that erupted in these industries and cities are only the first. But he also recognizes that workers are entitled to decent security in their retirement--a critical problem as the country ages. Arming readers with knowledge of the consequences of doing nothing, While America Aged is, first and foremost, a call to action.

Toxic Clean Up

by Teresa Day

(Morgan James Pub, 0 Pages)

Do you have high employee turnover or absenteeism rates? Are your employees disengaged and unproductive? Do you dread going to work? Today's workplace environments are teeming with dysfunctional managerial practices that lead to the development of toxic workplaces. The end result is failure - failure for the business to live up to its potential, failure to keep good talent, failure to provide an environment that generates productivity and a solid bottom line. This failure is tragic and unnecessary. Read this book to find out how you can rid your workplace of the Seven Deadly Toxins and increase morale and productivity.

The War for Wealth

by Gabor Steingart

(McGraw-Hill, 304 Pages)

Wall Street Stories

by Edwin Lefevre

(McGraw-Hill, 224 Pages)

Follow the Fed to Investment Success

by Doug Roberts

(John Wiley & Sons , 224 Pages)

The Sales Bible

by Jeffrey H. Gitomer

(Collins, 304 Pages)

"Every once in a while ONE book defines a category."
—Jack Covert, 800-CEO-READ

Since its initial publication in 1994, Morrow's hardcover edition of Jeffrey Gitomer's THE SALES BIBLE has sold over 117,000 copies, and another 100,000 in paperback (published by Wiley). But in the 13 years since then, Gitomer has made himself into a sales powerhouse with huge success around an inventively packaged series of books, with his classic THE LITTLE RED BOOK OF SELLING at its heart. Now at last, Gitomer has taken the title that began it all, and has completely revised it. The Sales Bible is totally reworked to fit into his line of bestselling sales titles. It's sure to be THE must-have title for sales professionals worldwide who've already come to know and trust Jeffrey's inventive, irreverent sales wisdom through his "Little [Color] Book of..." series.

John Maynard Keynes

by Hyman P. Minsky, Curvebreakers

(McGraw-Hill, 181 Pages)

Leisureville

by Andrew D. Blechman

(Atlantic Monthly Press, 320 Pages)

Escape from Corporate America

by Pamela Skillings

(Ballantine Books, 224 Pages)

Does your corporate career leave you stressed out, burned out, or just plain bummed out? You’re not alone. The good news is that there’s a way out–and you’re holding it. Written by career expert and corporate escapee Pamela Skillings, Escape from Corporate America inspires the cubicle-bound and the corner-office-cornered to break free and create the career of their dreams–without going broke. With no-nonsense advice and unflagging humor, Skillings shows you how to

• assess your job’s “suck” factor–from terminal boredom to boss from hell

• identify your true calling–brainstorm fantasy careers and test-drive your dream jobs

• develop your Escape Plan–set goals, figure out your timing, and evaluate your finances and health insurance options

• find jobs that don’t bite–entrepreneurial corporate environments, energetic start-ups, the nonprofit sector, and flexible work options

• be your own boss–explore entrepreneurship and freelancing, assemble an advisory team, and start a business while you collect a paycheck

• follow your creative dreams–learn how to make time for your artistic passion and develop a plan to quit your day job

• overcome any obstacle–deal with fear, doubt, negative people, and other bumps along the road

Plus, Skillings shares success stories from dozens of corporate escape artists, including celebrity TV chef Andrea Beaman, Cranium CEO Richard Tait, and many others.

Full of practical strategies and fun-to-follow exercises, Escape from Corporate America will help disgruntled office workers everywhere find more meaningful, fulfilling careers.

The Exhaustion Cure

by Laura Stack

(Broadway Books, 368 Pages)

Feeling fatigued? Wish you could have more get-up-and-go?

If you’re like millions of Americans, you get home from a long day with barely enough energy to lift the remote control. But with Laura Stack’s comprehensive plan, you can regain your vitality in just three weeks. Let The Productivity Pro® help you eliminate the “energy bandits” from all aspects of your life--from your diet and your work schedule to your environment and your relationships--so you can start living in a way that will boost your energy.

Focusing on simple changes that make a huge difference, The Exhaustion Cure presents manageable ways to:
Cut down on “energy bandits” and fill up on “energy boosters.”
Stop relying on caffeine, cigarettes and other substances to keep you going.
Avoid letting negative situations or people control your thoughts and actions.
Sneak in time for fitness during the busiest days.
Accomplish your goals and find more time to devote to your family.

LAURA STACK, MBA, CSP, is a personal productivity expert and the author of Leave the Office Earlier and Find More Time. As a professional speaker, she helps workers Leave the Office Earlier® with Maximum Results in Minimum Time™. Laura is the president of The Productivity Pro®, Inc., an international time management company whose clients include Microsoft, GM, Time Warner, Lockheed Martin, and Bank of America.

A World of Wealth

by Thomas G. Donlan

(Financial Times Management, 300 Pages)

This is a book about economics that avoids charts and graphs and dull discussion. This is a book about money, wealth, power and society. It explains contemporary issues from a capitalist perspective and provides historical depth for understanding the issues. Throughout history people have tried many ways of building wealth and driving progress. One has consistently worked best: capitalism. This book explains why free markets and free enterprise are so successful, and demonstrates how they offer the best solutions for today's most challenging problems. Long-time Barron's editorial page editor Tom Donlan starts by explaining why markets are such efficient allocators of wealth, income, labor, goods, and everything else. It's possible to imagine kinder, more just, more equitable outcomes than markets deliver, says Donlan, but it's virtually impossible to engineer those outcomes without creating disastrous consequences. Then, one issue at a time, he focuses on the greatest challenges facing America and the world. Donlan reveals what economic history teaches us about poverty, inequality, taxes, globalization, trade, immigration, energy, health care, retirement security, and population growth -- and how we can harness the power of free markets to address these challenges today. Donlan has written the year's most compelling, engaging, passionate book about money, wealth, power, and society -- and the most powerful case for capitalism in a generation.

Winner Take All

by Richard Elkus

(Basic Books, 272 Pages)

High Performance with High Integrity

by Ben W. Heineman Jr.

(Harvard Business School Press, 125 Pages)

Product Description
Our free-market capitalist system is the world's greatest driver of prosperity, but it has a dark side. Under intense pressure to make the numbers, executives and employees face temptation to cut corners, fudge accounts, or worse. And in today's unforgiving environment, such lapses can be catastrophic. Fines and settlements have amounted to billions of dollars. Careers and companies have imploded.

In High Performance with High Integrity, Ben Heineman argues that there is only one way for companies to avoid such failures: CEOs must create a culture of integrity through exemplary leadership, transparency, incentives, and processes, not just rules and penalties. Heineman, GE's chief legal officer and a member of both Jack Welch's and Jeff Immelt's senior management teams for nearly twenty years, reveals crucial "performance with integrity" principles and practices that you can begin applying immediately, and shows how you can drive performance by integrating integrity systems and processes deep into company operations.

Concise and insightful, this book provides a much-needed corporate blueprint for doing well while doing good in the high-pressure global economy.

From our new Memo to the CEO series--solutions-focused advice from today's leading practitioners.

About the Author

Ben W. Heineman Jr., is Distinguished Senior Fellow at Harvard Law School's Program on the Legal Profession and a Senior Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. He was GE's Senior Vice President-General Counsel from 1987 to 2003 and Senior Vice President for Law and Public Affairs from 2004 until his retirement at the end of 2005.

Good Guys and Bad Guys

by Joe Nocera

(Portfolio, 288 Pages)

Topgrading for Sales

by Greg Alexander, Bradford Smart

(Portfolio, 128 Pages)

Book Description
A concise extension of the business classic Topgrading, targeted to sales managers.

Brad Smart’s Topgrading has sold more than 150,000 copies since 1999, making it the definitive book for executives who want to hire, coach, and retain top talent. Now Smart has teamed up with Greg Alexander, who used Topgrading to radically improve his sales force at EMC.

In Topgrading for Sales, they have boiled down the key Topgrading ideas to a pithy 112 pages while focusing on the unique needs of sales managers and sales directors.

Great sales forces don’t just depend on strategies— they depend on hiring the best possible reps. But surveys show that about half of all hires and promotions put an underqualified person in the wrong job. No wonder the average tenure for sales managers is only nineteen months.

Topgrading for Sales takes the guesswork out of hiring by teaching readers how to interview systematically for A-level talent instead of relying on hunches and prejudices. It also shows how to coach B-level reps to turn them into A-players and how to weed out C-players before they do too much damage.

The ETF Strategist

by Russ Koesterich

(Portfolio, 256 Pages)

Product Description

A sophisticated guide to today’s hottest investment vehicle— exchange traded funds.

The ETF Strategist is aimed primarily at investment advisers and sophisticated retail investors who are interested in using exchange traded funds, or using them more effectively than they already do.

Compared with mutual funds, ETFs can offer a better way to diversify risk, target specific sectors or countries, avoid style drift, and maintain a specific asset allocation that might include real estate or commodities.

Previous ETF books have focused on their mechanics, regulation, and other basic information. But The ETF Strategist goes much further, showing how ETFs can improve many aspects of an overall investment strategy. It explores advanced concepts such as alphabeta separation, which basically means “don’t confuse skill with risk.” And it shows how different ETFs can be combined to find the ideal balance of risk and potential reward.

Persuasion IQ

by Kurt Mortensen

(Amacom Books, 336 Pages)

Book Description
Do you realize how much your professional success, your income, and even your personal relationships depend on your ability to persuade, influence, and motivate other people? Yet many of us continue to use outdated tech­niques for convincing others...or worse yet, have no technique at all. Kurt Mortensen, through his Persuasion Institute, has sought out and studied the world's top persuaders, and with his specially formulated Persuasion I.Q. assessment--the most comprehensive persuasion resource available today--he lets readers in on the essential habits, traits, and behaviors neces­sary to cultivate their natural persuasive abilities. Concen­trating on the 10 major Persuasion I.Q. skills, the book allows readers to determine their own current Persu­asion I.Q., helping them to identify their strengths and weaknesses, and start­ing them down a path to enormous success and wealth.

Whether we're selling a product, presenting an idea, or ask­ing for a raise, persuasion is the magic ingredient. This powerful, life-changing book will transform anyone into a persuasion genius.

Chinese Fireworks

by Robert Hsu

(John Wiley & Sons Inc, 224 Pages)

China is on fire! In the course of barely a decade, China has become the world's fastest-growing economy and it is now the world's most important marketplace. China produces more steel, coal, clothing, and toys than any other country in the world, and exports to the U.S.alone have grown by more than 1,500% since the 1990s. These are the figures that everyone talks about. What they don't know is that the Chinese consumer is the real growth driver and has become singularly important to the global economy. Because of the incredible growth in China, there are 1.3 billion people who suddenly have the ability to create personal wealth. This new reality has created an unprecedented opportunity for global investors to grow their portfolios and build their fortunes.

As big investors scramble for their piece of theChina pie, however, individual investors are being fed misinformation and conflicting reports that could lead to disastrous investments. Investing in China is easier to navigate and much more profitable when you know what to look for—and China Fireworks will show you the way.

Author Robert Hsu has been making money for years by watching China's growth and identifying trends that deliver the greatest return for investors. As one of the leading experts on investing in China's economy, he advises people every day on how a China strategy will truly take them to a new level of investing.

With this book, Hsu shows you how to build your fortune by participating in what he calls the "China Miracle." Hsu begins by explaining the key differences between China's major economic and geographic regions, as well as Hong Kong, providing insight into how consumer spending habits differ and what that means for you when building an investment strategy in China.
With China Fireworks as your guide—along with some thoughtful research and common sense—you'll be well on your way to getting rich from the "China Miracle."

Fast Strategy

by Yves Doz, Mikko Kosonen

(Wharton School Pub, 264 Pages)