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Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse (Lynn Sonberg Books)

Peter D. Schiff, John Downes

Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse (Lynn Sonberg Books) Peter D. Schiff, John Downes Amazon Price: $18.45
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 231 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

The economic tipping point for the United States is no longer theoretical. It is a reality today. The country has gone from the world's largest creditor to its greatest debtor; the value of the dollar is sinking; domestic manufacturing is winding down - and these trends don't seem to be slowing. Peter Schiff casts a sharp, clear-sighted eye on these factors and explains what the possible effects may be and how investors can protect themselves. For more than a decade, Schiff has not only observed the U.S. economy, but also helped his clients reposition their portfolios to reflect his outlook. What he sees is a nation facing an economic storm brought on by growing federal, personal, and corporate debt, too-little savings, a declining dollar, and lack of domestic manufacturing.
Crash-Proof is an informed and informative warning of a looming period marked by sizeable tax hikes, loss of retirement benefits, double digit inflation, even - as happened recently in Argentina - the possible collapse of the middle class. However, Schiff does have a survival plan that can provide the protection that readers will need in the coming years.

The Secrets of Economic Indicators: Hidden Clues to Future Economic Trends and Investment Opportunities, 2nd Edition

Bernard Baumohl

The Secrets of Economic Indicators: Hidden Clues to Future Economic Trends and Investment Opportunities, 2nd Edition Bernard Baumohl Amazon Price: $12.91
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 44 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Every day, stocks, bonds, and currencies bounce wildly in response to new economic indicators. Money managers obsess over those statistics, because they provide crucial clues about the future of the economy and the financial markets.

Now you can use these indicators to make smarter investment decisions, just like the professionals do.You don't need an economics degree, or a CPA... just this easy-to-use book.

Former TIME Magazine senior economics reporter Bernard Baumohl has done the impossible: he's made economic indicators fascinating.

Using real-world examples and stories,Baumohl illuminates every U.S. and foreign indicator that matters.Where to find them.What they look like. What the insiders know about their track records. And exactly how to interpret them.

Whether you're an investor,broker, portfolio manager, researcher, journalist,or student, you'll find this book indispensable.Nobody can predict the future with certainty. But The Secrets of Economic Indicators will get you as close as humanly possible.

What the numbers really mean...

...to stocks, bonds, rates, currencies, and you

Ahead of the curve: spotting turning points

Calling recessions and recoveries in time to profit from them

Leading indicators: where's the economy really heading

Decoding initial unemployment claims, housing starts, the yield curve, and other predictors

Beyond the borders

Why foreign indicators are increasingly important—and how to use them

Making sense of indicators in conflict

What to do when the numbers disagree

Finding the data

Free web resources for the latest economic data

The Innovator's Solution: Creating and Sustaining Successful Growth

Clayton M. Christensen, Michael E. Raynor

The Innovator's Solution: Creating and Sustaining Successful Growth Clayton M. Christensen, Michael E. Raynor Amazon Price: $19.77
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 50 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

In the worldwide bestseller The Innovator's Dilemma, Clayton M. Christensen exposed a crushing paradox behind the failure of many industry leaders. By doing what good companies were supposed to do-focus on pleasing their most profitable customers-leaders were paving the way for their own demise. How? By ignoring "disruptive technologies"-new, cheaper innovations that initially target small customer segments but evolve to displace the reigning product.

Now, Christensen and coauthor Michael E. Raynor cut the Gordian knot of the "innovator's dilemma" with The Innovator's Solution. This groundbreaking book reveals that innovation is not as unpredictable as most managers have come to believe. While the outcomes of past innovations seem random, the process by which innovations are packaged and shaped within companies is very predictable. By understanding and managing the forces that influence this process, companies can shape high-octane business plans that create truly disruptive growth.

Drawing on years of in-depth research and using new theories tested in hundreds of companies across many industries, the authors identify the processes that create successful innovations, and show managers how to tailor their strategies to the changing circumstances of a dynamic world.

Comprehensive yet practical, The Innovator's Solution is an actionable prescription for innovation-driven, profitable growth.


"A good business book makes managers stop and think. A great business book teaches managers how to stop and think. This is a great book. It is hard to imagine an executive team that would not benefit from devoting an entire day to discussing it."


-Geoffrey Moore, Chairman and Founder, TCG Advisors, and author, Crossing the Chasm and Living on the Fault Line

"In The Innovator's Solution, Christensen and Raynor address the holy grail of all organizations: how to generate growth and sustain it over long periods. Avoiding the temptation to provide simplistic formulas, they guide the reader through carefully constructed frameworks that teach how to think about the issues that limit-and provide-growth to organizations."


-Dr. Andrew S. Grove, Chairman of the Board, Intel

"Christensen and Raynor have done a superb job of creating a framework for helping to understand the industry dynamics and for planning your own growth alternatives."


-Pekka Ala-Pietilä, President, Nokia Corporation

"Singapore, as a small nation, needs to be innovative and sensitive to disruptive changes more than other countries. Christensen and Raynor have provided an excellent framework to reduce the randomness of the innovation process. This framework will help in our effort to nurture an environment conducive for enterprises to create and capitalize on disruptive innovations."


-Teo Ming Kian, Chairman, Singapore Economic Development Board

"The Innovator's Solution goes directly to the heart of why large companies have failed to sustain innovation. Christensen and Raynor have a deep insight into the challenges that innovative companies face, and they propose practical, realistic solutions to the dilemmas of innovation. This book will be extremely useful to all managers who are committed to using innovation to sustain their growth."


-Bill George, former Chairman and CEO, Medtronic, Inc.


Seeing What's Next: Using Theories of Innovation to Predict Industry Change

Clayton M. Christensen, Erik A. Roth, Scott D. Anthony

Seeing What's Next: Using Theories of Innovation to Predict Industry Change Clayton M. Christensen, Erik A. Roth, Scott D. Anthony Amazon Price: $21.75
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 20 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

One Book Too Many 3 out of 5 stars.
14 of 15 people found this review helpful.

Christensen's two earlier books ("The Innovator's Dilemma," and "The Innovator's Solution") provided great new insights into business history and strategic thinking. "Seeing What's Next" goes on to attempt to demonstrate implementation of these two books' insights, unfortunately with less than total success.

Early in "Seeing What's Next," Christensen uses Dell Computer to illustrate the "Value Chain Evolution" theory's golden rule: Integrate to improve what is "not good enough" (speed, customization, and convenience of PC ordering and acquisition), and outsource what is "more than good enough" (the PC computer's architectural design) - certainly a potentially helpful insight.

"Seeing What's Next" eventually moves on to examining several sectors and making predictions for the future. 1)Education: Christensen sees on-line services from the University of Phoenix (UOP) as an innovation that is likely to disrupt the higher-education market. However, even the UOP has had limited success with this innovation - the vast majority of its services are still provided via bricks-and-mortar classrooms. (Another major UOP problem is that increasing questions are aimed at its credibility - especially the strength of its instructors, and its very low graduation rate.) On the other hand, Christensen probably has it right in seeing community-colleges provide a much greater challenge to pupils currently "over-served" by higher-cost state universities. (This applies to businesses and the general public as well - the vast majority of "research" undertaken at major universities offers very little or no concrete value to society.)

Aviation is another sector examined. Here Christensen sees low-cost Southwest Airlines as in danger of being over-ridden by major airlines - certainly about as far from the ensuing reality as one could get. As for the semiconductor sector - Christensen sees overshot customers (eg. word-processor and spreadsheet users) as becoming vulnerable targets for less expensive/capable processors; again, however, this has been little sign of this. (Christensen's "problem" may be failing to recognize that users want only one operating system/CPU, and that combination should be able to handle most/all existing PC applications. Regardless, it is also noteworthy that Andy Grove, an enthusiastic endorser of Christensen's first two books, does not have an endorsement on this book's back cover.

Healthcare: Christensen observes a "do-it-yourself" trend with home pregnancy tests and glucose monitors. However, both are small components of a relatively trivial healthcare market not likely to sustain major innovation. His third example - cheaper/easier angioplasty replacing cardiac surgery, is an unfortunate one because the latest findings are that angioplasty is not generally an acceptable substitute. Finally, Christensen is totally correct in concluding that many patients are overserved by M.D. providers vs. eg. nurse practitioners - unfortunately, legal constraints are not likely to relax soon in this area. (This also limits "off-shore" provision of X-ray readings, etc., though combining tourism with cheaper Asian healthcare may grow into a much greater market.)

Finally, "Seeing What's Next" considers the wireless communication sector. VOIP is seen as a major challenge - not likely, in my opinion, due to users being physically tied to an on-line computer, and existing wireless providers already able to offer long-distance quite cheaply via national service plans and/or offerings of free calling on weekends and after 7 P.M. during weekdays.

Bottom Line: "Seeing What's Next's" greatest contribution is probably through demonstrating how difficult seeing into the future actually can be.

Editorial Review:

When a disruptive innovation is launched, it changes the entire industry and every firm operating within in

This book argues that it is possible to predict which companies will win and which will lose in a specific situation—and provides a practical framework for doing so.

Most books on innovation—including Christensen’s previous two books—approached innovation from the inside-out, showing firms how they can create innovations inside their own companies. This book is written from an “outside-in” perspective, showing how executives, investors, and analysts can assess the impact of a new innovation on the firms they have a vested interest in.

The Coming Economic Collapse: How You Can Thrive When Oil Costs $200 a Barrel

Stephen Leeb, Glen Strathy

The Coming Economic Collapse: How You Can Thrive When Oil Costs $200 a Barrel Stephen Leeb, Glen Strathy Amazon Price: $11.55
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 76 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Great read... 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Loved this book when it came out. Very few at the time could even imagine $100/barrel oil, now the next step is $200.

There are some great investment tips towards the end and also gives you a pretty intense idea of what would happen if oil hits new records.

A good one to at least check out. Also, good book format and interior makes it an easy read. Most of these oil books are boring, but this seems to keep the readers attention.

Hope this review helps.

Editorial Review:

Stephen Leeb shows how hard times can be a boon for smart investors. As the world faces an energy crisis of unprecedented scope, renowed economist Stephen Leeb shows how surging oil prices will contribute to an economic collapse. With meticulous research and analysis, Leeb shows that due to strong competition from India and China, prices could soon double, a cost for which most countries and investors are ill-prepared. Now, in this groundbreaking book, Leeb not only shows how this crisis will affect consumers, but how savvy investing can turn these dire times into financial gain.

Rich Dad's Advisors®: The ABC's of Writing Winning Business Plans: How to Prepare a Business Plan That Others Will Want to Read -- and Invest In (Rich Dad's Advisors)

Garrett Sutton

Rich Dad's Advisors®: The ABC's of Writing  Winning Business Plans: How to Prepare a Business Plan That Others Will Want to Read -- and Invest In (Rich Dad's Advisors) Garrett Sutton Amazon Price: $11.53
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 9 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Inspiring! 5 out of 5 stars.
9 of 9 people found this review helpful.

This book lights a fire under your butt! The author does a great job laying out the steps. Although the lack of skillful editing bothered me a bit in the beginning, it does deliver. After only a few days of reading, I was able to get get very clear and focused on how to present my ideas. In a month, I had my first chunk of real money to work with.

Fun, Informative, yet Inefficient read 3 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

Many of the points in this book could have been made more clearly and with much shorter explanations.

This book has EXCELLENT content, but is an inefficient read.

Great book 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I didnt start any business before. Recently I am trying to start my own business but I have no idea how I can do it. After reading this book, I figure out that I have to plan on all stuff before I start. It saves me from making a mess while start building my own business. Awsome book.

Editorial Review:

Learn how to prepare and utilize the most important document for any organizationthe business plan. Whether one is just starting out or is already in business and needs to refocus efforts, this practical guide will clearly instruct how to prepare a winning business plan. This book will become a valued resource for entrepreneurs and business owners on their path towards future success.

Strategy Maps: Converting Intangible Assets into Tangible Outcomes

Robert S. Kaplan, David P. Norton

Strategy Maps: Converting Intangible Assets into Tangible Outcomes Robert S. Kaplan, David P. Norton Amazon Price: $26.37
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 29 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

More than a decade ago, Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton introduced the Balanced Scorecard, a revolutionary performance measurement system that allowed organizations to quantify intangible assets such as people, information, and customer relationships. Then, in The Strategy-Focused Organization, Kaplan and Norton showed how organizations achieved breakthrough performance with a management system that put the Balanced Scorecard into action.

Now, using their ongoing research with hundreds of Balanced Scorecard adopters across the globe, the authors have created a powerful new tool-the "strategy map"-that enables companies to describe the links between intangible assets and value creation with a clarity and precision never before possible.

Kaplan and Norton argue that the most critical aspect of strategy-implementing it in a way that ensures sustained value creation-depends on managing four key internal processes: operations, customer relationships, innovation, and regulatory and social processes. The authors show how companies can use strategy maps to link those processes to desired outcomes; evaluate, measure, and improve the processes most critical to success; and target investments in human, informational, and organizational capital.

Providing a visual epiphany for executives everywhere who can't figure out why their strategy isn't working, Strategy Maps is a blueprint any organization can follow to align processes, people, and information technology for superior performance.


Mind Set!: Reset Your Thinking and See the Future

John Naisbitt

Mind Set!: Reset Your Thinking and See the Future John Naisbitt Amazon Price: $16.47
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 17 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Learning to read Trends - Useful YES - Practical - MAYBE 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 1 people found this review helpful.

As you prepare to operate in the business world, one of the most useful and rewarding skills that you could develop is the ability to read trends. Working in the business world can be compared to surfing: the surfer sits on their board behind the breaking waves staring out at the horizon watching for the next big wave. When they see a big wave building up they turn their board toward the shore, lie down and begin paddling to build some forward momentum so that when the wave reaches them, they can catch it and ride it towards the shore. The bigger and more powerful the wave the better the ride. To be successful in business one also needs to ride waves, these waves are called trends. As a business person one needs to be "looking over the horizon" for the next trends and positioning oneself to ride the trend when it arrives. The bigger and more powerful the trend the more successful the ride. Some recent business trends include:
* Outsourcing - increased amounts of work being outsourced to regions of the world where labour is relatively cheap e.g. the processing of US tax returns being outsourced to India.
* Open source software development - more and more software is being developed by individuals from all over the world working in collaboration with one another from the comfort of their own homes and doing all of this for free e.g. The Firefox web browser and Ubuntu operating system.
* Online expression - many people are expressing themselves publicly in online forums. Look at the number of people with personal blogs or "MySpace" websites or publishing video on "YouTube".

How does one develop the ability to read business trends? Is it a skill that can be learned or is it more of an intuitive sense?

One of the people who has been most successful at reading trends over the past 30 years is John Naisbitt. In the 1980's and 1990's he published two bestselling books that examined trends for the future, Megatrends and Megatrends 2020. Both of these books were incredibly insightful and accurate and won him wide acclaim and credibility as a trend spotter.

In his most recent book entitled "Mindset", published in late 2006, he shares many of his secrets for spotting trends. He highlights eleven mindsets that have enabled him pick up on what is going on in the world today and project that into the future. The book is practical, insightful and incredibly easy to read and to apply. These mindsets, if applied, will give anyone going into a career in consulting, technology, strategy, marketing, investments or wanting to be an entrepreneur a massive head start.

To give you an insight into the book, here are three of the eleven mindsets that he shares:
* "The future is embedded in the present" - if one pays close attention to what is going on in the world today, it creates an excellent insight into what is likely to happen in the future. John Naisbitt gathers most of insight into the future by reading regional news papers and current affairs magazines from across the globe. He uses the news of today to make predictions about tomorrow.
* Focus on the score - one can easily get tied up and distracted by anecdotal evidence but the real truth is in the numbers. In soccer if the score is 3-1 then no matter how well the team that only scored one goal played, they still lost. In business we need to look at the numbers and measure the likelihood of economic success from the numbers e.g. is the unemployment rate decreasing, is GDP per capita growing etc.
* Understand how powerful it is not to have to right - in making predictions about the future, people are paralyzed by the need to be right and therefore never make a predication about a trend and as a result never take action. If one releases oneself from the need to always be right, then one is far more likely to take the bold step of making a predication and taking action. Rather make a prediction and be marginally wrong than say and do nothing at all.

This is an good book that comes highly recommended for those who want to position themselves for a successful career in business.

Editorial Review:

In his seminal works Megatrends and Megatrends 2000, John Naisbitt proved himself one of the most far-sighted and accurate observers of our fast-changing world.

Mind Set! goes beyond that—Mind Set! discloses the secret of forecasting. John Naisbitt gives away the keys to the kingdom, opening the door to the insights that let him understand today's world and see the opportunities of tomorrow. He selects his most effective tools, 11 Mindsets, and applies them by guiding the reader through the five forces that will dominate the next decades of the twenty-first century.

Illustrated by stories about Galileo and Einstein to today's icons and rebels in business, science, and sports, Mind Set! opens your eyes to see beyond media headlines, political slogans, and personal opinions to select and judge what will form the pictures of the future.

The Strategy-Focused Organization: How Balanced Scorecard Companies Thrive in the New Business Environment

Robert S. Kaplan, David P. Norton

The Strategy-Focused Organization: How Balanced Scorecard Companies Thrive in the New Business Environment Robert S. Kaplan, David P. Norton Amazon Price: $23.97
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 22 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

In their previous book, The Balanced Scorecard, Robert Kaplan and David Norton unveiled an innovative "performance management system" that any company could use to focus and align their executive teams, business units, human resources, information technology, and financial resources on a unified overall strategy--much as businesses have traditionally employed financial management systems to track and guide their general fiscal direction. In The Strategy-Focused Organization, Kaplan and Norton explain how companies like Mobil, CIGNA, and Chemical Retail Bank have effectively used this approach for nearly a decade, and in the process present a step-by-step implementation outline that other organizations could use to attain similar results. Their book is divided into five sections that guide readers through development of a completely individualized plan that is created with "strategy maps" (graphical representations designed to clearly communicate desired outcomes and how they are to be achieved), then infused throughout the enterprise and made an integral part of its future. In several chapters devoted to the latter, for example, the authors show how their models have linked long-term strategy with day-to-day operational and budgetary management, and detail the "double loop" process for doing so, monitoring progress, and initiating corrective actions if necessary. --Howard Rothman

The Basics of Process Mapping

Robert Damelio

The Basics of Process Mapping Robert Damelio Amazon Price: $9.85
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 13 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Very good for a book on process mapping 5 out of 5 stars.
14 of 14 people found this review helpful.

Let's face it--there really isn't very much to process mapping. I've searched for books on it, and none of them seem to be more than 100 pages. The reason is that there isn't much to mapping out a process.

So, for the limited subject material, this book does an excellent job. It was a fast read. I think I read it in about 2 hours, going pretty slowly through it.

This book talks about three types of process maps, and from the book it says:

"Since most readers may already have experience with flowcharts, the main emphasis of this book will be on relationship and process maps. The steps you should follow to create both types of maps are included."

However, I think it focused equally on all three of the types of process maps. I mention this so you don't think that this will jut be a book on flowcharting.

I thought it was good, and helpful. It gave me some new stuff to think about, and it's a basic look at process mapping. And, like I said, there really isn't a much more complex way of looking at it.

Editorial Review:

Practical and easy to read, this book contains a case study of both levels of process mapping and guidelines for when to use each type. It details the importance of process mapping in examining a work flow and customer-supplier relationships as the foundation for appropriate improvements. The author provides step-by-step instructions for creating and interpreting a relationship process map and a cross-functional process map, and reviews the commonly used flowchart. Highlighting the relationship of process mapping to flowcharting, he delineates the differences between a cross-functional process map, a relationship map, and a flowchart, providing detailed examples of why and how each is used in specific situations.

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