Business Books - Page 12

Waiter Rant: Thanks for the Tip - Confessions of a Cynical Waiter

Steve Dublanica

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 160 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

According to The Waiter, eighty percent of customers are nice people just looking for something to eat. The remaining twenty percent, however, are socially maladjusted psychopaths. WAITER RANT offers the server’s unique point of view, replete with tales of customer stupidity, arrogant misbehavior, and unseen bits of human grace transpiring in the most unlikely places. Through outrageous stories, The Waiter reveals the secrets to getting good service, proper tipping etiquette, and how to keep him from spitting in your food. The Waiter also shares his ongoing struggle, at age thirty-eight, to figure out if he can finally leave the first job at which he’s really thrived.

"The other shoe finally drops. The front-of-the-house version of Kitchen Confidential; a painfully funny, excruciatingly true-life account of the waiter’s life. As useful as it is entertaining. You will never look at your waiter the same way again–and will never tip less than 20%." --Anthony Bourdain, author of Kitchen Confidential
"I really enjoyed WAITER RANT. The book is engaging and funny, a story told from my polar opposite perspective. I will now do my best to act better as a Chef -- and I dare say, I’ll never be rude to a waiter again, as long as I live."--John DeLucie, Chef of The Waverly Inn

The Know-It-All

A.J. Jacobs

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 222 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Thoroughly enjoyable 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

One of my favorite books this year. I fully expected to enjoy it after reading the entertaining account of the author's latest "humble quest" to follow the bible as literally as possible (also highly recommended!). And I was right - I loved the book, and when I finished it, I went into immediate Jacobs withdrawal, and had to look up his old Esquire articles and interviews to get my daily dose of self-deprecating humor (thank you, google!). Jacobs somehow managed to include a dizzying number of Britannica facts in a funny, witty, creative way, by giving the reader a glimpse of his own universe, his quirky family, his compulsions and eccentricities, his marriage and his thoughts on his impending fatherhood. The book is hilarious - I laughed out loud while reading it - but it is also tender and touching. I can't wait to read about the author's next quest.

Editorial Review:

A hilarious, intelligent-trivia-packed story from a man who read the entire ENCYLOPEDIA BRITANNICA. Early in his career, A. J. Jacobs found himself putting his Ivy League education to work at ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY. After five years he learned which stars have fake boobs, which stars have toupees, which have both, and not much else. This unsettling realization led Jacobs on a life-changing quest: to read the entire contents of the ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA, all 33,000 pages, all 44 million words. Jacobs accumulates useful and less-so knowledge, and along the way finds a deep connection with his father (who attempted the same feat when Jacob's was a child), examines the nature of knowledge vs. intelligence, and learns how to be rather annoying at cocktail parties. Part memoir/part-education (or lack thereof), the chapters are organized by the letters of the alphabet.

The Sociopath Next Door

Martha Stout

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 222 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Excellent source of information 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

Dr. Stout has written a very worthwhile book that is informative, useful, and dense in information. I have purchased six copies (at least) to give friends and relatives whom I felt could benefit from the information presented. Considering that only about four percent of the population is believed to have no concience, it is my opinion that "The Sociopath Next Door" presents a likely explaination for some of the pointles, damaging, and outlandish behaviors I have observed in others (including public figures)on occcasion.

Editorial Review:

We are accustomed to think of sociopaths as violent criminals, but in The Sociopath Next Door, Harvard psychologist Martha Stout reveals that a shocking 4 percent of ordinary peoplea "one in twenty-fivea "has an often undetected mental disorder, the chief symptom of which is that that person possesses no conscience. He or she has no ability whatsoever to feel shame, guilt, or remorse. One in twenty-five everyday Americans, therefore, is secretly a sociopath. They could be your colleague, your neighbor, even family. And they can do literally anything at all and feel absolutely no guilt.

The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century

Steve Coll

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 25 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Important and Valuable Read on Globalization's Trappings 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

With his "The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century" Steve Coll has written something relevant and valuable. In his meticulous reporting of a powerful Middle Eastern family that spawned the world's most famous terrorist Steve Coll has, more important, revealed the trappings of globalization.

The Bin Ladens is the Saud royal family's contractors, and they have literally built most of Saudi Arabia. They are a large and expansive, devout and traditional Muslim family but before anything else they are businessmen. That's why they will assiduously cultivate good relations with the corrupt and tyrannical Saud royal family, whose very whim rests the fate of the family. They will also tear down and bulldoze to a fault the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, and transfer their capital and assets out of Saudi Arabia in times of uncertainty. By being absolutely loyal to the Saud royal family, even acting as one of their largest creditors, the Bin Ladens has prospered, even though because their private and business dealings are so blurred together and because the thorny web of personal relationships that constitute business in Saudi Arabia means everyone owe and is owed money to someone else, they have no idea how much they're worth.

As a mighty tome this book discusses many topics but ultimately it's about, as the subtitle suggests, the Bin Ladens and globalization. And while this is a family epic the patriarch was much too prodigious (fathering at least 54 children), and the story centers around two Bin Laden scions: the eldest and heir Salem and his younger half-brother Osama.

Sent to English boarding schools at a young age the very large and personable Salem, as the heir apparent to this family's construction empire, must have learned quickly that wealth in a global free market means he can live his life like a wet dream. After his father died Salem did much to globalize his company, and retained many foreigners -- lawyers and advisors, pilots and girlfriends -- in his retinue. Yet, out of necessity, Salem was staunchly loyal to the Saud royal family, even doing intelligence work for them -- such as supplying the mujahedeen arms, money, and Osama in their fight against the Soviets in Afghanistan. Freely moving between the West and his homeland Salem's ultimate dream was to have four Western women from different countries as his wives: for him this was the true meaning of globalization.

Osama Bin Laden led a very different life from Salem. His mother had him when she was fifteen, and, because there were so many wives already in the Bin Laden household and as was the custom, she re-married, and it was in junior high that the Osama became involved tangentially with the Muslim Brotherhood and radical Islam. At that time many young boys in Saudi Arabia were drawn to radical Islam, and it's possible that like fatherless black teenagers in New York who joined gangs they were drawn in because they desperately wanted authority and structure in their lives. When Middle Eastern patriarchs decide to have dozens of sons they in fact sentence all of them to a fatherless existence. And while Osama had a kind stepfather his Bin Laden name meant he was in fact superior to his stepfather, and therefore could never look up to him.

Besides providing Osama with structure and order Islam also sated his second most immediate need: sex. Islam permitted Osama at 17 to marry a younger cousin of 14, and would permit him to marry three more times. And fighting the jihad in Afghanistan Osama may have been motivated by yet another mundane reason: respect from his half-brothers. The Saudi royal family supported the war, and thus the Bin Laden family supported the war -- and here was an opportunity for Osama to finally prove himself to the Bin Ladens. Ultimately, it did not but in Afghanistan he created a new family for himself: Al-Qaeda.

"Ambition, energy, natural talent, and a gift for managing people had made [the patriarch] Mohamed Bin Laden wealthy," Steve Coll writes. "Reinterpreted by Salem, these characteristics had girded a secular life of singular creativity and financial success. Reinterpreted through a prism of Islamic radicalism by Osama, they would soon prove just as transforming."

And what Osama realized was that the very tools of globalization -- mobile phones, Internet, and international finance -- could be used against globalization itself with devastating effect.

Unfortunately, globalization's prophets were so enamored of their creation they could not imagine this was possible. During the late Clinton administration federal agents tried to ascertain the funds available to Osama by hacking into Swiss banks but their overlords overruled this, arguing this would compromise confidence in the European banking system.

What was so traumatic about the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks was not the degree of damage but how it shattered our very sense of the world -- of what is fixed, true, and right. By turning the very symbols of modernity and globalization against itself Osama Bin Laden showed how messy and precarious our world really is, and that's a sort of metaphysical trauma almost impossible to recover from.

Globalization indeed is a messy and complicated process, as the Bin Laden family would discover. Yes, globalization meant cheap access to German prostitutes and German cars but it also brought many complications. While in America Bin Laden family members were swindled out of their money, and harassed by the police about if they were treating their household help properly. When one Bin Laden son found himself in American divorce court, and constantly harassed about his actual finances -- which he knew nothing about -- by his wife's divorce lawyers he yearned for the ease and simplicity of patriarchal Muslim law. Not at all strange that while reared in modern and progressive Western society most Bin Laden sons in the end chose the comfort and certainty of their corrupt and close-minded homeland.

Globalization, like the Internet and modernity, is neither good nor bad. It just is -- it promises and it imperils, it strengthens and weakens, it creates and destroys. Many are turned off by globalization's inherent messiness and complication, and thus it's not surprising many -- in every society -- will seek comfort and consolation in religion, the simplest and most dogmatic thing available to them.

And so Osama Bin Laden is not globalization's enemy. He is, like his other brother Salem and like the Bin Laden family and like all of us, ensnared and overwhelmed by globalization, desperately trying in his own way to best make sense of it.

Editorial Review:

In The Bin Ladens, two- time Pulitzer Prize–winner Steve Coll continues where Ghost Wars left off, shedding new light on one of the most elusive families of the twenty-first century. Rising from a famine-stricken desert into luxury, private compounds, and even business deals with Hollywood celebrities, the Bin Ladens have benefited from the tensions and contradictions in a country founded on extreme religious purity, suddenly thrust into a world awash in oil, money, and the temptations of the West. But what do these incongruities mean for globalization, the War on Terror, and America’s place in the Middle East? Meticulously researched, The Bin Ladens is the story of a remarkably varied and often dangerous family that has used money, mobility, and technology to dramatically different ends.

Primal Leadership: Realizing the Power of Emotional Intelligence

Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis, Annie McKee

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 90 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Emotional Intelligence Greater Component of Success than IQ: Develop Your Own EI and Leadership to Make a Difference 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

"Leaders have always played a primordial emotional role [...] Quite simply, in any human group the leader has maximal power to sway everyone's emotions" (5).

Daniel Goleman, author of the bestseller Emotional Intelligence, explores the power of EQ in leadership and shows how we can apply these proven principles to "excel not just through skill and smarts, but by connecting with others" (Cover). Studies of star performers have shown that 85% of the difference in success is attributed to emotional intelligence factors rather than cognitive abilities like IQ or technical abilities. In today's competitive world, the art of relationships is more indispensable than ever.

Editorial Review:

Daniel Goleman’s international bestseller Emotional Intelligence changed our concept of “being smart,” proving that emotional intelligence— how we handle ourselves and our relationships—matters more than IQ or technical skill in educational success. Now, Goleman teams with Richard Boyatzis and Annie McKee, experts on emotional intelligence research, to explore the consequences of emotional intelligence for leaders and organizations. The authors argue that a leader’s emotions are contagious, and must resonate energy and enthusiasm if an organization is to thrive.

The Art of Possibility - Audio Edition

Rosamund Stone Zander, Benjamin Zander

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Editorial Review:

The audio edition of The Art of Possibility brings Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander's internationally best selling book to life. This seven-CD edition is read by the authors and contains bonus musical examples throughout to illustrate the text.

The Art of Possibility, a New York Times bestseller, has been translated into fifteen languages and has sold over 500,000 copies worldwide. Presenting twelve breakthrough practices for bringing creativity into action, The Art of Possibility is the dynamic product of an extraordinary partnership. It combines Benjamin Zander's experience as conductor of the Boston Philharmonic and his talent as a teacher and communicator with psychotherapist Rosamund Zander's genius for creating inventions for personal and professional development.

The authors' interwoven perspectives provide a deep sense of the powerful role that Possibility can play in every aspect of life. Through uplifting stories, parables and personal anecdotes, the Zanders invite us to become passionate communicators, leaders and performers whose lives radiate Possibility into the world.

Banker to the Poor: Micro-Lending and the Battle against World Poverty

Muhammad Yunus

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 78 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Banker to the Poor 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Banker To The Poor: Micro-Lending and the Battle Against World Poverty
This is a life changing book! This book will change the way that you think about poverty and how to end it. In this book, Professor Yunus tells of his own journey in first recognising that the University in which he lectured in Economics, needed to impact his local community, and secondly, doing something about it. The book has all of the elements of a good novel, humour, romance, and drama, but it is so much more. Buy this book, read this book, and then join Kiva.org to make a difference.

Editorial Review:

In 1983, Muhammad Yunus established Grameen, a bank devoted to providing the poorest of Bangladesh with miniscule loans. Believing that credit is a basic human right, not the privilege of a few, Yunus aimed to support that spark of personal initiative and enterprise by which the poor might lift themselves out of poverty forever. Grameen Bank now provides over 2.5 billion dollars of micro-loans to more than two million families in rural Bangladesh, with repayment rates at nearly 100 percent. In Banker to the Poor, Yunus traces the journey that led him to rethink the economic relationship between rich and poor and recounts the challenges he faced in founding Grameen. He provides wise, hopeful guidance for anyone who would like to join him in the burgeoning world movement of micro-lending to eradicate world poverty.

The Innovator's Dilemma

Clayton M. Christensen, Don Leslie

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 160 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Disrupt your competitors, not your customers! 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

With the Innovator's Dilemma, Clayton Christensen delivers a very powerful analysis of the role of innovation in gaining market leadership. The question raised is whether market leadership can be sustained through innovation alone. Indeed, the core of the Innovator's Dilemma illustrates how successful companies with established solutions, marquee customers and a valued brand keep being threatened and at time vanquished by start-ups. A recent example would be how established enterprise software vendors have been shaken up by disruptive startups: Remember Salesforce.com vs. Siebel Systems? Christensen addresses a difficult problem that most successful customer focused companies face. Precisely, because it is a formidable challenge for an established company to bring disrupting technology to its own installed base of customers.

Editorial Review:

Great companies can fail—not because they do anything wrong, but because they do everything right. Meeting customers' current needs leads firms to reject breakthrough innovations-"disruptive technologies" that create the products and opportunities of the future.

Radical thinking . . . and a wake-up call. Citing examples from many industries (computers, retailing, pharmaceuticals, automobiles, steel), Clayton M. Christensen explains how to avoid a similar fate. He presents strategies for determining when not to listen to customers, when to pursue small markets at the expense of larger ones, and other ways to ensure long-term growth and profit. This award-winning book shows managers the changes that may be coming—and how to respond for success.

Supercapitalism: The Transformation of Business, Democracy, and Everyday Life

Robert B Reich

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 58 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Required reading to understand our current economic downfall 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Robert Reich blends the ideas that not only are companies but also citizens of America are to blame for the current economic crisis. He details the rise and ultimate fall of deregulation, the increased availability of resources and the somewhat new idea of fierce competition between deeply rooted and fledgling companies. Mr. Reich shows that corporations looking to increase their stock prices are hurting the economy by the ways they go about doing so.

But the most telling aspect of the story is how we, as citizens of America, are allowing these corporations to continue their greedy ways and how we are almost of the same mindset.

Definitely pick this item up if you want to understand how we can get out of the current mess and the history of it all.

Editorial Review:

From one of the nations most valued voices on politics, business, and the economy, the bestselling author of "Locked in the Cabinet" and "The Work of Nations" discusses the clash between capitalism and democracy, in this timely, impassioned, and highly important book. Unabridged. 8 CDs.

How to Make Money in Stocks: A Winning System in Good Times or Bad

William J. O'Neil

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 217 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

A Goldmine of Stock Investing Ideas! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

William O'Neil, who started a successful financial paper known as Investors Business Daily, wrote How to Make Money in Stocks. Decade of research, critical thinking and common sense has helped O'Neil to create some very powerful ways of investing successfully.

This book isn't about getting rich quick. It takes time, study diligence and patience coupled with controlling ones emotions to become an excellent investor.

I have read many books, magazines and articles on investing in stocks, bonds, mutual funds and more over the years. O'Neil's ideas are some of the most solid and consistent I have found to apply to the stock market.

In the book he teaches his CAN SLIM method of investing. Looking at these indicators are powerful ways to find the right stocks. CAN SLIM stands for:

C = Current Quarterly Earnings per share: The Higher the Better
A = Annual Earnings Increases: Look for Growth
N = New Products, New Management, New Highs
S = Supply and Demand
L = Leader or Laggard
I = Institutional Sponsorship
M = Market Direction

There are other great ideas in the book such as: Nineteen Common Mistakes Most Investors Make, How to Cut Your Losses, When to Sell and Take Your Profit and much more. How to Make Money in Stocks is a gold mine of ideas!

The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide to: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking

Editorial Review:

This bestseller has shown over one million investors the secrets to building stock market wealth.