Books — Business

Business

I Moved Your Cheese: For Those Who Refuse to Live as Mice in Someone Else's Maze (BK Business)

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Author: Deepak Malhotra

If you were a mouse trapped in a maze and someone kept moving the cheese, what would you do?

Over a decade ago the bestselling business fable Who Moved My Cheese? offered its answer to this question: accept that change is inevitable and beyond your control, don't waste your time wondering why things are the way they are, keep your head down and start looking for the cheese.

But success in the areas of innovation, entrepreneurship, creativity, leadership and business growth--as well as personal growth--depends on the ability to push the boundaries, reshape the environment, and play by a different set of rules: our own. With that in mind, Harvard Business School professor Deepak Malhotra offers a radically different answer to this question.

Malhotra tells an inspiring story about three unique and adventurous mice--Max, Big and Zed--who refuse to accept their reality as given. As we watch their lives unfold and intersect, we discover that instead of just blindly chasing after the cheese, each of us has the ability to escape the maze or even reconfigure it to our liking.

In the face of established practices, traditional ideas, scarce resources and the powerful demands or expectations of others, we often underestimate our ability to control our own destiny and overcome the constraints we face--or think we face. I Moved Your Cheese reminds us that we can create the new circumstances and realities we want, but first we must discard the often deeply ingrained notion that we are nothing more than mice in someone else's maze. As Zed explains, "You see, Max, the problem is not that the mouse is in the maze, but that the maze is in the mouse."

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The Scarlet Letter (Unabridged Classics in MP3)

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Author: Nathaniel Hawthorne

General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1871 Original Publisher: Fields, Osgood,

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Steve Jobs: A Biography

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Author: Walter Isaacson

Based on more than forty interviews with Jobs conducted over two years--as well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues--Walter Isaacson has written a riveting story of the roller-coaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, and digital publishing.

At a time when America is seeking ways to sustain its innovative edge, and when societies around the world are trying to build digital-age economies, Jobs stands as the ultimate icon of inventiveness and applied imagination. He knew that the best way to create value in the twenty-first century was to connect creativity with technology. He built a company where leaps of the imagination were combined with remarkable feats of engineering.

Although Jobs cooperated with this book, he asked for no control over what was written nor even the right to read it before it was published. He put nothing off-limits. He encouraged the people he knew to speak honestly. And Jobs speaks candidly, sometimes brutally so, about the people he worked with and competed against. His friends, foes, and colleagues provide an unvarnished view of the passions, perfectionism, obsessions, artistry, devilry, and compulsion for control that shaped his approach to business and the innovative products that resulted.

Driven by demons, Jobs could drive those around him to fury and despair. But his personality and products were interrelated, just as Apple's hardware and software tended to be, as if part of an integrated system. His tale is instructive and cautionary, filled with lessons about innovation, character, leadership, and values.

Amazon Best Books of the Month, November 2011: It is difficult to read the opening pages of Walter Isaacson’s Steve Jobs without feeling melancholic. Jobs retired at the end of August and died about six weeks later. Now, just weeks after his death, you can open the book that bears his name and read about his youth, his promise, and his relentless press to succeed. But the initial sadness in starting the book is soon replaced by something else, which is the intensity of the read--mirroring the intensity of Jobs’s focus and vision for his products. Few in history have transformed their time like Steve Jobs, and one could argue that he stands with the Fords, Edisons, and Gutenbergs of the world. This is a timely and complete portrait that pulls no punches and gives insight into a man whose contradictions were in many ways his greatest strength. --Chris Schluep

Amazon Exclusive: A Q&A with Walter Isaacson

Q: It's becoming well known that Jobs was able to create his Reality Distortion Field when it served him. Was it difficult for you to cut through the RDF and get beneath the narrative that he created? How did you do it?

Isaacson: Andy Hertzfeld, who worked with Steve on the original Macintosh team, said that even if you were aware of his Reality Distortion Field, you still got caught up in it. But that is why Steve was so successful: He willfully bent reality so that you became convinced you could do the impossible, so you did. I never felt he was intentionally misleading me, but I did try to check every story. I did more than a hundred interviews. And he urged me not just to hear his version, but to interview as many people as possible. It was one of his many odd contradictions: He could distort reality, yet he was also brutally honest most of the time. He impressed upon me the value of honesty, rather than trying to whitewash things.

Q: How were the interviews with Jobs conducted? Did you ask lots of questions, or did he just talk?

Isaacson: I asked very few questions. We would take long walks or drives, or sit in his garden, and I would raise a topic and let him expound on it. Even during the more formal sessions in his living room, I would just sit quietly and listen. He loved to tell stories, and he would get very emotional, especially when talking about people in his life whom he admired or disdained.

Q: He was a powerful man who could hold a grudge. Was it easy to get others to talk about Jobs willingly? Were they afraid to talk?

Isaacson: Everyone was eager to talk about Steve. They all had stories to tell, and they loved to tell them. Even those who told me about his rough manner put it in the context of how inspiring he could be.

Q: Jobs embraced the counterculture and Buddhism. Yet he was a billionaire businessman with his own jet. In what way did Jobs' contradictions contribute to his success?

Isaacson: Steve was filled with contradictions. He was a counterculture rebel who became a billionaire. He eschewed material objects yet made objects of desire. He talked, at times, about how he wrestled with these contradictions. His counterculture background combined with his love of electronics and business was key to the products he created. They combined artistry and technology.

Q: Jobs could be notoriously difficult. Did you wind up liking him in the end?

Isaacson: Yes, I liked him and was inspired by him. But I knew he could be unkind and rough. These things can go together. When my book first came out, some people skimmed it quickly and cherry-picked the examples of his being rude to people. But that was only half the story. Fortunately, as people read the whole book, they saw the theme of the narrative: He could be petulant and rough, but this was driven by his passion and pursuit of perfection. He liked people to stand up to him, and he said that brutal honesty was required to be part of his team. And the teams he built became extremely loyal and inspired.

Q: Do you believe he was a genius?

Isaacson: He was a genius at connecting art to technology, of making leaps based on intuition and imagination. He knew how to make emotional connections with those around him and with his customers.

Q: Did he have regrets?

Isaacson: He had some regrets, which he expressed in his interviews. For example, he said that he did not handle well the pregnancy of his first girlfriend. But he was deeply satisfied by the creativity he ingrained at Apple and the loyalty of both his close colleagues and his family.

Q: What do you think is his legacy?

Isaacson: His legacy is transforming seven industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, digital publishing, and retail stores. His legacy is creating what became the most valuable company on earth, one that stood at the intersection of the humanities and technology, and is the company most likely still to be doing that a generation from now. His legacy, as he said in his "Think Different" ad, was reminding us that the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.

Photo credit: Patrice Gilbert Photography

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The Art Of War

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Author: Sun Tzu

The classic by Sun Tzu. The definitive guide to strategy, tactics, and success.

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Wuthering Heights

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Author: Emily Bronte

Wuthering Heights is the story of love turning on itself and of the violence and misery that result from thwarted passion. A book of immense power, it is filled with the raw beauty of the moors and a deep compassion for the conflicting destinies of men and women. Emily Bronte lived out her life in the wilderness of the moors and died a year after her extraordinary novel was published. The story of stubborn Cathy and wild-as-the-wind Heathcliff has been a favorite since its original publication in 1848. The novel begins with Lockwood, a tenant, taking up residence close to Wuthering Heights. His landlord, Mr. Heathcliff, proves to be surly, unfriendly and rude. When Lockwood discovers a mildewed book with the names Catherine Earnshaw, Catherine Heathcliff and Catherine Linton scratched on its cover he begins to read and starts on a strange tale that proves irresistible . . .

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Extreme Money: Masters of the Universe and the Cult of Risk

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Author: Satyajit Das

The human race created money and finance: then, our inventions recreated us. In Extreme Money, best-selling author and global finance expert Satyajit Das tells how this happened and what it means. Das reveals the spectacular, dangerous money games that are generating increasingly massive bubbles of fake growth, prosperity, and wealth--while endangering the jobs, possessions, and futures of virtually everyone outside finance.

"...virtually in a category of its own — part history, part book of financial quotations, part cautionary tale, part textbook. It contains some of the clearest charts about risk transfer you will find anywhere. ...Others have laid out the dire consequences of financialisation ("the conversion of everything into monetary form", in Das’s phrase), but few have done it with a wider or more entertaining range of references...[Extreme Money] does... reach an important, if worrying, conclusion: financialisation may be too deep-rooted to be torn out. As Das puts it — characteristically borrowing a line from a movie, Inception — "the hardest virus to kill is an idea".
-Andrew Hill "Eclectic Guide to the Excesses of the Crisis" Financial Times (August 17, 2011)

Extreme Money named to the longlist for the 2011 FT and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year award.

Interview with Satyajit Das, author of Extreme Money: Masters of the Universe and the Cult of Risk

Read an interview with Satyajit Das, author of Extreme Money: Masters of the Universe and the Cult of Risk.

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Age Smart: Discovering the Fountain of Youth at Midlife and Beyond (paperback)

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Author: Jeffrey Rosensweig

Americans are embracing an entirely new way of aging: one that's based on staying productive, staying active, and staying young in body and mind. Jeffrey A. Rosensweig and Betty Liu share strategies for bringing together all the elements of a long, happy, fulfilling, connected life. Starting today, you'll learn how to take advantage of the latest sciences of health and longevity... leverage today's most powerful techniques for protecting your financial security... find or keep the work you love... pursue a path to deepen your own personal spirituality, whatever form it may take. No Pink Pants is packed with easy-to-use tips and guidelines for everything from your portfolio to your medical insurance. The heart of the book: intimate interviews with individuals celebrated for what they've learned about getting better with age: powerful role models ranging from Jimmy Carter to Helen Gurley Brown, Robert Mondavi to C. Everett Koop. Learn from their experiences; then use this book's easy worksheets to take control of your own future!

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How to Retire Happy, Wild, and Free: Retirement Wisdom That You Won't Get from Your Financial Advisor

Always Know What To Say - Easy Ways To Approach And Talk To Anyone

Author: Peter W. Murphy

Want to know the easy way to approach and make conversation with new people? In this book you`ll discover simple ways to ensure you always have something interesting to talk about.

Find out how popular people make it look so easy and how you can do the same.

This short 17 page book covers the following strategies:

- How to Approach Someone to Start a Conversation
- 9 Great Ways to Confidently Approach Anyone
- How to Stop Feeling Nervous When Meeting New People
- What to Say When Introducing Yourself to New People
- 6 Easy Ways to Avoid Getting Stuck for Words
- 10 Interesting Topics of Conversation for Every Occasion
- The Best Questions to Keep a Conversation Going
- How to Shine in Conversation with Listening Skills
- How to Use Body Language to Read People Like a Book
- Show People You Like Them and Make Friends with Ease

Start reading this book right away and you`ll enjoy better conversation skills and have much more fun talking to the people in your day to day life.

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From Ramen to Riches: Building Wealth in Your 20s: Or Spending, Saving, Investing and Managing Your Money to Get Rich Slowly, but Surely

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Author: James G. Wood

"You mean to tell me you've been employed as a software engineer for five years and your net worth is $500?" These are not the words you want to hear from your mortgage banker when you're looking to borrow a large sum of money. Despite a well-paying job, the author had managed to spend everything he had earned in the five years after college. The meeting with the mortgage officer was his financial epiphany. He finally got serious about managing and investing his money. Now in his early 50s, the author is debt free, owns a house free and clear, and has built a retirement portfolio that will comfortably sustain him and his wife in the coming years. This book will help people avoid the financial mistakes the author made the first few years after college. In a breezy, humorous, and conversational style, it describes a common-sense approach to spending, saving, investing, and managing your money to build wealth over time. If you are looking to get a grip on managing your money, From Ramen to Riches is for you!

Silver medal winner in the 2011 Living Now Book Awards. Finalist in the 2011 Next Generation Indie Book Awards.

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The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

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Author: Stephen R. Covey

In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, author Stephen R. Covey presents a holistic, integrated, principle-centered approach for solving personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and pointed anecdotes, Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, service, and human dignity--principles that give us the security to adapt to change and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change was a groundbreaker when it was first published in 1990, and it continues to be a business bestseller with more than 10 million copies sold. Stephen Covey, an internationally respected leadership authority, realizes that true success encompasses a balance of personal and professional effectiveness, so this book is a manual for performing better in both arenas. His anecdotes are as frequently from family situations as from business challenges. Before you can adopt the seven habits, you'll need to accomplish what Covey calls a "paradigm shift"--a change in perception and interpretation of how the world works. Covey takes you through this change, which affects how you perceive and act regarding productivity, time management, positive thinking, developing your "proactive muscles" (acting with initiative rather than reacting), and much more. This isn't a quick-tips-start-tomorrow kind of book. The concepts are sometimes intricate, and you'll want to study this book, not skim it. When you finish, you'll probably have Post-it notes or hand-written annotations in every chapter, and you'll feel like you've taken a powerful seminar by Covey. --Joan Price

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ISBN13: 9780743269513
Condition: New
Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!

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