An accessible reference tool for business leaders.
In this business guidebook, an experienced senior executive reflects on common mistakes made by CEOs.
In the cutthroat world of American business, even the “smallest blind spot can jeopardize the biggest vision,” writes Miller in this handbook for executives. This volume features 37 “secrets” arranged thematically by topics that span from communication and culture to strategy and decision-making. Each brief chapter in the book is devoted to a specific secret and follows the same organizational structure: a case study of an individual CEO’s mistake, followed by an explanation of how they recovered and the lessons learned. A chapter on delegation, for instance, looks at the CEO of an IT firm who “prided himself on running a flat organization” without any middle managers. This structure satisfied his desire for complete control; it also created an atmosphere of micromanaging that bred resentment among employees and a suffocating business culture that was not conducive to success. While many chapters focus on the practical elements of business management, the author also provides advice on how CEOs can thrive both financially and personally. Miller highlights “the toll that unchecked passion for business can take on relationships and personal well-being,” urging executives to also devote time and energy to their families and health. The author additionally discusses putting aside one’s ego and pride when making decisions, embracing innovation, and cultivating a climate characterized by integrity, transparency, and accountability. A former executive with more than three decades of experience in the business sector, Miller has more recently worked as a business blogger, conference speaker, and coach. Many of the CEOs featured in the book include his former colleagues and clients, who share intimate details of both their failings and successes. The book’s emphasis on real-life stories and its avoidance of jargon and theoretical conjecture make for an engaging read with practical utility. The author’s focus on CEOs, however, may limit its audience, though his advice has broad applications for anyone in a leadership position.
An accessible reference tool for business leaders.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2025
ISBN: 9781735653846
Page Count: 332
Publisher: Beelinebill Publishing
Review Posted Online: Feb. 27, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
IN THE NEWS
IN THE NEWS
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.
“Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions. Data can be adduced, for example, to answer the question of whether immigration tends to suppress wages. The answer: “There is no evidence low-skilled migration to rich countries drives wage and employment down for the natives.” In fact, it opens up opportunities for those natives by freeing them to look for better work. The problem becomes thornier when it comes to the matter of free trade; as the authors observe, “left-behind people live in left-behind places,” which explains why regional poverty descended on Appalachia when so many manufacturing jobs left for China in the age of globalism, leaving behind not just left-behind people but also people ripe for exploitation by nationalist politicians. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock.” In what they call a “slightly technical aside,” they build a case for addressing trade issues not with trade wars but with consumption taxes: “It makes no sense to ask agricultural workers to lose their jobs just so steelworkers can keep theirs, which is what tariffs accomplish.” Policymakers might want to consider such counsel, especially when it is coupled with the observation that free trade benefits workers in poor countries but punishes workers in rich ones.
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-61039-950-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
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