by I. Kostika ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 10, 2015
A business fable uses transition in a family-run company as a catalyst for analysis and insight.
A father and son evaluate the operations of their family business.
In this business book, Kostika (Flow Management Technology, 1989) uses a fictional format in the tradition of Who Moved My Cheese? (1998) to explore the challenges inherent in the customer-facing aspects of a small business. When Dad informs Steve that he plans to retire and leave him in charge of the family’s tool repair business, Steve has a sleepless night as he analyzes the customer service challenges the firm has been facing. He reflects on his own experiences as a customer—an earlier frustration with a furniture restorer; a search for a midnight snack hampered by an ineffective cashier—in order to understand the expectations the company must meet, and he develops an understanding of several key metrics. In the morning, he shares his insights with Dad, and the two incorporate the observations of a hair salon owner and restaurateur as they develop a strategy for dealing with cyclical challenges. The book’s earnest tone (“Steve was not an artist. Yet, in his mind he pictured a humorous sketch of Dad’s idea”; “For a moment Steve felt that he was stuck, but his college education seemed to pay off once more. ‘I can use the 80/20 rule in order to expedite things,’ he thought”) reinforces its fablelike structure and informational purpose. At times the emphasis on the inherent nobility of Steve’s and Dad’s “Midwestern” attitudes and manners can be excessive (“One can only imagine what would have happened had Amos worked in New York City and faced an upset customer after such a delay”). The book does not attempt to guide readers to specific solutions to business problems but focuses on providing a framework for evaluating business cycles, customer relationships, and other fundamental concepts. While not a replacement for traditional business texts, Steve and Dad’s story may prove useful to readers looking for a new perspective on their own business challenges.
A business fable uses transition in a family-run company as a catalyst for analysis and insight.Pub Date: June 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4991-7945-3
Page Count: 278
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Abhijit V. Banerjee & Esther Duflo ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 12, 2019
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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More About This Book
SEEN & HEARD
by Enrico Moretti ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 5, 2012
A welcome contribution from a newcomer who provides both a different view and balance in addressing one of the country's...
A fresh, provocative analysis of the debate on education and employment.
Up-and-coming economist Moretti (Economics/Univ. of California, Berkeley) takes issue with the “[w]idespread misconception…that the problem of inequality in the United States is all about the gap between the top one percent and the remaining 99 percent.” The most important aspect of inequality today, he writes, is the widening gap between the 45 million workers with college degrees and the 80 million without—a difference he claims affects every area of peoples' lives. The college-educated part of the population underpins the growth of America's economy of innovation in life sciences, information technology, media and other areas of globally leading research work. Moretti studies the relationship among geographic concentration, innovation and workplace education levels to identify the direct and indirect benefits. He shows that this clustering favors the promotion of self-feeding processes of growth, directly affecting wage levels, both in the innovative industries as well as the sectors that service them. Indirect benefits also accrue from knowledge and other spillovers, which accompany clustering in innovation hubs. Moretti presents research-based evidence supporting his view that the public and private economic benefits of education and research are such that increased federal subsidies would more than pay for themselves. The author fears the development of geographic segregation and Balkanization along education lines if these issues of long-term economic benefits are left inadequately addressed.
A welcome contribution from a newcomer who provides both a different view and balance in addressing one of the country's more profound problems.Pub Date: May 5, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-547-75011-8
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Review Posted Online: April 3, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2012
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