A visionary, engaging book that offers real insight into an exciting alternative method for operating a business.
In this forward-looking debut, a former CEO and business coach promotes a plan to transform traditionally run businesses into “virtual” organizations.
Some CEOs may balk at Russo’s premise that any company could essentially abandon traditional physical boundaries and run with greater efficiency and higher profitability. But the author’s own experience doing so warrants a serious look: as a CEO, Russo says that he operated a $25 million business with 300 home-based employees and thousands of clients from “my spare bedroom converted to a workspace.” Still, he recognizes that many readers are likely to have a great deal of skepticism about this idea, so in this intriguing book, he appropriately bolsters his argument with a section titled “Myths, Realities and Outcomes.” Here, the author addresses objections head-on (such as “I’ll Lose Control of My Company” or “I Can’t Transition Now. I’ve Just Invested a Fortune”) and tells how to develop leadership skills and spawn a company culture in an “invisible” organization without a central, physical office. He lays out a rationale for the transition, offering positive outcomes, such as encouraging “a new way of thinking” among home-based employees while also making them happier and more productive. A significant portion of the book deals with the logistics of how to build a virtual organization; not surprisingly, at the heart of this corporate structure are excellent systems. The details that Russo offers about customer-relationship management, automated training, and project management systems are especially useful. Perhaps most valuable is the in-depth discussion of how to optimize marketing and sales; it delves into strategy and tactics, includes a convincing pitch for the use of radio advertising, and outlines specific ways to recruit and compensate top salespeople. It also offers an ingenious plan for implementing an “expert network” of certified consultants—a concept that could be adapted by most any service company, virtual or not. Russo’s passion for his subject is infectious, and he sees virtuality as a pathway for the CEO who wants to “live the dream of freedom and have more of what you want.”
A visionary, engaging book that offers real insight into an exciting alternative method for operating a business.Pub Date: June 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5122-3162-5
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Best Seller Publishing
Review Posted Online: Dec. 7, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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