Business Problem Solving

In today's fast-moving Information Age, traditional business-planning tools are rapidly becoming obsolete. Yet the competitive, ever-changing marketplace demands that executives move quickly or risk becoming relics. Here's how the world's top executives use chess tactics to thrive in the face of incalculable complexities and unexpected change.

Dan Foxx has spent more than 50,000 hours face-to-face with over 4,500 top execs from America’s finest companies, from high-flying high techs to promising start-ups. With pressure from boards of directors and investors to deliver dollars and high-ticket IPOs and with expectations from direct reports to make the savvy decisions, these CEOs bare all behind closed doors when their leadership chops are on the line.

ABC Hurricane Shutters, a Florida-based company, was on the verge of Chapter 11 bankruptcy, having recorded losses in each of the preceding three years. In From Red to Black: A Business Turnaround, Robert S. Curry shares his thought process, action steps, and profit improvement recommendations throughout his turnaround engagement at the shutter company. After Bob’s first meeting with the owner, he developed a detailed plan for recovery and was engaged the next day. Within four months, the company had made a complete turnaround with nearly every “must-do” completed.

Companies stumble when they imagine that innovation is mostly about ideas. The reality is that ideas are only beginnings. Indeed, even a company with the world’s best idea still faces a devilish challenge: it must build the business of tomorrow without endangering the business of today. Beyond the Idea is an essential book for any business that recognizes that innovation always has been, and always will be, the key to long term growth and vitality.

The inability to set good strategy can sink a company - and a leader's career. A recent Wall Street Journal study revealed that the number one most sought after executive skill by organizations is strategic thinking, but few leaders have that skill set.

In Bet on You, Angie Morgan and Courtney Lynch reveal hard-earned, real-world insights that will help you realize your potential by enacting risk in ways most meaningful to you. The author’s risk-taking guidance has been embraced by the world’s best businesses: Google, Boston Scientific, FedEx, and Oracle. Their insights are the secret sauce behind any transformative journey to a success-filled life.

The Leader Lab is a high-speed leadership intensive, equipping managers with the Swiss Army Knife of skills that help you handle the toughest situations that come your way.

Who are the greatest innovators in the world? You're probably thinking Steve Jobs, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford - the usual suspects.

This book isn't about them. It's about people who are just as innovative, entrepreneurial, and visionary as the Jobses, Edisons, and Fords of the world, except they're not in Silicon Valley. They're in the street markets of Sao Paulo and Guangzhou, and the rubbish dumps of Lagos. They are pirates, slum dwellers, computer hackers, dissidents, and inner city gang members.

They're loyal, loving, and big-hearted - dogs are our best friends for a good reason. Yet they have much more to offer than just love and friendship. Let CEO Scott MacDonald and rescue dog Sadie show you how to have a more rewarding life and a more successful career in Think Like a Dog.

Learn how to take the bold yet intelligent risks that will help you thrive in business - and in life. How can you challenge and change yourself when you need it most? We're creatures of habit, programmed by evolution to favor the safe and familiar, especially when the stakes are high. This bias no longer serves us in a world of constant change. Through stories of trailblazers in business, health, education and activism, Jonah Sachs reveals a path to higher performance and creativity for anyone ready to step out of their comfort zone.

Data. It's the benchmark that informs corporate projections, decision-making, and analysis. But, why do many organizations that see themselves as data-driven fail to thrive? In Leading with AI and Analytics, two renowned experts from the Kellogg School of Management show business leaders how to transform their organization to become evidence-driven, which leads to real, measurable changes that can help propel their companies to the top of their industries.

Today, the economic environment is global, highly sophisticated, and in continuous flux. Thus, the challenge for business leaders is to stay ahead of market flow and change, in order to gain competitive advantage. Creating Competitive Advantage explores why this pioneering can be the safest and best course for organizations to get ahead and guides leaders on how to forecast trends without increasing risk. It introduces the new concepts of market flow visualization and the line of probability, pioneering the safe course, and analytically supported intuition.

For years, I have been doing turnarounds of distressed companies to make the businesses profitable. I believe that the main reason companies are distressed is that the business owners do not know how to hire and manage a strong management team. Many business owners do not realize how important it is to have and maintain a qualified team of managers to oversee their employees. Most entrepreneurs believe they are doing a decent job of building a quality management team to lead their companies.

How much information is too much? Do we need to know how many calories are in the giant vat of popcorn that we bought at the movie theater? Do we want to know if we are genetically predisposed to a certain disease? Can we do anything useful with next week's weather forecast for Paris if we are not in Paris? In Too Much Information, Cass Sunstein examines the effects of information on our lives. Policymakers emphasize "the right to know", but Sunstein takes a different perspective, arguing that the focus should be on human well-being and what information contributes to it.

Green to Gold is an essential guide for forward-thinking business leaders who see the Green Wave coming and want to profit from it. This audio explores what every executive must know to manage the environmental challenges facing society and business. Based on the authors' years of experience and hundreds of interviews with corporate leaders around the world, Green to Gold, shows how companies generate lasting value.

When a manager is pressed to find a project manager for an important client, he looks to Rhett Sero, our to-be hero. He introduces Rhett to Heda Heldenmacher, a noted project management consultant. Designed to increase success, this book is for accidental and new project managers, beginning project management learners, and those exploring project management careers or looking for a refresher. Told in the form of a business fable, concepts are put in everyday terms and stories make it more memorable.

Few businesses can afford to shut down for an extended period of time, regardless of the cause. If the past few years have taught us anything, it's that disaster can strike in any shape, at any time. Be prepared with the time-tested strategies in Business Continuity Management: Building an Effective Incident Management Plan and protect your employees while ensuring your company survives the unimaginable.

The Innovative Team is an engaging business fable that reveals the impact our underlying work style preferences have on our teams and their results. The authors present a breakthrough thinking process for developing successful teams. They introduce a uniquely effective set of tools built on FourSight, a measure of problem-solving preferences field-tested by top consultants, which can help anyone from professionals to novices solve problems and achieve performance breakthroughs.

Nem todas as coisas difíceis na vida podem ser facilitadas. Mas é possível tornar mais fácil aquilo que é mais importante. Em Sem esforço, Greg McKeown oferece conselhos práticos para você realizar suas atividades essenciais com mais facilidade e, assim, atingir seus objetivos. Se você trabalha muito mas continua distante de suas metas, quer contribuir mais mas lhe falta energia, vai encontrar neste livro ótimas estratégias para lidar com seus projetos e desafios.

In The High-Velocity Edge, the reissued edition of five-time Shingo Prize winner Steven J. Spear's critically acclaimed book Chasing the Rabbit, Spear describes what sets market-dominating companies apart and provides a detailed framework you can leverage to surge to the lead in your own industry. Spear examines the internal operations of dominant organizations across a wide spectrum of industries, from technology to design and from manufacturing to health care.