Recommendations based on "Cues"

The Law of Market Failure: Most new products will fail in the market, even if competently executed.Using his experience at Google, his remarkable success as an entrepreneur and consultant, and insights from his lectures at Stanford University and Google, Alberto Savoia’s The Right It offers an unparalleled approach to beating the beast that is market failure.Millions of people around the world are working hard to bring to life new ideas. Some of these ideas will turn out to be stunning successes that will have a major impact on our world and our culture: The next Google, the next Polio vaccine, the next Harry Potter, the next Red Cross, the next Ford Mustang. Others will be smaller, more personal but no less meaningful, successes: A little restaurant that becomes a neighborhood favorite, a biography that does not make the best-seller list but tells an important story, a local nonprofit to care for abandoned pets. At this very same moment, another group of people is working equally hard to develop new ideas that, when launched, will fail. Some of them will fail spectacularly and publicly: like New Coke, the movie “John Carter”, or the Ford Edsel. Others will be smaller, more private, but no less painful failures: A home-based business that never takes off, a children’s book that neither publishers nor children have any interest in, a charity for a cause that too few people care enough about.If you are currently working to develop a new idea, whether on your own or as part of a team, which group are you in? Most people believe that they either are, or will be, in the first group—the group whose ideas will be successful. All they have to do is work hard and execute well. Unfortunately, we know that this cannot be the case. The law of market failure tells us that up to 90 percent of most new products, services, businesses, and initiatives will fail soon after they are launched—regardless of how promising they sound, how much we commit to them, or how well we execute them. This is a hard fact to accept. We believe that other people fail because they don’t know what they are doing. Somehow, we believe that this does not apply to us and to our idea—especially if we’ve experienced victories in the past.Filled with detailed case studies, a lesson on creating your own hard data, a strategy for market engagement, and an introduction to the concept of a pretotype (not a prototype), The Right It is a groundbreaking, entertaining, and highly practical book delivers a proven formula for turning ideas, products, services, and businesses into successful endeavors.As Alberto writes, “make sure you are building The Right It before you build It right”.

Economics is not a field that is known for good writing. Charts, yes. Sparkling prose, no.   Except, that is, when it comes to Deirdre Nansen McCloskey. Her conversational and witty yet always clear style is a hallmark of her classic works of economic history, enlivening the dismal science and engaging readers well beyond the discipline. And now she’s here to share the secrets of how it’s done.   Economical Writing is itself economical: a collection of thirty-five pithy rules for making your writing clear, concise, and effective. Proceeding from big-picture ideas to concrete strategies for improvement at the level of the paragraph, sentence, or word, McCloskey shows us that good writing, after all, is not just a matter of taste—it’s a product of adept intuition and a rigorous revision process. Debunking stale rules, warning us that “footnotes are nests for pedants,” and offering an arsenal of readily applicable tools and methods, she shows writers of all levels of experience how to rethink the way they approach their work, and gives them the knowledge to turn mediocre prose into magic.   At once efficient and digestible, hilarious and provocative, Economical Writing lives up to its promise. With McCloskey as our guide, it’s impossible not to see how any piece of writing—on economics or any other subject—can be a pleasure to read.

In a book that Business Insider noted as one of the "14 Books that inspired Elon Musk," J.E. Gordon strips engineering of its confusing technical terms, communicating its founding principles in accessible, witty prose.For anyone who has ever wondered why suspension bridges don't collapse under eight lanes of traffic, how dams hold back--or give way under--thousands of gallons of water, or what principles guide the design of a skyscraper, a bias-cut dress, or a kangaroo, this book will ease your anxiety and answer your questions.Structures: Or Why Things Don't Fall Down is an informal explanation of the basic forces that hold together the ordinary and essential things of this world--from buildings and bodies to flying aircraft and eggshells. In a style that combines wit, a masterful command of his subject, and an encyclopedic range of reference, Gordon includes such chapters as "How to Design a Worm" and "The Advantage of Being a Beam," offering humorous insights in human and natural creation.Architects and engineers will appreciate the clear and cogent explanations of the concepts of stress, shear, torsion, fracture, and compression. If you're building a house, a sailboat, or a catapult, here is a handy tool for understanding the mechanics of joinery, floors, ceilings, hulls, masts--or flying buttresses.Without jargon or oversimplification, Structures opens up the marvels of technology to anyone interested in the foundations of our everyday lives.

Even bad code can function. But if code isn’t clean, it can bring a development organization to its knees. Every year, countless hours and significant resources are lost because of poorly written code. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Noted software expert Robert C. Martin presents a revolutionary paradigm with Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship. Martin has teamed up with his colleagues from Object Mentor to distill their best agile practice of cleaning code “on the fly” into a book that will instill within you the values of a software craftsman and make you a better programmer–but only if you work at it. What kind of work will you be doing? You’ll be reading code–lots of code. And you will be challenged to think about what’s right about that code, and what’s wrong with it. More importantly, you will be challenged to reassess your professional values and your commitment to your craft. Clean Code is divided into three parts. The first describes the principles, patterns, and practices of writing clean code. The second part consists of several case studies of increasing complexity. Each case study is an exercise in cleaning up code–of transforming a code base that has some problems into one that is sound and efficient. The third part is the payoff: a single chapter containing a list of heuristics and “smells” gathered while creating the case studies. The result is a knowledge base that describes the way we think when we write, read, and clean code. Readers will come away from this book understanding How to tell the difference between good and bad code How to write good code and how to transform bad code into good code How to create good names, good functions, good objects, and good classes How to format code for maximum readability How to implement complete error handling without obscuring code logic How to unit test and practice test-driven development This book is a must for any developer, software engineer, project manager, team lead, or systems analyst with an interest in producing better code.

This book brings science to marketing with practical findings that have been replicated, explained and generalised into 'laws' we can rely on. Until every marketer applies these learnings, there will be a competitive advantage for those who doMelding logic and science with compelling insight, this books lays out important principles that every manager should know and applyEmploys an exciting evidence based approach to marketingProvides insight for all business professionals about how to market their brands effectivelyThe author is Director of The Ehrenberg-Bass Institute which has many international big brand corporate members including British Airways, Mars, Coca-Cola, Colgate-Palmolive, ESPN, Kraft, Unilever, Procter & Gamble

When it comes to making your business more profitable and successful, don't look to re-engineering for answers. A better way is to apply the concept of kaizen, which mean making simple, common-sense improvements and refinements to critical business processes.The result: greater productivity, quality, and profits achieved with minimal cost, time, and effort invested. In this book, you discover how to maximize the results of kaizen by applying it to gemba--business processes involved in the manufacture of products and the rendering of services--the areas of your business where, as the author puts it, the "real action" takes place.

Good Strategy/Bad Strategy clarifies the muddled thinking underlying too many strategies and provides a clear way to create and implement a powerful action-oriented strategy for the real world. Developing and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader. A good strategy is a specific and coherent response to—and approach for—overcoming the obstacles to progress. A good strategy works by harnessing and applying power where it will have the greatest effect. Yet, Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with “strategy.” In Good Strategy/Bad Strategy, he debunks these elements of “bad strategy” and awakens an understanding of the power of a “good strategy.” He introduces nine sources of power—ranging from using leverage to effectively focusing on growth—that are eye-opening yet pragmatic tools that can easily be put to work on Monday morning, and uses fascinating examples from business, nonprofit, and military affairs to bring its original and pragmatic ideas to life. The detailed examples range from Apple to General Motors, from the two Iraq wars to Afghanistan, from a small local market to Wal-Mart, from Nvidia to Silicon Graphics, from the Getty Trust to the Los Angeles Unified School District, from Cisco Systems to Paccar, and from Global Crossing to the 2007–08 financial crisis.Reflecting an astonishing grasp and integration of economics, finance, technology, history, and the brilliance and foibles of the human character, Good Strategy/Bad Strategy stems from Rumelt’s decades of digging beyond the superficial to address hard questions with honesty and integrity.

Put into practice today's winning strategy for achieving success in high-end sales! The SPIN Selling Fieldbook is your guide to the method that has revolutionized big-ticket sales in the United States and globally. It's the method being used by one-half of all Fortune 500 companies to train their sales forces, and here's the interactive, hands-on field book that provides the practical tools you need to put this revolutionary method into action­­immediately. The SPIN Selling Fieldbook includes: Individual diagnostic exercises Illustrative case studies from leading companies Practical planning suggestions Provocative questionnaires Practice sessions to prepare you for dealing with challenging selling situations Written by the pioneering author of the original bestseller, SPIN Selling, this book is aimed at making implementation easy for companies that have not yet established SPIN techniques. It will also enable companies that are already using the method to reinforce SPIN methods in the field and in coaching sessions.

Building upon the success of best-sellers The Clean Coder and Clean Code, legendary software craftsman Robert C. "Uncle Bob" Martin shows how to bring greater professionalism and discipline to application architecture and design.   As with his other books, Martin's Clean Architecture doesn't merely present multiple choices and options, and say "use your best judgment": it tells you what choices to make, and why those choices are critical to your success. Martin offers direct, no-nonsense answers to key architecture and design questions like: What are the best high level structures for different kinds of applications, including web, database, thick-client, console, and embedded apps? What are the core principles of software architecture? What is the role of the architect, and what is he/she really trying to achieve? What are the core principles of software design? How do designs and architectures go wrong, and what can you do about it? What are the disciplines and practices of professional architects and designers? Clean Architecture is essential reading for every software architect, systems analyst, system designer, and software manager -- and for any programmer who aspires to these roles or is impacted by their work.

A captivating blend of cutting-edge scientific evidence and real-world stories providing leaders and managers with proven and practical strategies and tools for navigating today's emotionally taxing workplace.Broad changes have dramatically disrupted our workplaces and increased the emotional demands on leaders everywhere. Leaders now must support their teams' mental health and burnout (while managing their own), build trust with and motivate a remote and diverse workforce, allay employee fears of obsolescence while driving the integration of new technologies like AI, and demonstrate bottomless sensitivity and compassion while still delivering results at a relentless pace. No wonder leaders are burning out. Emotional labor is a daily unrecognized burden leaders carry and can have significant costs for their health and performance over time.However, achieving high performance and fulfillment without compromising your well-being is possible, and Emotionally Charged shows you how. Dina Denham Smith and Alicia A. Grandey debunk myths and equip you to handle emotionally loaded work events, from preparing for high-stakes scenarios to managing curveballs and conflicts, supporting distressed employees, and recovering effectively after being drained at work.Blending real-world cases from leaders and evidence-based insights, Emotionally Charged will help all leaders--from front-line managers to C-Suite execs--manage the new work landscape. Anchored in the science of emotions, Emotionally Charged will equip you with practical strategies and tools to lead successfully and thrive in the new age of work.