Uncategorized Posts
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Blog / News & Opinion
Warren Bennis | 1925-2014
By Porchlight
Aaron updated us last Wednesday with some dispatches we've received from a new generation of Authors On the Road, Changing the World. It is great to hear from the folks we're working with, to watch them spreading their ideas and expertise, and see them slowly and deliberately effect real change as they do. But, we know they're standing on the shoulders of giants, and as this new generation of authors and educators strengthens and broadens the scope of the business book genre, we have been losing some of those giants—the first generation of business book writers, the ones that blazed the trail, that made the study of business, management, and leadership an educational pursuit rather than a purely profit-based one.
Categories: news-opinion
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Blog / News & Opinion
Friday Links
By Porchlight
➻ Let's start with a quote, brought to our attention by a Vox Communications post entitled Read this male CEO's feminist explanation of why he's quitting: Friends and colleagues often ask my wife how she balances her job and motherhood. Somehow, the same people don't ask me. The above pull-quote is from Max Schireson, CEO of database company MongoDB, extracted from a blog post he published revealing why he was stepping down from his CEO position.
Categories: news-opinion
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Blog / News & Opinion
The FT Press/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Longlist
By Porchlight
I speculated back in May when submissions opened for The Financial Times and McKinsey & Company 2014 Business Book of the Year Award that the books they looked at would be more focused on business nuts-and-bolts issues now that a consultancy firm (McKinsey) had taken over for an investment bank (Goldman Sachs) as the Financial Times' partner on the awards. I also thought they would not be announcing a longlist as they had in the past because it was not on their awards schedule. It seems I was wrong on both counts, because The Financial Times and McKinsey announced a longlist this morning, and the books on it are mostly big-picture books, not nut-and-bolts business and management books.
Categories: news-opinion, publishing-industry
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Blog / News & Opinion
Authors On the Road, Changing the World
By Porchlight
Here at 8cr, we are so fortunate to work, and form long-lasting relationships with, really great authors who are sharing important ideas with people around the world. We see them out on the road speaking to hundreds of groups a year, trying to make the world of business a better place. Spending time away from their friends and families, they work hard to make sure that the ideas that they’ve captured on paper are helping people become better leaders, communicators, listeners.
Categories: news-opinion, publishing-industry, the-company
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Blog / New Releases
Books to Watch: August 2014
By Porchlight
Well here we are again—Summer is drawing to a close and we've hardly put a dent in that towering stack of summer reads. Don't fret, though—we still have a few weeks to sneak in a couple more books. Here are some new titles for Summer's end that'll help you start your Fall off right, with plenty of great ideas and new perspectives.
Categories: new-releases
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Blog / News & Opinion
ChangeThis: Issue 119
By Porchlight
The Most Important Company In the World: Intel, Moore’s Law, and the Heartbeat of Civilization by Michael S. Malone “We now live differently, learn differently, communicate differently, an ultimately, think differently. … We have internalized Moore’s Law.
Categories: news-opinion
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Blog / ChangeThis
The Road (to Reinvention) Is Calling
By Josh Linkner
"Companies, communities, and individuals fall for many reasons, but one of the most common—and easily avoidable—is the failure to reinvent. Those who feel the most secure in the status quo are in fact the most vulnerable. Many organizations, once great, wither and die as a direct result of their deep entrenchment in the past. They discover too late that success isn't about cracking the code once and then enjoying the spoils forever. Instead, it's a moving target that we have to hit again and again. The disruption of ongoing innovation eventually topples any organization that fails to keep moving—to reinvent. The good news about reinvention is that you don't need magic, genius, good looks, or vaults of cash to transform your organization or career. Instead, the required elements are open-mindedness, courage, and imagination. Unleashing your imagination is no longer optional and, in fact, will become the lifeblood of your success. It's time to embrace your role as chief disruption officer, no matter where you sit on the organization chart.
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
The Digital Marketer's Manifesto
By Larry Weber
"To succeed in a customer-centric world, we must truly see our customers. Not stalk them, but understand them. As customer experience architects, we must collaborate to design and deliver products, services, environments, and personalized experiences that truly meet our customers' needs. As we do, we will transform a traditionally passive and transaction-oriented association into a productive, profitable, and mutually beneficial collaboration with our customers. To See ( s/ verb): to understand Now that we have entered what Forrester describes as the age of the consumer, those organizations that are able to really see their customers will be the ones that succeed. Indeed, the ability to see—to know where to look, to decode meaning from a glut of information and interactions, and reflect that understanding in our customer experience—is today's primary source of competitive advantage."
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
The Caring Mandate
By Porchlight
"It is very common to hear sales and marketing leaders talk about 'relationship.' All sales strategies and marketing campaigns work to build a relationship with a buyer. Trust is the basis of relationship! Therefore, it is the way to repeat sales and customer loyalty. However, I think that in order to meet the third level of motivation, we have to go toward something deeper and more at the core of relationship. I call it the Essence-to-Essence connection. Something in us connects with something outside of us, at a core level, and meaningful magic happens."
Categories: changethis
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Blog / ChangeThis
The Most Important Company In the World: Intel, Moore's Law, and the Heartbeat of Civilization
By Michael S. Malone
"The biggest invention of our digital age is one we rarely think of: ourselves. [...] Mankind lived for hundreds of thousands of years with almost no change; then, with the Industrial Revolution we learned to inhabit a world of continuous improvement. But now, we deal with lives that experience the equivalent of an Industrial Revolution every few years. We've survived it, we've adapted to it, and now we are learning to thrive in it. And, though we barely noticed the change, we now live differently, learn differently, communicate differently, an ultimately, think differently. ... In other words, we have internalized Moore's Law. Its beat is now our heartbeat; its pace of change is now the heartbeat of civilization."
Categories: changethis