December « 2006 « 800 CEO Read

December 29, 2006

Time Magazine's Person of the Year

Filed under: Uncategorized — 800-CEO-READ @ 9:28 am

If you’ve been near a waiting room coffee table at all recently, you probably saw the cover of Time magazine. It announced its person of the year.

And the winner is…

You.

“And for seizing the reins of the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game, TIME’s Person of the Year for 2006 is you.”

It has been really interesting, just coming on board at 800-CEO-READ, to see how much print is being devoted to this phenomenon of social media. I’m thinking specifically about Citizen Marketers and Wikinomics.

It has also been interesting to read some of the criticisms of our online communities.

“What’s to stop an online mass of anonymous but connected people from suddenly turning into a mean mob, just like masses of people have time and time again in the history of every human culture?”

I’m not sure that these communities are as dangerous as Lanier suggests, but does he have a point about creativity being replaced with groupthink?

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December 28, 2006

ZDNet's Best in Business and Technology 2006

Filed under: Lists — Todd Sattersten @ 11:03 am

Mitch Ratcliffe of ZDNet has complied his list of favorite business and technology books in 2006. He says:

This year’s crop of business books, as usual, included a lot of me-too titles that were easily put down and forgotten after a few pages or chapters, because they contained little new, nothing thought-provoking. Downright crazy ideas are better than none, and challenges to the status quo invaluable, so don’t shy away from shaking your colleagues’ mental trees with a good book.

Here are the books that worked for Mitch:

Naked Conversations by Robert Scoble and Shel Israel
WorldChanging edited by Alex Steffen
The Elements of Influence by Alan Kelly
The Long Tail by Chris Anderson
Small Is The New Big by Seth Godin
The Ghost Map by Steven Johnson
The Singularity Is Near by Ray Kurweil
Beautiful Evidence by Edward Tutfe
Against The Day by Thomas Pynchon
The Immortal Game by David Shenk

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Design Challenges

Filed under: Design — 800-CEO-READ @ 11:00 am

A friend at Rockport Books sent me a copy of Steven Heller and Mirko Ilic’s new book, The Anatomy of Design. It’s a sleek, colorful book with fold-outs that trace the evolution of design trends and influences.

Heller and Ilic are two of the preeminent designers out there today, directing and designing art for such publications as The New York Times and Time magazine. This book is really neat because it shows how there’s a pathology to design. Art builds on inspiration, from the most obscure to the most obvious objects in the world. It also deviates from existing design, as The Anatomy of Design shows.

Todd and I have been discussing the lack of design resources for the average businessperson. How do we identify good design? How do we know if our graphics are accomplishing what we want them to accomplish? I have some background in document design, but still it’s often difficult to accomplish even the simplest projects without some advice from a professional graphic designer.

We’re wondering, what are the design issues you face? How have you met design needs within your organization? What design resources would be useful to you?

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December 27, 2006

A Perfect Mess

Filed under: Personal Development — Kate @ 1:10 pm

After any holiday, I always return to a slightly messy desk; one that is covered with books, letters and anything else left from the week before. Today was no different. In attempt to dig out of the post-holiday mess that is my desk, I found this a bit comforting:

Don’t let the neat freaks push you around. Chaos, clutter, disorganization, and on-the-fly decision-making actually are good for your company–and for you.
[More here.]

David Freedman and Eric Abrahmson (authors of the soon-to-be-released A Perfect Mess) would assure us that there actually is hope for those of us too busy for filing and perfect piles. [Sigh of relief for not making my bed this morning.]

A perfect mess in practice is that of the New England Mobile Book Fair (known to Bostonians as Strymish’s). It’s a bookshop that operates less than five miles from four other major booksellers. Still it manages to generate around $10 million in sales a year!

How did its founder Louis Strymish, a Harvard-trained chemist, make the store so successful? By dumping books onto shelves straight from their boxes and creating a hodgepodge of new and bargained books along with leftovers. One would imagine that most bookstores buy based upon some science that involves bestseller lists and publisher suggestions. Strymishs does neither; decisions are based upon gut and instinct.

Yet, most people (including myself) would have never guessed to operate a business in a such a messy manner. Throughout time messiness has built a bad reputation. One that accounts for why 2/3 of the Americans surveyed by Eric and David said they feel guilty about how messy they are and believe they’d be more successful “if they were neater or more organized.” It’s also why 59% “think somewhat less” or “the worst” of messy people.

For Strymishs, being “messy” means:

Saving time not organizing (equates into more time, money saved and lower prices).
Creating an experience that’s unlike any other bookstore.
Enabling their visitors to run randomly into books that would otherwise remain undiscovered.

As with anything there are extremes to messiness and neatness. A certain amount of messiness can be good; it’s about finding that sweet spot that works for you. So go ahead, make a mess.

[p.s. check out the article for more on why having a messy desk can lead to inspired connections, Nobel Peace Prizes and more.]

[p.p.s. if you'd like the NYT review of the book, click here.]

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Economist Books of the Year 2006

Filed under: Lists — Todd Sattersten @ 8:03 am

Behind their firewall, The Economist has quite a list of books for 2006. The categories include history, biography, fiction, politics, fiction and science. In the Economics and Business category (notice the order):

The Wal-Mart Effect by Charles Fishman
Myself and Other More Important Matters by Charles Handy
Joe Wilson and the Creation of Xerox by Charles Ellis
Mavericks At Work by Bill Taylor and Polly LaBarre

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December 26, 2006

High Stakes

Filed under: Current Events,General Business,Global Business — 800-CEO-READ @ 2:53 pm

This story caught my attention today because this book just arrived on my desk this week:

Boeing Versus Airbus: The Inside Story of the Greatest International Competition in Business by John Newhouse (due out in mid-January, from Knopf)

After months of speculation, it looks like Boeing really is on track to outsell Airbus–for the first time in six years. Newhouse details the decades-long competition and raises questions about both companies’ priorities. It looks like a great read.

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December 22, 2006

800ceoread: Our Year In Review

Filed under: The Company — Todd Sattersten @ 10:44 pm

As the year closes, I wanted to share with you some of the milestones for 800ceoread. 2006 was a special year, one I believe we are going to look back upon as a turning point.

This year 800ceoread went from sell books to being in the business of moving ideas. We stepped away from the constraints of looking at ourselves based on our competitors. Since I joined the company, Jack and I have talked about 800ceoread being a unique company in the marketplace. This year we finally believed it.

You can see it in the products and services we launched this year. inBubbleWrap built a unique online community connecting readers with authors and publishers. ChangeThis regained its voice as a place for innovative thought. The live events in Milwaukee got the business community excited again about ideas. The perfect ending was the Author Pow-Wow we held in Chicago.

In 2007, expect more. More events in Milwaukee. More resources to help authors be more successful. More ways to access the recommendations we provide.

Here is the part where I need to thank everyone.

It starts with the folks that make up our little company — Meg, Roy, Dylan, Scott, Aaron, Kate, Ryan, Jake, Rebecca, Sally and Shane. You have all made our company the success it has been and the wonderful place it is to work.

Jack is what makes 800ceoread a magical place. I say magical because you sometimes don’t believe you could be working in such a great place or that such a place exists. I have been around. Few of these places exist. Thank you, Jack.

I want to thank Mary, Mel, and Shawn from Schwartz. Our growth and continuing diversification put stress on the whole system. Thank you for letting us do what we do (it seems to be working .

If you are an author, publisher, agent, or work in publishing in general, thanks for your support. Our company doesn’t exist without great product (ideas) to sell.

Finally, I want to thank our customers. You put trust in us to make your efforts successful. We take it seriously and I hope it reflects in the services we provide.

Have a Wonderful Holiday Season and a Happy Happy Happy New Year!

Todd

800ceoread

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The Best of Best of Business Books

Filed under: Lists — Todd Sattersten @ 4:03 pm

Using Squidoo’s new Plexo technology, I have created a list of favorite business books from many of the 2006 lists. You can vote on your favorites as well as add titles that you think are missing.

RSS Readers: Click-through to see and vote with the widget.

plex1851

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What To Read When Turning Around an Automaker

Filed under: History and Biographies — Todd Sattersten @ 1:12 pm

Wall Street Journal today has an extensive article on Alan Mulally and his attempt at revitalizing Ford. What do you read if you are rebuilding the number two automaker?

Shortly after his arrival, Mr. Mulally and his new troops bought books to better understand one another. The new CEO read the 1926 classic Today and Tomorrow by Henry Ford. He also met with the Ford family at the Henry Ford Museum complex early on. Ford managers began passing around The Machine That Changed the World, often cited by Mr. Mulally for its in-depth story of Toyota’s manufacturing operation.

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December 21, 2006

AdvertisingAge's "10 Books You Should Have Read"

Filed under: Uncategorized — 800-CEO-READ @ 2:35 pm

1. What Sticks: Why Most Advertising Fails and How to Guarantee Yours Succeeds
2. Branding Iron: Branding Lessons from the Meltdown of the U.S. Auto Industry
3. The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More
4. Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths, and Total Nonsense: Profiting from Evidence-Based Management
5. Waiting for Your Cat to Bark? Persuading Customers When They Ignore Marketing
6. Small is the New Big, and 183 Other Riffs, Rants and Remarkable Business Ideas
7. The Must-Have Customer: Seven Steps to Winning the Customer You Haven’t Got
8. An Army of Davids
9. Juicing the Orange: How to Turn Creativity into a Powerful Business Advantage
10. The Ultimate Question: Driving Good Profits and True Growth

And, just for fun, the 10 words or phrases that AdvertisingAge says are “so 2006″

1. Consumer-generated media
2. Touch point
3. Organic
4. Connective tissue
5. Web 2.0
6. The idea is king
7. Customer-centric
8. Open the kimono
9. Join the conversation
10. “My Avatar…”

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