Today is my last day at 800-CEO-READ.
The last six years have been incredible and I want to thank all of you for coming along on the ride.
I have decided to continue on the course of writing and speaking, following the wonderful experience we had with The 100 Best Business Books of All Time.
I hope you’ll follow along with the next part of my journey at toddsattersten.com.
Thanks again for everything,
Todd
Last night, it was announced at the Goldman Sachs Business Book Award ceremony in London that Liaquat Ahamed’s Lords of Finance won business book of the year. Lloyd Blankfein said of the book, “Lords of Finance is a timely reminder that turmoil and instability in financial markets are not an invention of the 21st Century.” A refreshing statement as the economy makes a slow turnaround from the past year.
The book details the economic collapse of the 1920s, through the stories of four men whose positions in the financial industry shaped the future. More attention to books such as Ahamed’s can help how we think about the economy, and if we’re in any position to effect it, make the right decisions.
It must be the season of the lists, yeah, because Publishers Weekly has announced their top 10 books of 2009. One business title made their list—Matthew B. Crawford’s Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work, released by penguin Press.
The others are:
The Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award will be announced today at a gala dinner in London. The shortlist, announced in September, is:
You can find the longlist here if you’re interested. We’ll let you know the winner when it’s been announced.
My personal favorite list so far this year, though, is AbeBooks Top 10 Ghostwritten Books. It has some gems, such as Tennis As I Play It, ghosted by Sinclair Lewis, and the bizarre story of Hedy Lamarr suing her own publisher for the inaccuracies in her own “autobiography,” Ecstasy and Me: My Life as a Woman, ghostwritten by pulp novelist Leo Guild.
As many of you know, the Senate is holding climate change hearings this week. In conjunction with that, we have an article from the authors of Who Turned Out the Lights?: Your Guided Tour to the Energy Crisis.
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By Scott Bittle & Jean Johnson
As the Senate environment committee starts to hold hearings on the climate change bill, we think there’s one critical question for the senators: Who are you talking to?
That’s not an obvious question, or an (entirely) sardonic one. Legislation is almost always shaped more by leaders and lobbyists rather than the public at large, and given the complexity of the climate bill that’s even more true here.
But you can’t solve the climate change problem if the public isn’t ready to accept some level of change. In the end, this is an argument about how we get the energy to fuel the life Americans want to live. You can’t change the energy picture without getting the public to reconsider where our energy comes from and what practical alternatives there are for developing a more climate-friendly mix. If too many Americans believe there’s an easy, cost-free answer out there, or conversely, if too many believe that we can’t tackle our climate problems without destroying the American way of life, we’re not going to get very far.
Right now, too many Americans are heading into this fight unarmed. Four in ten Americans can’t name a fossil fuel, according to Public Agenda’s Energy Learning Curve survey. Even more can’t name a renewable energy source. It’s a fair assumption that most people aren’t going to understand the ins and outs of the climate bill.
What’s worse is that most don’t understand the fundamental challenge here: that the world needs to change the kind of energy we use, even as we need more and more of it. World energy demand is projected to rise 50 percent over the next 20 years, mostly because hundreds of millions of people in China, India and the developing world will be buying cars and living better lives. Production of fossil fuels, particularly oil, is going to have trouble keeping up with that demand anyway. And even if we could meet that demand with fossil fuels, we’d end up with irreversible climate change.
But there is a coalition to be built here, if you talk to the right people in the right way.
When our organization, Public Agenda, conducted its Energy Learning Curve survey of Americans, we found they fell naturally into four broad categories: the Anxious (40 percent), the Greens (24 percent), the Disengaged (19 percent) and the Climate Change Doubters (17 percent).
The Greens, as you can imagine, are probably at a 350.org rally right now, the Doubters are still chanting “drill baby drill,” and the Disengaged are watching the playoffs instead. The most interesting group—and the most significant—are the Anxious. They don’t know much about energy issues, but they know enough to be worried. Almost all of this group worries “a lot” about the cost of energy (91 percent); They report higher levels of worry than the other groups on scarcity and on increased worldwide demand for oil. Global warming is a lesser concern, but even here 69 percent say it’s real and 54 percent say they worry “a lot” about it.
Most importantly, the Anxious are the largest single group, at 40 percent. They’re the “swing voters” of this issue, and you can’t build a majority without them.
A lot of environmentalists seem convinced that the key to success is making everyone else as concerned about climate change as they are. That’s no help in persuading the Anxious; they’re already worried about it and convinced it’s real. Making sure there’s enough energy to go around, and at a price that people can afford, are even more important to this group.
So what’s the takeaway here? There are two key points:
Back to basics: We’ve been doing a lot of work to educate the public on energy (in fact, we’ve just written a book on the subject). And one thing we’ve learned is you can’t assume people know the fundamentals. And we’re not talking about the science of global warming here. We’re talking about the fact that there’s a relatively short list of options that can provide the energy we need in the volume we need. Right now, 80 percent of our energy comes from fossil fuels like coal, oil, and natural gas and only 2 percent from wind and solar combined. Given that, we have some practical choices to make here, and in our experience, people are pretty good at making them, if you lay them out and are honest about the pros and cons. Plus, a little information up front can head off a lot of misinformation later on, as the health care reform advocates found out to their dismay.
Speak to people’s real concerns. People can approach a problem from entirely different perspectives and still end up at the same place. The Anxious are actually strongly supportive of alternative energy, ranging from ethanol to solar, and they strongly favor conservation over exploration. So do the Greens. But the rationales are different—Greens favor alternative energy because it’s clean; the Anxious favor it because they want to stretch the supply.
The groups who will play a major role at the Senate hearings—cabinet officers, environmentalists, businesses—are all critical. But the public matters, too. If we let the concerns of lobbyists and policy experts drive this debate, we’ll never build the coalition needed to move forward.
Then, if the lights go out, we’ll have no one to blame but ourselves.
©2009 Scott Bittle & Jean Johnson, authors of Who Turned Out the Lights: Your Guided Tour to the Energy Crisis
Author Bios
Scott Bittle, co-author of Who Turned Out the Lights: Your Guided Tour to the Energy Crisis, is executive editor of PublicAgenda.org, where he has prepared citizen guides on more than twenty major issues including the federal budget deficit, Social Security, and the economy. He is also the website director for Planet Forward, an innovative PBS program designed to bring citizen voices to the energy debate.
Jean Johnson, co-author of Who Turned Out the Lights: Your Guided Tour to the Energy Crisis, is co-founder of PublicAgenda.org, and has written articles and op-eds for USA Today, Education Week, School Board News, Educational Leadership, and the Huffington Post Website.
For additional energy resources and supplemental material, please visit www.whoturnedoutthelights.org
-From Chapter Six of The Upside of the Downturn: Ten Management Strategies to Prevail in the Recession and Thrive in the Aftermath by Geoff Colvin.
Gary Hamel, author of The 100 Best Select Competing For The Future, has a blog on the Wall Street Journal site called Management 2.0.
In his latest entry, Hamel writes about the small fraction of people who actually read books, producing back of the napkin calculations to support the infinitesimal percentages. He concludes writing another business book is not in his future.
BUT, if he did, he says it would be about adaptability, going as far as creating a table of contents for this forever-to-go unwritten tome.
The first three chapters are:
-CHAPTER 1: Anticipation.
It’s hard to out-run the future if you don’t see it coming.
-CHAPTER 2: Intellectual Flexibility.
To change an organization you must first change minds.
-CHAPTER 3: Strategic Variety
To give up the bird in the hand you must first see a flock in the bush.
Hamel says in the final three chapters will be in his next post and ends with the question:
What’s the one thing your company could do to lessen the gravitational pull of the past?
Great question for the disruptive times in which we live.
The incomparable Seth Godin has a way of instantly finding clarity on issues that others wrestle with endlessly. This morning he pondered trends in the book industry:
Here are two interesting lessons from the book industry:
- Kindle readers buy two or three times as many books as book readers. Why? I don’t think it’s necessarily because using a Kindle leads someone to read more books. I think it’s because the kind of person who buys a lot of books is the most likely person to pony up and buy a Kindle. I know that sounds obvious, but once you see it this way, you understand why book publishers should be killing themselves to appeal to this group. After all, the group voted with their dollars to show that they’re better.
- Walmart and other mass marketers are now offering top bestsellers for $9 or less each, about $5 less than their cost. Why? Why not offer toasters or socks as a loss leader to get people in the store? I think the answer is pretty clear: people who buy hardcover books buy other stuff too. A hardcover book is a luxury item, it’s new and it’s buzzable. This sort of person is exactly who you want in your store.
Head over to Seth’s post to read his brief, warm and incredibly sober assessment of what this means—for every industry, not only our own.
I Love You More Than My Dog: Five Decisions That Drive Extreme Customer Loyalty in Good Times and Bad by Jeanne Bliss, Portfolio, 224 Pages, $22.95, Hardcover, October 2009, ISBN 9781591842958
When Todd and I decided to write our book, I knew the title of the book would be critical. I was right, but the title I wanted for our book was totally wrong and I’m glad we didn’t use it. I discovered that it takes a special talent to get the essence of a book distilled into a few words to be broadcast across the front cover. Jeanne Bliss and the Portfolio Publishing people have totally nailed the title for her newest book. For any company striving to become beloved by customers, the goal should be to elicit just the sentiment expressed in this title.
Bliss knows her subject matter well. She has held customer-focused jobs with five Fortune 500 organizations. Backed by 25+ years of real-world experience, she shares five key decisions that will inspire your customers to become your cheerleaders. It is important, Bliss stresses, that a company never forget the human component in every business decision, because when a customer profits, the company profits.
Early in her career Bliss was employed at a very young Land’s End. The people who started Land’s End believed in their customer. Because of that belief, if a customer had any problem with a Land’s End product, it could be returned—no questions. Jeanne Bliss ran that department.
Instead of the usual forty page chapters delineating each of the five key decisions, I Love You More Than My Dog sums up its keep points in chapters around ten pages long, each loaded with stories, followed by a series of two-page sections with questions called “duets.” This is a highly functional way for Bliss to convey her concepts and these short, extremely focused sections are memorable and easily communicated to others within your organization.
Alex Bogusky and John Winsor have written an interesting book called Baked In: Creating Products and Businesses That Market Themselves. After checking out the book, I asked co-author John Winsor a few questions about some of their ideas. Here’s what followed:
What’s the best evidence that traditional advertising is no longer necessary for a new company?
Look at Zappos. Instead of focusing on traditional advertising to engage customers with Zappos Tony Hsieh focused on building an incredible internal culture, one build on redefining customer service. By doing anything for their customers, Zappos created wonderful stories that their customers could share. Social media only poured gas on the fire by making it easier for customers to share their passion with the world. Why buy ads when your customers are so happy they tell their own stories?
How can an entrepreneur “bake in” marketing to their business to make this not only possible, but with leverage to develop a long-term strategy?
Most entrepreneurs get it because they don’t have the money to spend on advertising. instead, they have to build products that market themselves. Tesla just opened a store here in Boulder. The town is buzzing. Tesla could have focused on making a cheap electric car that looked like other hybrids. Instead, they focused on an absolute, “the most expensive electric car in the world.” Who doesn’t want to check that out? No need to advertise. People are going to talk.
“Baking in” works great for businesses in a down economy, but as the economy improves, and consumers get used to products developed in this fashion, will the practice sustain?
While the economy has made companies focus on spending their money more wisely, other forces have fueled the need to bake marketing into products. Social media has spawned new levels of transperancy, whether companies like it or not. No matter what you’re doing people, can talk about it. So, if you’re marketing and product are telling different stories people not only will notice but will also call you out on it. Just look at GM. While their ads told one story, their products were telling another. And, for that matter, their executive’s actions were telling a third story.
Your book ties the relationship between product development and marketing pretty tightly. How can large organizations, which may have some disconnect between all the departments involved, create a better “oven” so to speak?
Breakdown the silos. I mean physically knock down the walls. Often times, in big companies, marketing sits in one building and product design sits in another. You have to get people to sit in the place, share the same information, work for the same goals.
Part of the book talks about doing things wrong. When is wrong, right?
When it’s perfectly wrong. The Flip Video Camera was perfectly wrong when it came out. it was cheap, simple to operate and wasn’t focused on picture quality. Instead, it was the perfect tool to make videos for YouTube. Remember, this was when other video camera manufacturers were focused on the high end consumer market. In another example, I’m surprised with myself how little I use my digital camera these days. I was always obsessed with getting a point and shoot digital camera with a large number of pixels. I was focused on the quality of the picture. Lately, I’ve been shooting most of my pictures with my iPhone 3GS. I would never buy a camera with 3 mega-pixels. And, using a phone to take pictures is perfectly wrong. Yet, my philosophy of what constitutes a good picture has changed from the quality of the picture to it’s sharability.
For more information on how to bake in marketing into your business, check out their book. It’s a small but densely packed read with some great stories and case studies to help you understand how to apply the theories to your own work.
The Match King: Ivar Kreuger, the Financial Genius Behind a Century of Wall Street Scandals by Frank Partnoy, PublicAffairs, 272 Pages, $26.95, Hardcover, April 2009, ISBN 9781586487430
When reading The Smartest Guys in the Room, the outstanding book by Bethany McLean that looks into the Enron debacle, you will learn about an accounting term called “mark to market.” Not being an accountant, my simplified understanding of the concept is that when you purchase a product for $100 and you believe you can sell the product for $200 in five years, you put the sale price on your books at the expected selling price instead of the actual purchase price. Enron didn’t create this approach to record keeping. In the roaring ‘20s, a gentleman named Ivar Kreuger used it, made tons of money, and ultimately bankrupted millions around the globe. The Match King is his story.
Kreuger became known as the “The Match King” because, in his native Sweden, he had cornered the market on matches—monopolies were allowed then. He moved and acquired companies that made the machines used in his factories; ultimately he got involved in the forestry industry. During the reconstruction after WWI, his company loaned the equal of billions of dollars to European countries.
Using esoteric financial instruments like debentures and more common instruments like shares—which were much easier to sell in the days before the federal regulations brought on by the crash—Kreuger was able to fund his global acquisitions. His numbers were sketchy, but the banks valued him as a client too much to look too closely at his books. Then, October 1929 happened, and his pipeline of cash started to dry up. He was able to last longer than most business people who were nothing but glorified “snake oil” salesmen, but in 1932 the banks started to want their money back. Kreuger returned to Europe to face his European bankers and committed suicide the night before the meeting.
In The Match King, Frank Partnoy brings this fascinating person and exciting (though terrifying) time to life. So brilliant is Partnoy’s portrayal that I wanted to keep reading the book even as I walked to my car from the office at night. A great story, told well—there is nothing better.
