More companies & individuals fail because they are unwilling to recognize or deal with information readily at hand, than fail because of the economy, the marketplace, or lack of luck. Shakespeare said it all in Much Ado About Nothing. We make it too tough. Success is a product of correct responses to the information & circumstances that are placed before us. MANAGING THE OBVIOUS is straightforward & delivered in a style that encourages the reader to make simple changes in their life & mindset which will increase their success. Coonradt brings 20 years of experience in assisting people & the organizations they make up, achieve measureable results. The principles have been used by Pepsi Cola, Quaker Oats Company, Fleming Foods, American Stores, First Interstate Bank, Browning-Ferris Industries, United Artists Cable Systems, Wendy's, McDonalds, & others around the globe. MANAGING THE OBVIOUS follows in the path of the consistently high selling text THE GAME OF WORK. The tradition continues of making good companies great, & great companies extraordinary.
The Killer Questions Your Company Should Be Asking Generating and executing great ideas is the key to staying ahead in a rapidly changing world. It seems so basic. Why is it so hard to actually get right? According to innovation expert Phil McKinney, the real problem is that we're teaching people to ask the wrong questions about their businesses--or none at all. There has to be a better way. In Beyond the Obvious, McKinney will help you use his proven FIRE (Focus, Ideation, Rank, Execution) Method to dig deeper and get back to asking the right questions--the ones all companies must ask to survive. Full of real-world examples, this book will change the way you operate, innovate, and create, and it all begins with battle-tested questions Phil has gathered on note cards throughout his career. Shared for the first time here, these "Killer Questions" include: What are the rules and assumptions my industry operates under? What if the opposite were true? What will be the buying criteria used by my customer in 5 years? What are my unshakable beliefs about what my customers want? Who uses my product in ways I never anticipated? These questions will reframe the way you see your products, your customers, and the way the two interact. Whether you're a company of thousands or a lean startup, Beyond the Obvious will give you the skills and easy-to-follow plan you need to make both the revolutionary changes and nuanced tweaks required for success. Praise for Beyond the Obvious "Human beings are creatures of habit, so getting ourselves and our teams to think beyond the obvious is a challenge we face all the time. Phil McKinney is an innovation expert, and his killer questions and hit-the-spot anecdotes provide a great way to get out in front of opportunities we otherwise won't see." -- Geoffrey Moore, author of Crossing the Chasm and Escape Velocity "I've always believed that asking the right questions is the essence of design. Phil McKinney proves that point with this wonderful set of killer questions that will jumpstart-or greatly enhance- your innovation efforts." -- B. Joseph Pine II, co-author, The Experience Economy & Infinite Possibility. "Product Innovation is a prerequisite to building great brands. Phil's questions are a prerequisite to building innovative products." -- Satjiv S. Chahil, former global marketing chief, Apple"
From international bestselling author and leadership expert Robert Cottrell comes the ultimate insiders guide for anyone who wants to break through and control their professional destiny.
"This book does for retailing what Goldratt's international bestseller The Goal did for manufacturing. A breakthrough solution is exposed when some unexpected events force Caroline and Paul, a married couple working for their family's retail business, to make a few small changes in the way things are done. A solution that propels the family's regional chain of stores into a very profitable, rapidly growing, international enterprise. If there is a hint of Jonah, from The Goal, reappearing in this novel, it is Henry, the soon-to-retire president and majority owner of the company who logically states that, "if you do not deal directly with the core problem, don't expect significant improvement." Eli Goldratt's Theory of Constraints is woven throughout this book but answers are not handed to you. The reader and the characters in the book work through the process together to discover solutions. Dr Goldratt deals with core problems inherent in the retail industry: the inability to forecast future demand accurately enough; a very long supply time (often much longer than anyone thinks it is); retailers purchasing too few of some items and too many of others; the way today's approach to logistics is forcing the inventory that is in the supply chain to be unavailable where and when it is needed. The elegant but simple solutions give the reader that sensation that followers love about Goldratt: "Ah-ha! Now I get it!" And that's when Goldratt says: "Isn't It Obvious?""--
Designing the Obvious belongs in the toolbox of every person charged with the design and development of Web-based software, from the CEO to the programming team. Designing the Obvious explores the character traits of great Web applications and uses them as guiding principles of application design so the end result of every project instills customer satisfaction and loyalty. These principles include building only whats necessary, getting users up to speed quickly, preventing and handling errors, and designing for the activity. Designing the Obvious does not offer a one-size-fits-all development process--in fact, it lets you use whatever process you like. Instead, it offers practical advice about how to achieve the qualities of great Web-based applications and consistently and successfully reproduce them. This latest edition updates examples to show the guiding principles of application design in action on today's web, plus adds new chapters on strategy and persuasion. It offers practical advice about how to achieve the qualities of great Web-based applications and consistently and successfully reproduce them.
Why is the Mona Lisa the most famous painting in the world? Why did Facebook succeed when other social networking sites failed? Did the surge in Iraq really lead to less violence? And does higher pay incentivize people to work harder? If you think the answers to these questions are a matter of common sense, think again. As sociologist and network science pioneer Duncan Watts explains in this provocative book, the explanations that we give for the outcomes that we observe in life-explanations that seem obvious once we know the answer-are less useful than they seem. Watts shows how commonsense reasoning and history conspire to mislead us into thinking that we understand more about the world of human behavior than we do; and in turn, why attempts to predict, manage, or manipulate social and economic systems so often go awry. Only by understanding how and when common sense fails can we improve how we plan for the future, as well as understand the present-an argument that has important implications in politics, business, marketing, and even everyday life.
The Latest Edition Of The #1 Bestselling Trend Series Shared Online More Than 1 Million Times! The Non-Obvious series of books is an annual trend report on the top 15 trends likely to affect business and consumer behaviour in the upcoming year. The book has been a Wall Street Journal bestseller, the research has been viewed and shared online more by more than a million readers and the report has been a multi-year #1 best seller online.
In the twelfth Longmire novel, Walt, Henry, and Vic discover much more than they bargained for when they are called in to investigate a hit-and-run accident involving a young motorcyclist near Devils Tower—from the New York Times bestselling author of Land of Wolves In the midst of the largest motorcycle rally in the world, a young biker is run off the road and ends up in critical condition. When Sheriff Walt Longmire and his good friend Henry Standing Bear are called to Hulett, Wyoming—the nearest town to America's first national monument, Devils Tower—to investigate, things start getting complicated. As competing biker gangs; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms; a military-grade vehicle donated to the tiny local police force by a wealthy entrepreneur; and Lola, the real-life femme fatale and namesake for Henry's '59 Thunderbird (and, by extension, Walt's granddaughter) come into play, it rapidly becomes clear that there is more to get to the bottom of at this year's Sturgis Motorcycle Rally than a bike accident. After all, in the words of Arthur Conan Doyle, whose Adventures of Sherlock Holmes the Bear won't stop quoting, "There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact."
If two people always agree, one of them is unnecessary, Henry Ford once said. He was on to something: The best businesspeople suggest alternatives to ideas and strategies. When practiced effectively, this can lead to innovations that dramatically boost sales. Edward F. Schultz, a leading consultant to businesses both big and small, explains why conventional or group thinking results in conventional results--something no business owner wants. The key to lasting success is engaging in differential thinking, which will allow you to. retain top-quality employees; help customers achieve their goals; provide employees with the support they need to succeed; reduce inefficiencies and ineffectiveness; and achieve small, incremental goals on the way to your ultimate target. Each chapter includes separate insights designed to address a different element of leadership, weaving together theory and practical application. Filled with real-life scenarios on coaching employees and managers, this guidebook for owners, leaders and entrepreneurs will get you the bottom-line results you crave. But youll only get them when you Look Beyond the Obvious.
