Economics and Business

Here is a collection of ancient Chinese maxims on strategy, battlefield tactics, and deception—in the spirit of such classics as The Art of War and The Book of Five Rings—made fresh and relevant with contemporary examples and explanation.

The In An Instant series is a new brand of user-friendly, engaging, and practical reference guides on core business topics, which capitalises on the authors' extensive experience and knowledge, as well as interviews they have conducted with leading business experts.

Mentoring differs from instruction, teaching and coaching in that it emphasizes not talents and skills used in executing a project, but the qualities and values of life that are needed to sustain oneself in the creative endeavour. In LEADER MENTORING, Shenkman makes the case for leader mentoring. “No mentors, no leaders,” he says.

Meetings should drive results. Instead they drive most people crazy! MAKE MEETINGS MATTER will help you rethink the role of meetings in your organisation and enable you to: · Reinvent meetings to get more done, minimise time spent and maximise productivity. · Avoid unnecessary and useless meetings. · Keep participants engaged and energised. · Keep the agenda on track. · Leverage technology.

Want the world to know who you are, what your company offers or the urgency of your cause? With the popularity of the Internet, it's never been easier for an ordinary person to use publicity to spread the word.

Turning any small business into a success is tough. Doing so in a market crowded with national and global sized competitors seems challenging, to put it kindly. Yet the millions of small business owners continue to fight. Many thousands lose every year. Why? Because they fail to capitalise on the agility their small size affords them.

Do you work with other people? Fellow employees; your boss; customers; buyers; colleagues? Of course, we all work in organisations comprised of people. People with whom we must have strong, positive relationships in order to ensure our own success as well as the organisation's. Do we get any training or education on this key skill at our companies? Rarely.

To be successful in the 21st century global marketplace you need many things - determination, well-articulated goals and a bit of luck. But more than anything else, you need kindness. Kindness becomes the key business asset when you couple a caring attitude toward others with a focus on achieving your goals. Often people see business as a choice between being kind and being successful.

BUSINESS REPORTS FOR BUSY PEOPLE is a handy, quick-reference guide that describes how to write the most common types of business reports and provides a wide range of samples and templates that can be used to produce professional-looking, clear and concise reports. Business is about decisions.

The motivations customers act on are seldom logical, predictable or even conscious. Instead, their strongest responses stem from one source: emotion. It's a deceptively simple reality. But it permanently changes the way organisations must go about understanding their customers.

Climate change. Energy security. Water shortages. These perils affect our world and ??increasingly ??the ability of businesses to operate profitably. In the face of soaring energy prices and decreasing inventories of natural resources, larger businesses are taking steps to control their costs.

Traditional ways of motivating a sales force have included money, incentives, contests and even turnover (regardless of performance). While it's true being a sales professional is not for everyone, there is a way to identify, build and retain a top-notch motivated sales force. The trick is to build and keep a sales team that delivers sustainable results.

THE WILD IDEA CLUB will help you get there, by providing managers with an easy, step-by-step approach that harnesses the collective genius of their people to drive innovation, improve efficiency and increase morale.