The timeless business book that still brings perspective and guidance to today's bottom-line executives When first published in 1963, IBM CEO Thomas Watson Jr.'s A Business and Its Beliefs gave readers an unprecedented look inside IBM's executive offices. Watson--son of IBM's founder--candidly discussed how the company clung to its values during the first great technological shift, and how this refusal to compromise became IBM's strength. He also became one of the first CEOs to question business's place and responsibility in society, and openly discuss how firms could meet expanding social expectations while still turning a profit. The groundbreaking ideas in this book still resonate with today's managers. This newly published edition reintroduces Watson's ideas to a new generation of decision-makers in search of IBM-style standards for their own organizations. A to-the-point examination of the values and beliefs that built and sustained IBM, its message is as valuable today as it was four decades back--and will once again strike a resounding chord with executives everywhere. .†

The timeless business book that still brings perspective and guidance to today's bottom-line executives When first published in 1963, IBM CEO Thomas Watson Jr.'s A Business and Its Beliefs gave readers an unprecedented look inside IBM's executive offices. Watson--son of IBM's founder-- candidly discussed how the company clung to its values during the first great technological shift, and how this refusal to compromise became IBM's strength. He also became one of the first CEOs to question business's place and responsibility in society, and openly discuss how firms could meet expanding social expectations while still turning a profit. The groundbreaking ideas in this book still resonate with today's managers. This newly published edition reintroduces Watson's ideas to a new generation of decision-makers in search of IBM-style standards for their own organizations. A to-the-point examination of the values and beliefs that built and sustained IBM, its message is as valuable today as it was four decades back--and will once again strike a resounding chord with executives everywhere.

Ari’s new book is the culmination of a lifetime of learning and thirty four years in business, the last three of which have been spent intensively studying, reflecting on, and writing about the critical role of beliefs in the businesses and organizations of which we’re a part. The fruits of that labor are now available in this new 600-page book. We could tell you more about what's in the book but we think John U. Bacon, author of the New York Times' bestseller, Endzone: The Rise, Fall and Return of Michigan Football, said it better than we ever could! “Some business leaders know practice. Some know theory. Ari Weinzweig is one of the few who knows both. He has built a famously successful organization, while giving it more thought than do the business gurus who merely philosophize about such things. The insights Ari shares here are both deeply perceptive and highly practical, from the ideas of Howard Zinn, Viktor Frankl and Anais Nin on one page, to the importance of learning your employees’ names on the next. Like its author, this book is uncommonly smart, helpful, and just plain fun.”

For any CEO who wants to achieve and sustain superior shareholder value growth. All chief executives want to deliver superior returns for their shareholders, however only a few have been able to do so on a sustainable basis. Beliefs, Behaviors, and Results profiles how the best Fortune 200 CEOs have been able to outperform their peers and sustain superior shareholder returns by institutionalizing a set of beliefs and behaviors in their organizations. Through the words and case examples of these leading chief executives, the authors capture the five core principles that have transformed the performance of some of the world's best corporations. Readers will learn how the CEOs of these companies united their organizations around a common definition of winning, how they helped their managers capture a greater share of market profits, and how they established a culture where all managers think and act like entrepreneurial owners. Readers will learn how the best executives: * Look at markets differently to identify new profitable growth opportunities * Develop strategic innovations that are at least as valuable as new product innovations in driving shareholder value growth * Establish a reinvestment advantage that is difficult for competitors to match * Sustain superior performance over time In addition, the reader will learn the: * Common mistakes that prevent most management teams from maximizing profitable growth and shareholder value * Specific actions that all senior managers can take to materially change sustainable performance of their corporation

How investor expectations move markets and the economy The collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 caught markets and regulators by surprise. Although the government rushed to rescue other financial institutions from a similar fate after Lehman, it could not prevent the deepest recession in postwar history. A Crisis of Beliefs makes us rethink the financial crisis and the nature of economic risk. In this authoritative and comprehensive book, two of today’s most insightful economists reveal how our beliefs shape financial markets, lead to expansions of credit and leverage, and expose the economy to major risks. Nicola Gennaioli and Andrei Shleifer carefully walk readers through the unraveling of Lehman Brothers and the ensuing meltdown of the US financial system, and then present new evidence to illustrate the destabilizing role played by the beliefs of home buyers, investors, and regulators. Using the latest research in psychology and behavioral economics, they present a new theory of belief formation that explains why the financial crisis came as such a shock to so many people—and how financial and economic instability persist. A must-read for anyone seeking insights into financial markets, A Crisis of Beliefs shows how even the smartest market participants and regulators did not fully appreciate the extent of economic risk, and offers a new framework for understanding today’s unpredictable financial waters.

Beliefs are the lenses through which we view the world and the blueprints from which we construct our lives. At no time are family and individual beliefs more affirmed, challenged, or threatened than when illness emerges.But some beliefs are more useful than others. This is the first book to offer a specific clinical approach for examining family members' beliefs and intervening in that area. Drawing on disciplines ranging from religion to anthropology as well as on family therapy and psychology, the authors describe their own advanced practice model. Rich in clinical examples, the book takes readers inside the therapeutic conversation between the clinician and family members to show the model in action. By drawing forth more facilitative beliefs to cope with illness, the authors uncover and expand the therapeutic possibilities for helping and healing families.

The imagination is a terrible thing to waste, and Bill Zimmerman's Make Beliefs ensures that won't ever happen. With whimsical drawings by popular cartoonist Tom Bloom, this book encourages both young and old to give their imagination a fun workout, offering plenty of space to record responses to leading questions or make drawings right in the book.

The rules of business are changing dramatically. The Aspen Institute's Judy Samuelson describes the profound shifts in attitudes and mindsets that are redefining our notions of what constitutes business success. Dynamic forces are conspiring to clarify the new rules of real value creation—and to put the old rules to rest. Internet-powered transparency, more powerful worker voice, the decline in importance of capital, and the complexity of global supply chains in the face of planetary limits all define the new landscape. As executive director of the Aspen Institute Business and Society Program, Judy Samuelson has a unique vantage point from which to engage business decision makers and identify the forces that are moving the needle in both boardrooms and business classrooms. Samuelson lays out how hard-to-measure intangibles like reputation, trust, and loyalty are imposing new ways to assess risk and opportunity in investment and asset management. She argues that “maximizing shareholder value” has never been the sole objective of effective businesses while observing that shareholder theory and the practices that keep it in place continue to lose power in both business and the public square. In our globalized era, she demonstrates how expectations of corporations are set far beyond the company gates—and why employees are both the best allies of the business and the new accountability mechanism, more so than consumers or investors. Samuelson's new rules offer a powerful guide to how businesses are changing today—and what is needed to succeed in tomorrow's economic and social landscape.