We already know what works in schools; we just need to focus on getting it right. This is the premise of Simply Better: Doing What Matters Most to Change the Odds for Student Success, which offers a practical, research-based framework for improving student achievement. According to author Bryan Goodwin, decades of research have shown time and again that focusing on the following five essential practices can vastly increase students' chances of doing well in school: * Guaranteeing that instruction is challenging, engaging, and intentional * Ensuring curricular pathways to success * Providing whole-child student supports * Creating high-performance school cultures * Developing data-driven, high-reliability district systems Whether at the district-, school-, or classroom-level, educators don't need to reinvent the wheel or pursue the latest trends to ensure that students succeed. This powerful book reveals what research clearly shows works best in schools, and provides a valuable blueprint for turning that knowledge into visible results.

In this radically conservative book, the authors advocate a back-to-basics approach to marketing that replaces the relentless quest for differentiation with a relentless focus on these types of basic customer needs The authors’ research shows that most companies have been ignoring the basics for too long. At the heart of the authors’ approach is a view of why customers buy what they do. Barwise and Meehan argue that marketers must understand what customers want from the entire product or service category. So rather than focus on new luxury attributes for a specific car —marketers need to understand what basic needs customers have for automobiles in general (ie: safety, handling, etc). Once they figure that out—they need to deliver on those basic needs better than everyone else.

We already know what works in schools; we just need to focus on getting it right. This is the premise of Simply Better: Doing What Matters Most to Change the Odds for Student Success, which offers a practical, research-based framework for improving student achievement. According to author Bryan Goodwin, decades of research have shown time and again that focusing on the following five essential practices can vastly increase students' chances of doing well in school: * Guaranteeing that instruction is challenging, engaging, and intentional * Ensuring curricular pathways to success * Providing whole-child student supports * Creating high-performance school cultures * Developing data-driven, high-reliability district systems Whether at the district-, school-, or classroom-level, educators don't need to reinvent the wheel or pursue the latest trends to ensure that students succeed. This powerful book reveals what research clearly shows works best in schools, and provides a valuable blueprint for turning that knowledge into visible results.

Most executives believe that winning and keeping customers requires offering something unique. But as physical products are seen as increasingly hard to differentiate, companies resort to branding, gimmicks, and “thinking outside the box.” Meanwhile, customers are less satisfied than they were a decade ago. Patrick Barwise and Seán Meehan argue that most companies have taken differentiation so far that they’ve left their customers behind. Customers don’t want bells and whistles and don’t care about trivial differences between brands. What they really want are quality products, reliable services, and fair value for money. Yet most companies consistently fail to meet these basic customer needs. Simply Better is a no-nonsense, back-to-basics manifesto for today’s businesses. Barwise and Meehan argue that successful differentiation lies not in unique selling propositions, but in generic category benefits, such as good service, on-time delivery, and quality products, that any company can provide. The key is to deliver these consistently better than competitors. Illustrating this customer-focused differentiation through vivid examples of companies, including Toyota, P&G, Hilti, Tesco, and Ryanair, Simply Better outlines an actionable framework managers can use to: • Understand what customers really value and why they buy the brands they do • Discover basic, unmet needs ripe for reliable solutions • Channel customer dissatisfaction into performance improvements • Balance in-the-box thinking in strategy and innovation with out-of-the-box thinking in advertising and communications • Create a learning culture that continuously responds to changing customer needs While being unique might be exciting and appealing, it doesn’t drive business success. Simply Better shows how meeting and exceeding the most ordinary of customer expectations can lead to extraordinary—and lasting—rewards.

Master the art of communication to improve outcomes in any scenario Simply Said is the essential handbook for business communication. Do you ever feel as though your message hasn't gotten across? Do details get lost along the way? Have tense situations ever escalated unnecessarily? Do people buy into your ideas? It all comes down to communication. We all communicate, but few of us do it well. From tough presentations to everyday transactions, there is no scenario that cannot be improved with better communication skills. This book presents an all-encompassing guide to improving your communication, based on the Exec|Comm philosophy: we are all better communicators when we focus focus less on ourselves and more on other people. More than just a list of tips, this book connects skills with scenarios and purpose to help you hear and be heard. You'll learn the skills to deliver great presentations and clear and persuasive messages, handle difficult conversations, effectively manage, lead with authenticity and more, as you discover the secrets of true communication. Communication affects every interaction every day. Why not learn to do it well? This book provides comprehensive guidance toward getting your message across, and getting the results you want. Shift your focus from yourself to other people Build a reputation as a good listener Develop your written and oral communications for the greatest impact Inspire and influence others Communicate more effectively in any business or social situation Did that email come across as harsh? Did you offend someone unintentionally? Great communication skills give you the power to influence someone's thinking and guide them to where you need them to be. Simply Said teaches you the critical skills that make you more effective in business and in life.

Here's a whole houseful of clever ideas, design tips, and time-saving, money-saving, easy-to-do projects--for glue gun and stapler as well as sewing--by the experts who know all the tricks of the do-it-yourself trade. 16-page, four-color photographic insert. Drawings.

The must-read summary of Patrick Barwise and Sean Meehan's book: "Simply Better: Winning and Keeping Customers by Delivering What Matters Most". This complete summary of the ideas from Patrick Barwise and Sean Meehan's book "Simply Better" highlights how the benefits of differentiation have been overstated. Instead of wanting something unique or even a cutting edge product, most customers simply want a quality product at a fair price which does what it promises consistently well. In their book, the authors encourage you not to obsess over trivial points of difference, gimmicks, branding or outside-the-box thinking and instead do the basics well. This summary offers six rules that you can follow to ensure that you perfect the basics and exceed your customers' expectations to deliver long-term success. Added-value of this summary: • Save time • Understand key concepts • Expand your business knowledge To learn more, read "Simply Better" and discover the key to delivering excellence by perfecting the basics.

This is a simplified, shortened, and updated version of the definitive title on management (Managing, which has sold over 70,000 copies) from management legend and best-selling author Henry Mintzberg.

Simply the Worst…Alice Cabot’s only great love is science, but a lapse in judgment has exiled the New York journalist to the glitzy Gallerias and vapid bubble-babble of Beverly Hills. The assignment to do a flattering feature series on Simply the Best and the superficial nonsense it sells threatens to crush what little is left of her spirit. Simply the Best…Pepper Addington can’t believe she’s moved up from grunt intern to personal assistant for Helene Jolie, the celebrity socialite founder of SimplytheBest.com. Succeeding at the job she worked so hard to get is her only priority. Keep a cynical know-it-all reporter in check? She promises Helene that she can. Simply Irresistible…Expecting nothing but games from the beach-blond surfer girl that Helene Jolie has assigned to keep an eye on her, Alice is fully prepared to resist any and all of California’s charms. Or so she thinks.