The fascinating story behind the company that revolutionized the financial world Catching Lightning in a Bottle traces the complete history of Merrill Lynch and the company's substantial impact on the world of finance, from the birth of the once-mighty company to its inauspicious end. Throughout its ninety-four year history, Merrill Lynch revolutionized finance by bringing Wall Street to Main Street, operating under a series of guidelines known as the Principles. These values allowed the company to gain the trust of small investors by putting the clients' interests first, driving a business trajectory that expanded capital markets and fueled the growth of the American post-war economy. Written by the son of Merrill Lynch co-founder Winthrop H. Smith, this book describes the creation and evolution of the company from Charlie Merrill's one-man shop in 1914 to its acquisition by Bank of America in 2008. Author Winthrop H. Smith Jr. spent twenty-eight years at the company his father co-founded, bringing a unique perspective to bear in telling the story of the company that democratized the stock market and eventually fell from its lofty perch. Learn why the industry initially scoffed at Charles Merrill's "radical" investment ideas Discover the origin of the Principles, and how they drove operations for nearly a century Find out why the author left a successful Wall Street career, and why it was such a smart move Examine the culture and values that built Merrill Lynch into one of the world's most successful and respected companies Revolutionary vision is rare, and enduring success is even more so. When a single organization demonstrates both of those characteristics, it is felt throughout the world. Discover the fascinating story behind Merrill Lynch and the men who built it from an insider's perspective in Catching Lightning in a Bottle.

This resource presents Minter and Reid's simple seven-step system for creating ideas that work--one that improves new-product success rates from the standard one in ten to one in two or better. It also explains the top ten reasons ideas fail, plus the dirty secrets of the research world.

From Patagonia to Apple, Whole Foods to New Balance, we love our favorite products--and, by extension, the companies that provide them. The emotional connections we form with our beloved brands and services are important relationships--relationships that are potentially worth billions. In the fast-paced, constantly-changing world of the modern marketplace, brands must adapt or perish—strategies, methods, and techniques must evolve to remain effective and relevant. Are you using yesterday’s thinking for tomorrow’s challenges? Brand Intimacy details ways to build better marketing through the cultivation of emotional connections between brand and consumer. The book provides lessons for marketers and business leaders alike who are seeking to understand these ultimate brand relationships and the opportunities they represent. Divided into three sections, Brand Intimacy starts with Context and Understanding. This explains today’s marketing landscape, the effects of technology, consumer behaviors and the advancements around decision making. Through research we discovered that people form relationships with brands the same way they develop relationships with other people. This section provides guidance on how to think about complimentary concepts such as loyalty, satisfaction and brand value. We then explore and compare established approaches and methodologies and showcase why intimacy is a compelling new and enhanced opportunity to build your brand or market your business. The second section, Theory and Model reveals and dimensions the brand intimacy model and dissects it into steps to help you better factor it into your marketing approaches or frameworks. Here you will learn the core concepts and components that are essential to build bonds and the role emotion can play to help you achieve greater customer engagement. You can also review the rankings of the best brands in terms of Brand Intimacy. A summary of our annual research reveals the characteristics of best performers, the most intimate industries, and differences based on geography, age, gender and income. By examining the top intimate brands, we reveal and decode the secrets of the bonds they form with their customers. The third section is Methods & Practice, this details the economic benefits and advantages of a strategy that factors Brand Intimacy. Intimate brands are proven to outperform the Fortune 500 and Standards and Poors’ index of brands. Intimate brands create more revenue and profit and last longer. Consumers are also willing to pay more for a brand they are more intimate with. Conversely, we also explore a series of brand failures and lessons learned to help you avoid common pitfalls in brand management. We articulate the steps to build a more intimate brand as well as share a glimpse on the future where software will play a more important role in brand building. The book outlines a proprietary digital platform that we use to help manage and enable intimacy through collaboration, simulators and real-time tracking of emotions. Business and marketing owners face an increasing difficult task to build brands that rise above the clutter, engage more and grow. Brand Intimacy explains how to better measure, build and manage enduring brands. Brands that are built to inspire as well as profit. Written by experienced marketers and backed by extensive research, Brand Intimacy rewrites the rulebook on how to establish and expand your marketing. The book is equal parts theory, research and practice, the result of 7 year journey and a new marketing paradigm for the modern marketer.

Distilling a vast amount of knowledge into an easy-to-read volume covering the full range of Oracle's features and technologies, this title includes an overview of Oracle 10g, along with recent releases 9i and 8i. It provides everything you should need to install and run the Oracle databases.

Let' s Get Real is a call to action to all Australians who want to take control of their destiny and fulfil their life goals. The author believes that most property investors don' t succeed because they approach investing in the wrong way &– it' s not about the property, it' s about the investor.In this updated and revised edition, investors will learn that if they have the correct mindset, understand their real motivations, define their goals intelligently and bring together an A-Team of experts, living an extraordinary life is within their reach.

Cool. It was a new word and a new way to be, and in a single generation, it became the supreme compliment of American culture. The Origins of Cool in Postwar America uncovers the hidden history of this concept and its new set of codes that came to define a global attitude and style. As Joel Dinerstein reveals in this dynamic book, cool began as a stylish defiance of racism, a challenge to suppressed sexuality, a philosophy of individual rebellion, and a youthful search for social change. Through eye-opening portraits of iconic figures, Dinerstein illuminates the cultural connections and artistic innovations among Lester Young, Humphrey Bogart, Robert Mitchum, Billie Holiday, Frank Sinatra, Jack Kerouac, Albert Camus, Marlon Brando, and James Dean, among others. We eavesdrop on conversations among Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and Miles Davis, and on a forgotten debate between Lorraine Hansberry and Norman Mailer over the "white Negro" and black cool. We come to understand how the cool worlds of Beat writers and Method actors emerged from the intersections of film noir, jazz, and existentialism. Out of this mix, Dinerstein sketches nuanced definitions of cool that unite concepts from African-American and Euro-American culture: the stylish stoicism of the ethical rebel loner; the relaxed intensity of the improvising jazz musician; the effortless, physical grace of the Method actor. To be cool is not to be hip and to be hot is definitely not to be cool. This is the first work to trace the history of cool during the Cold War by exploring the intersections of film noir, jazz, existential literature, Method acting, blues, and rock and roll. Dinerstein reveals that they came together to create something completely new—and that something is cool.

Unquestionably, The Word Factory is the perfect guide to better English Grammar and effortless writing. According to one newspaper report, universities in England had begun to penalise students who employed incorrect grammar in their essays. In South Africa, the analysis of seventy-four thousand short stories found that written work of children was littered with SMS language, American slang, exclamation marks, and references to celebrities. All through my formative years, I had to contend with five different languagesEnglish, Afrikaans, and two other dialects, which for the most part, accounted for my inability to translate thought into words effortlessly and inhibited my willingness to participate in lively social discussions especially in the course of my high school years. However, possessed of determination, I had vowed to overcome that infirmity. My need to succeed at all costs precipitated the memorisation of the entire Pocket Oxford Dictionary, an accomplishment that spanned ten long years, following which a further ten years were spent in acquainting myself with most English phrases, idiomatic expressions, and collecting the data and fully researching it. I decided to name the compilation The Word Factory. The fruits of my efforts, but more specifically the extensive employment of The Word Factory, not only marked my rise onto the podiums as master of ceremonies and public speaker, but had also enabled me to write approximately twenty-five articles to the Cape Argus, Cape Towns pre-eminent newspaper, within the space of two years, with 100 per cent publication rate.

Millions read the works of Napoleon Hill and are catapulted to their dreams. Others say they get nowhere. Why? The difference between success and failure lies in the use of the Master Mind. The Master Mind, Hill taught, is the pooling of intellectual, intuitive, and creative mental resources, which occurs when two or more people enter a supportive pact to assist one another's aims. A Master Mind group multiplies the mental powers of all its participants. This is the "secret ingredient," Hill insisted, that delivers lasting success. Now, acclaimed historian and New Thought author, MITCH HOROWITZ shows you, step by step, how and why the Master Mind works-and how truly easy it is to form and maintain your own Master Mind group. If you love the motivational lessons of Napoleon Hill, you cannot afford to be without the Napoleon Hill Success Course on the Master Mind. "Great power," Hill wrote, "can be accumulated through no other principle."

How Motown changed the landscape of American popular culture