Rob Hart’s book, The Warehouse, is a speculative dystopian thriller. The central character is an online retailer called Cloud – think Amazon dominating its rivals in the distant future, which has devastating effects on small retailers across the country. There’s a dying founder – is he a hero or delusional? Why did Paxton and Zinnia take jobs at Cloud? Is it for the paycheck? Rob is the first fiction writer to be interviewed on CFO Bookshelf.
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Is Customer Empathy All Talk or a Difference Maker?
Atticus in To Kill a Mockingbird states, “You never really understand a person until you consider things from their point of view … until you climb into their skin and walk around in it.” Elvis Pressley sang, “Before you abuse, criticize and accuse, walk a mile in my shoes.” In this conversation, we unpack the big ideas and linkages between business success and customer empathy with Dr. Natalie Petouhoff, the co-author of Empathy in Action.
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A Turnaround Expert Learned His Craft the Hard Way
Jeff Sands is the author of Corporate Turnaround Artistry. Before he started fixing and mending other companies’ broken income statements and balance sheets, he first had to fix his own where he learned how friendly banks could be. During this conversation, we also learn about debt stacks, a few myths about bankruptcies, the five stages of a turnaround, the three types of turnaround CEOs, the role of luck, and what Jeff calls the salvation process.
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The True Meaning of a Business Huddle
Most of the businesses I work with have business huddles. Some have daily stand-up huddles. Some have weekly huddles either at the beginning of the week or at the end. Some of these businesses have started conducting monthly financial huddles that I’ve taught them how to run. Perhaps you use a different term for these meetings. Personally, I prefer the terms debrief and financial impact circles. In this discussion, we’ll stick to the term business huddles.
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30 of the Best Business Books by Women
Lynette Pretorius shared a picture of the books she was reading on a LinkedIn post. She made the point that only two of ten books in her pile were by women. Then she stated, “I’m committing the reading at least three books by women every month for the rest of the year.” But she needed some recommendations. Surprise … I had a few.
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A Blockbuster Failure
If you think Netflix was the cause of Blockbuster’s failure, you’ll change your mind after you hear Alan Payne explain the reasons for this company’s demise. Alan was a longtime owner of a chain of successful Blockbuster stores. He was also featured in the Netflix 2020 documentary, The Last Blockbuster. His new book is Built to Fail, and we learn four reasons for Blockbuster’s eventual bankruptcy which started with poor leadership at the CEO level.
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A Financially Powerful Culture
More than twenty-five years ago, I knew next to nothing about the concept of company culture. Treating others the way I wanted to be treated. That’s what I did and hoped others would do the same. I never worked for a CEO before 2004 whose primary focus was building and developing great teams. One of my favorite books on culture is Powerful by the first HR leader at Netflix. This is the book I would have enjoyed reading in the 1990s.
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How Profitable Is That New Project?
Have you ever worked with a software vendor who said their solution would save you as much as $1 million annually? When you accept projects with these types of claims, have you gone back one year later to determine the actual cash savings you realized? Our topic on this show is the book, Project Profitability by our guest, Reginald Lee. We explore project salience, mental models for project prioritization, and informational and instructional-centric projects.
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Finance Essentials in AI, Data Science and ERP
Glenn Hopper is the author of Deep Finance: Corporate Finance for the Information Age. Glenn is a likable expert who helps the rest of us better understand artificial intelligence, data science, and ERP solutions. As a hands-on, self-taught digital expert, his writing is still easy to understand. In this conversation, we cover machine and deep learning, practical applications of data science in smaller businesses, and comparing comprehensive ERP solutions with best-of-breed tools that are stacked together.
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Reversing the Slide in Corporate Turnarounds
Looking back on my financial career, given the chance for a do-over, I would have focused on forensic accounting or corporate turnarounds. Turnarounds have the edge. Instead, I focused on intense scale-ups while studying and reading about those in turnaround management. One of those experts is Professor James Shein of the Kellogg School of Management. Reversing the Slide is one of the best books in the turnaround genre I’ve read, our topic on this episode.
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