Podcast

Jeff Hooke’s book, The Myth of Private Equity, left asking the question, “What is going on?” far too often while being educated at the same time. During this conversation, we learned much about the myths of PE funds focused on leveraged buyouts. Some of the big ideas in this conversation include the enormous fees fund managers are collecting, the poor fund performance these funds generate, and the lack of transparency in their reporting to institutional investors.

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Andy Kriebel is my favorite go-to person on all matters related to Tableau and Dataviz. Andy was the first to create a YouTube channel on Tableau. His subscriber base has surpassed 61,000, and his 750+ videos have 7.5 million views and counting. Andy and Eva Murray are the co-authors of the book #Makeover Monday. In this conversation, our topics range from writing to his five daily habits and why asking for a dashboard can be problematic.

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I have my theories on why W. Edwards Deming is not a household name in all business circles. Many view him as the ‘quality’ guy who impacted Japanese manufacturing after the Second World War. That view is limiting, as Deming’s management mindset had four central tenets: pragmatism, the law of variation, human psychology, and systems thinking. These are Deming’s pillars of thought, explained so clearly in a new book by John Willis.

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Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, technology activist, and journalist. He has written many books, most recently The Bezzle, a follow-up to Red Team Blues, which are the two books we’ll discuss in this episode. These titles begin a series featuring the fictional forensic accountant Martin Hench. Hench is self-employed, loves being on the red team, and rakes in 25% of the assets he can recover. While entertaining, Cory’s books are deeply thought-provoking.

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Alfred Sloan’s My Years with General Motors was an immediate success and is considered one of the best management books written by CEOs of his era. Before his book, we’d probably have to go back to Henry Ford’s autobiography to find a management book of this popularity. I now believe Harvey Firestone’s book from 1926 is as good, if not better than Ford’s and Sloan’s. The title is Men and Rubber, a republished book by Latticework Publishing.

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Gary Stevenson grew up in an impoverished area of East London where he could hold his life’s belongings in both arms. About three years after graduating from the London School of Economics, Citibank made him a millionaire at a very young age. While Gary defied the odds of becoming a successful trader at Citibank, he explains why wealth did not bring him happiness and why he was eager to leave the firm that made him rich.

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Agile, DevOps, TPS, TOC, Deming’s System of Profound Knowledge, and Lean. Is there a mental construct or latticework that connects these robust systems? I believe the answer can be found in Wiring the Winning Organization. The authors Gene Kim and Steve Spear introduce the concepts of the three layers of work and social circuitry. The book also explains its three biggest learning pillars: simplification, slowification, and amplification.

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Corporate Counsel by Peter Carayiannis is a Lencioni-like business fable geared toward lawyers contemplating a career move to become in-house attorneys in private business. However, the book is not just for those who have passed the bar exam. As a finance professional, I found this fast-paced book packed with actionable insights that business owners can apply immediately in their organizations. Finally, business readers have a book to build their legal and corporate risk literacy and acumen.

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Of all the books written about Warren Buffett, I am unaware of any authors who grew up in Omaha, Nebraska and went to school with his children. Todd Finkle is the author of Warren Buffett: Investor and Entrepreneur, a book that was fourteen years in the making. Even if you have read numerous books on investing, this one is full of gems from a unique perspective, including a chapter on Buffett’s investing missteps.

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Making his second appearance on the show is John Rossman. John hit my radar two years ago after he wrote The Amazon Way, which reached my Top 10 list of 2022 books. His newest book is Big Bet Leadership that he co-wrote with Kevin McCaffrey. This strategy and management book reads fast with practical and big ideas not just for high-tech organizations, but those that are low tech large or small. Nonprofits can gain value, too.

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