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Release Date: May 01, 2010

From the author of the award-winning book of poems, Miracle Fruit, comes the eagerly anticipated second collection, At the Drive-In Volcano. In this new and imaginative followup, Aimee Nezhukumatathil examines the full circle journey of desire, loss, and ultimately, an exuberant lovetraveling around a world brimming with wild and delicious offerings such as iced waterfalls, jackfruit, and pistol shrimp. From the tropical landscapes of the Caribbean, India, and the Philippines to the deep winters of western New York and mild autumns of Ohio, the natural world Nezhukumatathil describes is dark but also lovelyso full of enchantment and magic. Here, worms glow in the dark, lizards speak, the most delicious soup in the world turns out to be deadly, and a woman eats soil as if it were candy. Her trademark charm, verve and wit remain elemental and a delight to behold, even in the face of a crumbling relationship. These poems confront delicate subjects of love and loss with an exacting exuberance and elegance not hardly seen in a writer so young.

From the author of the award-winning book of poems, Miracle Fruit, comes the eagerly anticipated second collection, At the Drive-In Volcano. In this new and imaginative followup, Aimee Nezhukumatathil examines the full circle journey of desire, loss, and ultimately, an exuberant lovetraveling around a world brimming with wild and delicious offerings such as iced waterfalls, jackfruit, and pistol shrimp. From the tropical landscapes of the Caribbean, India, and the Philippines to the deep winters of western New York and mild autumns of Ohio, the natural world Nezhukumatathil describes is dark but also lovelyso full of enchantment and magic. Here, worms glow in the dark, lizards speak, the most delicious soup in the world turns out to be deadly, and a woman eats soil as if it were candy. Her trademark charm, verve and wit remain elemental and a delight to behold, even in the face of a crumbling relationship. These poems confront delicate subjects of love and loss with an exacting exuberance and elegance not hardly seen in a writer so young.

From the bestselling author of The Warren Buffett Way, a revealing inside look at the booming business-and investment opportunities-of NASCAR"Hagstrom's insights and observations bring a refreshing 'outside' business perspective to our industry."--From the Foreword by William C. France, President, NASCAR"From its origins in Daytona in the '50s to today's live network broadcasts for millions of devoted fans, Robert Hagstrom offers an in-depth look at the fastest-growing sport in the country. The NASCAR Way explains how and why dozens of Fortune 500 companies have been lining up to jump on board."--Michael T. Hargrave, Senior Motorsports Manager, Anheuser-Busch, Inc."It is great to be associated with NASCAR, the France family, and for me to get paid for what I love-to race! In The NASCAR Way, you see a prime-time sport."--Dale Earnhardt, 7-time NASCAR Winston Cup champion"An accurate and entertaining perspective to the unbridled capitalism that has built NASCAR into the #2 sport in America after football."--Bill Nielsen, Director, Promotion Development and Licensing, Kellogg USA, Inc."Hagstrom understands how our business works both on and off the track. His perception of our sport will have you racing through the pages on the edge of your seat. The book is definitely a winner!"--Dale Jarrett, Winston Cup driver

AT THE DRIVE-IN is a musical time capsule of the late 1950s and early '60s, featuring some of the biggest hits of the era-beach tunes, teen idol ballads, and good old rock 'n' roll-performed on a stage transformed into a nostalgic drive-in, complete with period cars! Fabian hosts an unprecedented lineup - Jan & Dean in their farewell concert tour, Bobby Ve and The Vees, The Surfaris, The Rip CHords, CHris Montez, Merrilee Rush, Ray Peterson, The Orlons, Dodie Stevens, and the late Rick Nelson's twin sons, The Nelsons.

Friday night at the Orbit Drive-in: a circus of noise, sex, teenage hormones, B-movie blood, and popcorn. On a cool, crisp summer night, with the Texas stars shining down like rattlesnake eyes, movie-goers for the All-Night Horror Show are trapped in the drive-in by a demonic-looking comet. Then the fun begins. If the movie-goers try to leave, their bodies dissolve into goo. Cowboys are reduced to tears. Lovers quarrel. Bikini-clad women let their stomachs’ sag, having lost the ambition to hold them in. The world outside the six monstrous screens fades to black while the movie-goers spiral into base humanity, resorting to fighting, murdering, crucifying, and cannibalizing to survive. Part dark comedy part horror show, Lansdale's cult Drive-In books are as shocking and entertaining today as they were 20 years ago.

Friday night at the Orbit Drive-in: a circus of noise, sex, teenage hormones, B-movie blood, and popcorn. On a cool, crisp summer night, with the Texas stars shining down like rattlesnake eyes, movie-goers for the All-Night Horror Show are trapped in the drive-in by a demonic-looking comet. Then the fun begins. If the movie-goers try to leave, their bodies dissolve into goo. Cowboys are reduced to tears. Lovers quarrel. Bikini-clad women let their stomachs’ sag, having lost the ambition to hold them in. The world outside the six monstrous screens fades to black while the movie-goers spiral into base humanity, resorting to fighting, murdering, crucifying, and cannibalizing to survive. Part dark comedy part horror show, Lansdale's cult Drive-In books are as shocking and entertaining today as they were 20 years ago.

The Test Drive deals with the war perpetrated by highly determined reactionary forces on science and research. How does the government at once promote and prohibit scientific testing and undercut the importance of experimentation? To what extent is testing at the forefront of theoretical and practical concerns today? Addressed to those who are left stranded by speculative thinking and unhinged by cognitive discourse, The Test Drive points to a toxic residue of uninterrogated questions raised by Nietzsche, Husserl and Derrida. Ranging from the scientific probe to modalities of testing that include the limits of friendship or love, this work explores the crucial operations of an uncontestable legitimating machine. Avital Ronell offers a tour-de-force reading of legal, pharmaceutical, artistic, scientific, Zen, and historical grids that depend upon different types of testability, involving among other issues what it means to put oneself to the test.

Release Date: August 19, 2010

Ace Records (UK) ( March 09, 2004 ), Genre: Jazz Instrument

Release Date: January 07, 2009

From the bestselling author of The Warren Buffett Way, a revealing inside look at the booming business-and investment opportunities-of NASCAR"Hagstrom's insights and observations bring a refreshing 'outside' business perspective to our industry."--From the Foreword by William C. France, President, NASCAR"From its origins in Daytona in the '50s to today's live network broadcasts for millions of devoted fans, Robert Hagstrom offers an in-depth look at the fastest-growing sport in the country. The NASCAR Way explains how and why dozens of Fortune 500 companies have been lining up to jump on board."--Michael T. Hargrave, Senior Motorsports Manager, Anheuser-Busch, Inc."It is great to be associated with NASCAR, the France family, and for me to get paid for what I love-to race! In The NASCAR Way, you see a prime-time sport."--Dale Earnhardt, 7-time NASCAR Winston Cup champion"An accurate and entertaining perspective to the unbridled capitalism that has built NASCAR into the #2 sport in America after football."--Bill Nielsen, Director, Promotion Development and Licensing, Kellogg USA, Inc."Hagstrom understands how our business works both on and off the track. His perception of our sport will have you racing through the pages on the edge of your seat. The book is definitely a winner!"--Dale Jarrett, Winston Cup driver

The Test Drive deals with the war perpetrated by highly determined reactionary forces on science and research. How does the government at once promote and prohibit scientific testing and undercut the importance of experimentation? To what extent is testing at the forefront of theoretical and practical concerns today? Addressed to those who are left stranded by speculative thinking and unhinged by cognitive discourse, The Test Drive points to a toxic residue of uninterrogated questions raised by Nietzsche, Husserl and Derrida. Ranging from the scientific probe to modalities of testing that include the limits of friendship or love, this work explores the crucial operations of an uncontestable legitimating machine. Avital Ronell offers a tour-de-force reading of legal, pharmaceutical, artistic, scientific, Zen, and historical grids that depend upon different types of testability, involving among other issues what it means to put oneself to the test.

DRIVING IN EUROPE 101 is not another tourist book, but a 'how to' book featuring traffic laws and road sign translations for 22 European countries. It provides clear explanations of how easily a fledgling American tourist may drive the streets of Europe, get the best deals on rental cars, airfare, and find some of the most romantic destinations on the continent. All too often American tourists in airport restaurants and lounges say, "I'd love to drive across Europe at my own pace, but." DRIVING IN EUROPE 101 was written for the person who spoke those words openly or reticently. Very easy to read with a smattering of humor, this book is structured in three sections. It begins with an honest evaluation of whether this type of venture is suited for the reader. From the opening quote, "It's the journey, not the destination that is important" the reader compares many aspects of public transportation and group travel to going solo in a car. See a lonely little road going into the mountains that you would like to explore? In a train - no chance. See a charming sidewalk café (in a building built 500 years ago where you would like to eat or simply get a cup of coffee? With a group - take a vote. As the reader navigates the pages he discovers strategies to plan that driving vacation through Europe. Chapter 2 gets to the heart of the topic, "What is so different about Driving In Europe." Here the book addresses the common differences between driving in the U.S. and Europe such as rights of way, horns and flashing lights, turning right on red, and the all-time best/worst - roundabouts. Consider this to be your introduction, Roundabout 101.In the United Kingdom, Ireland or anywhere else they drive on the wrong (oops) left side of the road. This information is backed up with more information describing how to get the best air fair prices, what to buy in preparation for the trip, insurance issues abroad and more. Jump to the end of the book, Section III, where appendices include weights and measure conversion tables, worksheets for planning the vacation and pictures of most of the traffic signs one may encounter in Europe with a detailed explanation for each. The heart of the book is found in the middle section, which features 22 European countries. Beginning with a basic map of the country and brief narrative of driving opportunities, each chapter includes Fast Facts about the country, Driving Facts or specific laws pertaining to each country, Emergency Telephone Numbers, U.S. Embassy addresses and translations for 35 Terms or Words commonly seen along the roadways. Humorous dialog written in the host country's language close each translation section, which differ for every country. The author, Curley Bowman, is a lieutenant with the Orlando Police Department, assigned to the Orlando International Airport. He has lived on three continents, and in seven states; additionally, he served 9 years in the U.S. Army including a tour in Vietnam. He and his wife Jan are avid travelers of Western Europe and the United Kingdom. DRIVING IN EUROPE 101 is a must have book for the person considering a driving vacation in Europe. Starting from, "Honey, lets go somewhere different this year." and ending with the vacation's flight home, this is a soup-to-nuts treatise. It is the only single-source book of its kind. Packed with facts, information and translations confirmed through embassies, police departments and locals around the world, the pages are straightforward, providing information in a logical and easy to find format. It will be considered one of the top three items to be packed for a driving vacation: 1) passport, 2) driver's license, and 3) DRIVING IN EUROPE 101.

Road accidents are the major cause of death and injury among young people in the developing world, and the field of psychology can offer great insights into the many factors that are at play when we get behind the wheels of our cars. Based on data collected around the world on drivers of all age groups, Graham Hole provides an up to date picture of the realities of driving, including visual perception issues, cell phone distractions, fatigue, drugs, and the effects of aging. These insights can help explain why we crash, as well as how we achieve the amazing feat of not crashing more often than we do.  In this jargon-free and very accessible book, Hole applies psychological methods and insights to this every-day experience with two audiences in mind. First, he speaks to accident investigators, who frequently rely on well-developed understandings of engineering and forensics and less insight into the psychology of the driver. Second, of course, this book will be of value to anyone interested in the application of cognitive psychology to real-world behaviors, and to anyone who drives.

Love at Work foments a revolution for workplaces of every description and in every industry: a revolution in which leaders understand that engaging people's hearts trumps engaging their minds. Wilson shows how leaders who love: believe in their people; pull out their highest good; serve their success; and challenge them to stress. When people's felt needs are met, says author Brady Wilson, they release the energy that triggers discretionary effort — 400% more effort, according to the Corporate Leadership Council. The principles in this cutting-edge book are sure to change the face of the workplace for years to come. &#8220A game changer ... provocative, thoughtful, and challenging.&#8221 &#8212JIM BROWN, author of The Imperfect Board Member &#8220... a must read for anyone who interacts with people at work.&#8221 &#8212JOSE TOLOVI, Jr., PhD, Global CEO, Great Place to Work Institute &#8220True love is a competence, a spiritual force, a strategy, a way of life.I challenge you to read this book, think, and engage.&#8221 &#8212MARK RIVERS, CEO, Canadian Equity Opportunity Capital BRADY G. WILSON is also the author of Juice: The Power of Conversation and Finding the Sticking Point: Increase Sales by Transforming Customer Resistance into Customer Engagement. He is the co-founder of Juice Inc., an organization committed to transforming people, teams, and organizations. Brady has energized leaders, managers, and front-line workers in many of North America's Fortune 500 companies, through keynote speeches, facilitation, coaching, and training. www.juiceinc.com

Love at Work foments a revolution for workplaces of every description and in every industry: a revolution in which leaders understand that engaging people's hearts trumps engaging their minds. Wilson shows how leaders who love: believe in their people; pull out their highest good; serve their success; and challenge them to stress. When people's felt needs are met, says author Brady Wilson, they release the energy that triggers discretionary effort — 400% more effort, according to the Corporate Leadership Council. The principles in this cutting-edge book are sure to change the face of the workplace for years to come. &#8220A game changer ... provocative, thoughtful, and challenging.&#8221 &#8212JIM BROWN, author of The Imperfect Board Member &#8220... a must read for anyone who interacts with people at work.&#8221 &#8212JOSE TOLOVI, Jr., PhD, Global CEO, Great Place to Work Institute &#8220True love is a competence, a spiritual force, a strategy, a way of life.I challenge you to read this book, think, and engage.&#8221 &#8212MARK RIVERS, CEO, Canadian Equity Opportunity Capital BRADY G. WILSON is also the author of Juice: The Power of Conversation and Finding the Sticking Point: Increase Sales by Transforming Customer Resistance into Customer Engagement. He is the co-founder of Juice Inc., an organization committed to transforming people, teams, and organizations. Brady has energized leaders, managers, and front-line workers in many of North America's Fortune 500 companies, through keynote speeches, facilitation, coaching, and training. www.juiceinc.com

Show me the money! This is the frantic cry of the "old guard" of senior executives as they desperately struggle to deal with commoditizing markets, the loss of their differentiator and the inevitable impact on profitability. At the same time the new breed of enlightened, customer-focused executives knowingly smile, seeing the answer is simple: focus on the customer rather than the organization, provide customers with an emotionally engaging experience, and the rest will take care of itself. They understand that the customer experience is the next competitive battleground and that emotions account for over 50% of an experience. In one case study in this book, an organization adopting this philosophy dealing in a mature market, enjoyed 100% growth in revenues, doubled their customer base, substantially reduced customer churn, increased the effectiveness of their marketing campaigns by 20% and reduced employee attrition by 13%. As the world thought leaders on customer experience, Colin Shaw and the team at Beyond Philosophy have undertaken more than 18 months of groundbreaking research to discovering the emotions that drive and destroy value in an organization and can now disclose the empirical link between evoking these emotions and substantial financial returns. By the end of the book you will understand:* The four clusters of emotions that increase customers' short term spend and drive and destroy customer loyalty* How to prove that improving your customer experience provides considerable financial returns* How to evoke these emotions in your customers* How these emotions affect your "Net Promoter" score and how to use them to improve it* Why every organization has an Emotional SignatureThis book is littered with examples of organizations who already understand the DNA of customer experience and know the power of emotions to gain a competitive edge.

CEOs regularly announce ambitious growth targets, then fail to achieve them. The reason? Too many companies are addicted to bad profits. These corporate steroids boost short-term earnings but burn out the employees and alienate customers. They undermine growth by creating legions of detractors - customers who sully the firm's reputation and switch to competitors at the earliest opportunity. Now loyalty expert Fred Reichheld shows how to reverse the equation, turning customers into promoters who generate good profits and true, sustainable growth. The key: one simple question - Would you recommend us to a friend? - that allows companies to track promoters and detractors and produces a clear measure of an organization's performance in its customers' eyes. Analysis shows that on average, increasing the Net Promoter Score (NPS) by a dozen points versus competitors can double a company's growth rate. While easy to grasp, this metric represents a radical change in the way companies manage customer relationships and organize for growth. Rather than relying on notoriously ineffective customer satisfaction surveys, companies can use NPS to measure customer relationships as rigorously as they now measure profits. What's more, NPS finally enables CEOs to hold employees accountable for treating customers right. It clarifies the link between the quality of a company's customer relationships and its growth prospects. Based on extensive research and rich with vivid examples of organizations that have pioneered NPS in practice, The Ultimate Question offers hands-on guidance on how to: Distinguish good profits from bad; Measure NPS and benchmark performance against world-class standards; Quantify the economic value generated by customer word of mouth; Assign accountability for improving customer relationships; Identify core customers and set priorities for strategic investments; Move customers beyond mere "satisfaction" to true loyalty; Create communications of passionate advocates that stimulate innovation and growth. Practical and compelling, The Ultimate Question will help you solve your organization's growth dilemma.

A smart, witty, and fresh look at the male side of the male-female relationship from a science writer at The Philadelphia Inquirer.In The Score, Faye Flam examines how the desire to "score" has profoundly shaped males over millions of years. Sweeping from the origin of the sexes to the sexual foibles of twenty-first-century humans, Flam, a science writer at The Philadelphia Inquirer, shows how a small difference in the size of the first sperm and eggs resulted in an evolutionary tradeoff that has affected both males and females. Because males of most species invest less in reproduction than females, they have to invest more up front to get sex-whether by jumping through hoops to prove that they'll be a good father, fighting to near death with rivals, or paying a couple thousand dollars for a class on how to pick up chicks à la the pickup artists in Neil Strauss's The Game. Within this tug-of-war context, Flam explores a wide range of male behaviors and courtship strategies and ultimately reveals that males have been shaped by competing for the preferences of the female sex. But after all this sex-propelled evolution, we're still stuck in a troublesome suspension between monogamy and promiscuity-and it's this tension that explains the contradictions of the modern man.

A smart, witty, and fresh look at the male side of the male-female relationship from a science writer at The Philadelphia Inquirer.In The Score, Faye Flam examines how the desire to "score" has profoundly shaped males over millions of years. Sweeping from the origin of the sexes to the sexual foibles of twenty-first-century humans, Flam, a science writer at The Philadelphia Inquirer, shows how a small difference in the size of the first sperm and eggs resulted in an evolutionary tradeoff that has affected both males and females. Because males of most species invest less in reproduction than females, they have to invest more up front to get sex-whether by jumping through hoops to prove that they'll be a good father, fighting to near death with rivals, or paying a couple thousand dollars for a class on how to pick up chicks à la the pickup artists in Neil Strauss's The Game. Within this tug-of-war context, Flam explores a wide range of male behaviors and courtship strategies and ultimately reveals that males have been shaped by competing for the preferences of the female sex. But after all this sex-propelled evolution, we're still stuck in a troublesome suspension between monogamy and promiscuity-and it's this tension that explains the contradictions of the modern man.

Gentlemen, start your engines...and live the life that matters most! Navigating a NASCAR racing career taught Kyle Petty hard lessons. Losing his son in a racing accident taught him the hardest lesson of all. In these six, 1-hour sessions, Kyle petty shares the lessons it's taken him a lifetime ---and more than 850 NASCAR races---to learn.You'll discover how to: Focus your ambition-- Find a purpose--Survive losses--Serve others and Experience life beyond yourself.

Shining with heart and humor, Porter Shreve’s second novel is a witty, wry tale about a modern-day mother who finds herself at a personal crossroads at age sixty-one. In the wake of her ex-husband’s wedding to a younger woman, Lydia is eager to shake the feeling of being replaced by a newer model and sets to rebuild a sense of family with her three grown children. The trouble is, they’ve all moved about as far as they could get from the Midwest, and Lydia’s only daughter blames her for the divorce.Undaunted, Lydia devises a complicated scheme to lure her children back to Detroit.As Shreve’s charming characters navigate the twists and turns of family loyalties, this warm, funny, and affecting novel offers entertaining comment on modern relationships. Drives Like a Dream is a perfect novel for any mother who has struggled with the empty nest, and any daughter whose mother has driven her just a little bit crazy.

Every healthcare organization can learn from Seattle Children’s continuous improvement process, but this book is not an operator’s manual. Instead, it is a challenge to everyone concerned with healthcare to reexamine deeply held assumptions. While it is commonly believed that improved quality, access, and safety, and an improved bottom line are mutually exclusive, Seattle Children’s demonstrates that it quite possible to realize all these improvements concurrently. Written by remarkable change agents from the front lines at Seattle Children’s and other forward-thinking organizations, this book discusses ways to transform key personnel into change agents and engage all staff in a patient-focused culture dedicated to eliminating waste and improving all aspects of quality and care. Change agents from Seattle Children’s Hospital, Jefferson Healthcare, and The Everett Clinic in Washington; Memorial Care in California; and Minnesota Children’s Hospital and Clinics all make contributions to this book. Each one tells of challenges overcome through continuous improvement. Providing both example and inspiration, these organizations stand as proof that effective mindful change is feasible. Their stories of hard-gained progress is for healthcare professionals who have the willingness to look critically at their work and the tenacity to find better, less wasteful ways to deliver safe, high-quality care. Seattle Children’s Hospital will change your mind about what’s possible. Joan Wellman and her colleagues provide examples of dramatic performance improvements. Using their practical examples, you can be on your way to becoming a leader who transforms your organization, empowers your team, adds value, and saves lives.—Ken Graham, CEO, El Camino Hospital, Mountain View, California  … Pat Hagan and his colleagues tell a compelling story of change at an enormously prestigious institution …. It is a story of humility and the courage to go outside of healthcare to learn. … while 10 years ago, lean in healthcare was interesting, today it is essential.—J. Michael Rona, Rona Consulting Group Joan Wellman and co-authors Pat Hagan and Howard Jeffries are true pioneers in the lean healthcare world. Their book… puts lean into the right context for healthcare leaders and change agents. …Engaging and well-written, I recommend it highly. —Mark Graban, author of Lean Hospitals: Improving Quality, Patient Safety, and Employee Satisfaction

ValueSelling Driving Up Sales One Conversation At A Time ValueSelling is a remarkable field-honed guidebook for sales executives and managers striving to compete more effectively. To help readers gain and consistently maintain their winning edge, author Julie Thomas shares the simple yet powerful framework that fueled her meteoric rise to CEO of ValueVision Associates. Written for sales professionals who compete in the most demanding worldwide sales arenas complex, high-end products or services readers in all sales environments will find ValueSelling relevant and easy to absorb. Pragmatic and fast-paced, each chapter focuses on specific strategies to move the sale forward. Filled with case studies, tactics and tips, readers can instantly put ValueSelling to work and drive up their sales one conversation at a time.

This slice-of-life comedy both documents and satirizes small town life in a rural Texas town where the only entertainment in the day is the roller rink and at night the local drive-in. Hosting a cross-section of the town's population, the drive-in comes to life at night - parents show up with their kids in tow, teenage paramours arrive with their dates, and the local gangs fuel their rivalry - under the gigantic screen and at the snack bar. The film playing is a '70s staple: the disaster movie. Tension builds on the screen and also among the patrons. Director Rod Amateau, producer/director of legendary television series "The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show" and "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, " is no stranger to comedy, and this off-beat, little-known film (with a lesser-known cast) is a hilarious flashback to the seventies. Newly remastered.This product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.This product is expected to play back in DVD Video "play only" devices, and may not play in other DVD devices, including recorders and PC drives.

Show me the money! This is the frantic cry of the "old guard" of senior executives as they desperately struggle to deal with commoditizing markets, the loss of their differentiator and the inevitable impact on profitability. At the same time the new breed of enlightened, customer-focused executives knowingly smile, seeing the answer is simple: focus on the customer rather than the organization, provide customers with an emotionally engaging experience, and the rest will take care of itself. They understand that the customer experience is the next competitive battleground and that emotions account for over 50% of an experience. In one case study in this book, an organization adopting this philosophy dealing in a mature market, enjoyed 100% growth in revenues, doubled their customer base, substantially reduced customer churn, increased the effectiveness of their marketing campaigns by 20% and reduced employee attrition by 13%. As the world thought leaders on customer experience, Colin Shaw and the team at Beyond Philosophy have undertaken more than 18 months of groundbreaking research to discovering the emotions that drive and destroy value in an organization and can now disclose the empirical link between evoking these emotions and substantial financial returns. By the end of the book you will understand:* The four clusters of emotions that increase customers' short term spend and drive and destroy customer loyalty* How to prove that improving your customer experience provides considerable financial returns* How to evoke these emotions in your customers* How these emotions affect your "Net Promoter" score and how to use them to improve it* Why every organization has an Emotional SignatureThis book is littered with examples of organizations who already understand the DNA of customer experience and know the power of emotions to gain a competitive edge.

A practical guide to the ABCs of ABBThis unique resource takes an in-depth look at creating value through activity-based budgeting (ABB). As most organizations are dissatisfied with some aspects of their performance, ABB has become an increasingly popular process for which many companies are abandoning traditional methods that no longer meet their demands. Emphasizing the importance of budgeting by activities and features rather than by cost elements, Driving Value Using Activity-Based Budgeting offers a complete overview of feature costing, a technique used in conjunction with ABB, as well as the underlying principles of ABB, including linking strategy to activities, forecasting revenue, capacity management, and gap analysis. With numerous examples and case studies, it shows how to use state-of-the-art tools for achieving strategic goals, such as customer survey, core competency analysis, benchmarking, house of activities, reverse engineering to cascade strategy so everyone can act to create value for the organization.In today's highly pressurized business environment, creating value is the number one priority for organizations. The key to achieving this is having a budget and accounting system that supports long-term goals. More and more organizations are now turning to activity-based budgeting (ABB), an innovative approach that can help organizations become more competitive by linking the budgeting process to organization strategy. Explaining the importance of budgeting by activities rather than by cost elements, this groundbreaking resource--the first book of its kind--is a practical how-to that covers the essentials of Driving Value Using Activity-Based Budgeting.Beginning with an overview of the fundamentals behind driving value, James Brimson and John Antos examine what exactly value is, how it is created, and why traditional planning and budgeting often lead to the destruction of value. Following a clear outline of the problems posed by the traditional budgeting process, the authors go on to explain that many companies have contemplated abandoning it altogether. In doing so, however, they must set performance targets and identify actions to achieve the targets: "Once those actions are implemented, there is a need to monitor the execution. Therefore, to drive value creation, organizations are implementing activity-based budgeting (ABB)." This comprehensive guide offers in-depth coverage of ABB and feature costing, a technique used in conjunction with ABB. ABB creates value by translating the business strategy into the activities necessary to implement that strategy. Feature costing creates value by understanding sources of product and customer variation and relating this variation to expected workload. Along with the benefits of using ABB and feature costing, Driving Value Using Activity-Based Budgeting addresses such essential topics as: * Translating strategy into a process and activity framework--performing activities and cross-functional processes that support strategy and assessing current performance against strategic goals * Forecasting revenue, volume, and workload--customer demographics and needs, the competition exploding a bill of activities, determining workload for special projects * Capacity management--capacity defined, managing capacity, capacity management methodology, handling excess capacity * Getting started--creating a business process budget, budget review panels, rank and select activities, cost budgeted activitiesFilled with numerous examples and case studies, a complete glossary, and an appendix of target-setting techniques, this is must reading for everyone in your organization since all participants must continually ask themselves how they create value.

To Steve Jobs, Simplicity was a religion. It was also a weapon.Simplicity isn’t just a design principle at Apple—it’s a value that permeates every level of the organization. The obsession with Simplicity is what separates Apple from other technology companies. It’s what helped Apple recover from near death in 1997 to become the most valuable company on Earth in 2011.Thanks to Steve Jobs’s uncompromising ways, you can see Simplicity in everything Apple does: the way it’s structured, the way it innovates, and the way it speaks to its customers.It’s by crushing the forces of Complexity that the company remains on its stellar trajectory.As ad agency creative director, Ken Segall played a key role in Apple’s resurrection, helping to create such critical marketing campaigns as Think different. By naming the iMac, he also laid the foundation for naming waves of i-products to come.Segall has a unique perspective, given his years of experience creating campaigns for other iconic tech companies, including IBM, Intel, and Dell. It was the stark contrast of Apple’s ways that made Segall appreciate the power of Simplicity—and inspired him to help others benefit from it.In Insanely Simple, you’ll be a fly on the wall inside a conference room with Steve Jobs, and on the receiving end of his midnight phone calls. You’ll understand how his obsession with Simplicity helped Apple perform better and faster, sometimes saving millions in the process. You’ll also learn, for example, how to:• Think Minimal: Distilling choices to a minimum brings clarity to a company and its customers—as Jobs proved when he replaced over twenty product models with a lineup of four.• Think Small: Swearing allegiance to the concept of “small groups of smart people” raises both morale and productivity.• Think Motion: Keeping project teams in constant motion focuses creative thinking on well-defined goals and minimizes distractions.• Think Iconic: Using a simple, powerful image to symbolize the benefit of a product or idea creates a deeper impression in the minds of customers.• Think War: Giving yourself an unfair advantage—using every weapon at your disposal—is the best way to ensure that your ideas survive unscathed.Segall brings Apple’s quest for Simplicity to life using fascinating (and previously untold) stories from behind the scenes. Through his insight and wit, you’ll discover how companies that leverage this power can stand out from competitors—and individuals who master it can become critical assets to their organizations.

Pages: 154, Paperback, BookSurge Publishing