Category Archives: Book Review

101 Things I Learned in Advertising School

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101 Things I Learned in Advertising School

by Tracy Arrington with Matthew Frederick

“To some, advertising has no soul, no center… It’s the art of lying.” Advertising executive Tracy Arrington writes, “I would argue the opposite. Advertising is the art of telling the truth. An ad campaign succeeds when it brings forward an embedded truth—about the product or service, our needs or idiosyncrasies as consumers, our daily foibles, or the fixations and biases of our culture. An ad campaign resonates when it shows us, at some level, who we are.”

Here’s a sampling of the expertise shared by the author.  Continue reading →

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How to Think About Money

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How to Think About Money

by Jonathan Clements

Jonathan Clements, a personal-finance columnist at The Wall Street Journal for some 20 years, advises how to think about work, debt, investments, and insurance at various stages of life. He puts an emphasis on preparing for retirement, starting at a young age.

“Chronologically, retirement might be our final financial goal, but we should always put it first. Amassing enough for a comfortable retirement is our life’s great financial task.” Given longer life expectancy, “we need to get ourselves on the right financial track as early in our adult life as possible, so we quickly achieve some measure of financial freedom.” Continue reading →

The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor

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The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor

by Howard Marks

Howard Marks is the co-founder and co-chairman of Oaktree Capital Management and he ranks #374 on the 2017 Forbes 400 list of wealthiest Americans. In this book he covers 20 topics: second-level thinking; market efficiency and its limitations; intrinsic value; the relationship between price and value; understanding risk; recognizing risk; controlling risk; market cycles; the pendulum; combating negative influences; contrarianism; finding bargains; patient opportunism; knowing what you don’t know; having a sense for where we stand; appreciating the role of luck; investing defensively; avoiding pitfalls; adding value; and pulling it all together.

Can you guess which one is the most important thing?  Continue reading →

Only the Paranoid Survive

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Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit the Crisis Points that Challenge Every Company

by Andrew S. Grove

“A strategic inflection point is a time in the life of a business when its fundamentals are about to change. The change can mean an opportunity to rise to new heights. But it may just as likely signal the beginning of the end.”

Andy Grove, former chairman of Intel, describes six categories of 10X changes: competition, technology, customers, suppliers, complementors, and regulation. “When a Wal-Mart moves into a small town, the environment changes for every retailer in that town. A 10X factor has arrived. When the technology for sound in movies became popular, every silent actor and actress personally experienced the 10X factor of technological change. When container shipping revolutionized sea transportation, a 10X factor reordered the major ports around the world.” Continue reading →

Simple Sabotage Field Manual

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Simple Sabotage Field Manual

Office of Strategic Services
William J. Donovan, Director

The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) was the predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), operating during World War II. This 32-page manual instructs OSS officers on numerous ways citizen-saboteurs can be trained to gum up the works. “Simple sabotage is more than malicious mischief, and it should always consist of acts whose results will be detrimental to the materials and manpower of the enemy.”

“Simple sabotage does not require specially prepared tools or equipment; it is executed by an ordinary citizen who may or may not act individually and without the necessity for active connection with an organized group; and it is carried out in such a way as to involve a minimum danger of injury, detection, and reprisal… Try to commit acts for which large numbers of people could be responsible.”  Continue reading →

The Way of Beauty

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The Way of Beauty: Five Meditations for Spiritual Transformation

by François Cheng

François Cheng is a Chinese-French writer who references art and language from both cultures as well as Taoism in his discussion of beauty. Cheng presents some interesting ideas, particularly in the fourth and fifth meditations, within an overall esoteric and meandering text.

Becoming

My favorite thought from this book is the idea of beauty as an experience as opposed to an attribute. “True beauty does not reside only in what is already manifest as beauty… It is a becoming, and the dimension of spirit or soul is vital to it… Beauty is always a becoming, an advent, if not to say an epiphany… Beauty implies interconnectedness, interaction, an encounter between the elements that constitute an occurrence of beauty, between the beauty present and the gaze that beholds it.”  Continue reading →

Nolo’s Quick LLC

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Nolo’s Quick LLC: All You Need to Know About Limited Liability Companies

by Anthony Mancuso

“The limited liability company (LLC) is a relatively new business ownership structure that combines the best features of the corporation and the partnership. It gives small business owners corporate-style protection from personal liability while retaining the pass-through income tax treatment enjoyed by sole proprietorships (the legal term for one-person businesses) and partnerships.” LLC owners are called members.

To determine if an LLC is the best fit for your business, the author explains the advantages and disadvantages of various business structures in comparison to LLCs, including sole proprietorship, general partnership, limited partnership, C corporation, S corporation, RLLP, Series LLP, L3C, and benefit corporations. Continue reading →