More than 11,000 business books are published every year—an overwhelming choice for busy professionals. Therefore, in partnership with getAbstract, Training brings you August’s top three business books recommended to our readers.
“The Best Teacher in You. How to Accelerate Learning and Change Lives.” By Robert E. Quinn, Katherine Heynoski, Mike Thomas, and Gretchen M. Spreitzer (Berrett-Koehler, 2014, 216 Pages, ISBN: 9781626561786; $13.23)
A team of researchers studied teachers with high assessment scores to discover how their methods differed from those of their less successful peers. The researchers held workshops and conducted interviews with these “highly effective teachers” to glean insights, formulate theories, and identify best practices. Robert E. Quinn, Katherine Heynoski, Mike Thomas, and Gretchen M. Spreitzer share the stories of seven extraordinary educators and explain the “Connect Framework,” a four-quadrant matrix delineating the core aspects of fruitful teaching. (The framework’s full name is BFK Connect; the initials stand for Battelle for Kids, the education nonprofit where Heynoski and Thomas work.) Here, the authors focus more on general areas such as empowerment, transformation, collective learning, and expectations than on specific classroom tactics. getAbstract recommends this inspiring approach to teaching to all educators, and to business leaders and trainers, who will find much applicable advice.
Rating (out of 10): 8
Applicability: 9
Innovation: 7
Style: 7
“The Mobile Learning Edge. Tools and Technologies for Developing Your Teams.” By Gary Woodill (McGraw-Hill, 2010, 288 Pages, ISBN: 9780071736763; $24.65)
Mobile learning expert Gary Woodill presents a strong case for why organizations should embrace the new technology of mobile learning. His guide is filled with information, strategies, hard and soft resources, innovative ideas, and case studies. It outlines a new learning landscape featuring participant freedom, virtual worlds, gaming, collective communication, and self-generated curricula. Woodill stresses that mobile learning is in its infancy and its effectiveness remains limited. You may see his concepts as the latest sci-fi, pie in the sky—or as the tip of a wedge that sunders corporate education and ushers in methods of learning that today’s trainers can scarcely imagine. With billions of mobile phones in use worldwide, getAbstract thinks this book merits a careful read by managers, trainers, HR and IT professionals, futurists, and educators of all stripes.
Rating (out of 10): 7
Applicability: 7
Innovation: 6
Style: 6
“Engaged! Outbehave Your Competition to Create Customers for Life.” By Gregg Lederman (Evolve Publishing, 2013, 240 Pages, ISBN: 9780989322218; $9.40)
Management consultant Gregg Lederman believes many companies overlook the obvious: Your employees’ “behaviors”—not your marketing slogans—shape customer attitudes about your business more than any other factor. Define a common set of behaviors for your employees, or they’ll devise their own ways to fulfill your marketing promises. Those results can be good or bad, but they definitely will be inconsistent. Try Lederman’s solution: Put every employee on the same page with a customer-service makeover he calls “Living the Brand.” His system is designed to help you establish a company mindset, define desired behaviors, and hold employees accountable for delivering a terrific customer experience. In an effort to make his advice universal, Lederman frequently favors the conceptual over the concrete. His book could benefit from more specific examples of behaviors and stories of how to put his ideas into practice; he makes you want to know. getAbstract recommends this approach to managers seeking to inspire their employees so they can develop loyal customers.
Rating (out of 10): 7
Applicability: 8
Innovation: 7
Style: 6
For five-page summaries of these and more than 10,000 other titles, visit http://www.getabstract.com/affiliate/trainingmagazine
