Free Prize Inside: The Next Big Marketing Idea by Seth Godin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
There is a considerable amount of good information contained within these pages. However, there also is a fair deal of fluff. I normally try to review books as soon as I read, them but this one I completed about a month ago. Sorry to say not much stuck with me, which is never a good sign. Looking back through my dog-eared pages, I did like Godin’s thoughts on Edgecraft vs. Brainstorming. Based on his notes in the book, it turns out that people are less productive at coming up with ideas in groups because they hold back, so brainstorming by yourself is actually a better idea than with other people.
This quick read boils down to finding “that thing”, that will turn your product from commodity to brand name. What that is, for each product is hard to determine so, Seth suggests you get cracking and start thinking about ways to differentiate other wise you end up as a commodity just like everyone else. I’m still looking for the ATM that spits out a $100 instead of a $20 but, once I find it I’ll know it was the product of someone reading this book.
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Idiot: Beating “The Curse” and Enjoying the Game of Life by Johnny Damon
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Being from Pittsburgh, I don’t really have a huge interest in Redsox vs. Yankees. However, being a baseball fan and a stats junkie, I just can’t get enough of the 2004 ALCS where the Red Sox came from three games down to beat the Yankees. Just like the 1980 USA Hockey, the story is told about a great rivalry where a team overcame what looked like insurmountable odds and the championship is often an after thought.
Damon does a fantastic job of educating the reader on what it is like to be a lead off hitter and the importance of taking pitches to wear down the opposing pitcher, often to his own Batting Average’s detriment. I didn’t realize how much emphasis the players put on becoming an all star, and hearing Damon’s frustrations about not getting selected as often as he though he was deserving was interesting. Also getting the back story on Pedro, Shilling, and Manny was always enjoyable to read. Reading Damon’s thoughts on living in a hotel and life on the road, especially as a single guy was funny too. I don’t want to spoil it but his story of getting propositioned by two girls is funny, but his reaction is priceless. I came into this book expecting something average, and I was pleasantly surprised, kudos to Johnny.
The only thing I didn’t like about the book was how hypocritical it made Damon look knowing full well he would eventually go play for the Yankees. But granted the book was written before he jumped ship to the tune of $52 Million over 4 years in 2006. Damon seems like a level headed guy, and hearing how he treats the game like a business seems very practical. It was awesome getting his first hand account of the 2004 ALCS, and he did a good job keeping his rise to stardom entertaining but saved enough for the bulk of the book to be about those 4 fateful days in October.
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How Come That Idiot’s Rich and I’m Not? by Robert Shemin
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
Do not waste your time with this book. This is just a rehash of so many other books on investing and real estate. Buying a used car instead of a new one, and explaining how real estate is a good investment over the long run has been explained more interestingly by much better writers elsewhere. The one unique thought here was to become a travel agent using some multi-level marketing site so you could get free or discounted travel. While not a bad idea I must admit, it just did not seem practical and would end up costing you money up front and the ROI seemed like a lot of work over a long time before it paid off.
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Competing on Analytics: The New Science of Winning by Thomas H. Davenport
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Impressive book. As I make my way through Drexel’s MBA program I’m finding anything published by the Harvard Business School press to be a cut above my normal reading material. While most of my reading of their work was through handouts for a MIS class and academically focused this book I picked up to further my education of the Web Analytics field.
With over a dozen pages dog eared this one will be on my shelf for the long haul. The competing on analytics stages model is by far my favorite part of the book. The chart ranking companies from stage one “analytically impaired” to stage five “analytical competitor” with each of the stages in between is fantastic. Not only does this book give great background on how companies like Harrah’s and Marriott became more competitive by using evidence based decisions, it puts together a step by step plan to take your company to the next level.
In my experience most companies struggle with analytics, and getting from stage 1 to stage five is very difficult. While the background and stories are great, the real advantage of this book is the charts you can pull out and show to others so they can quickly understand why having an analytically competitive company is valuable. While this is probably over the head of most general business readers, it is solid gold for anyone in business intelligence or web analytics.
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This is Gonna Hurt by Tito Ortiz
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I was on the fence about Tito Ortiz, until I read this book. The main reason I did not like Tito was I started out as a Chuck Liddell fan when I started watching UFC in 2006. Once I watched season three of the Ultimate Fighter starring Tito Ortiz and Ken Shamrock, I began to appreciate Tito as a coach. He really does wear his heart on his sleeve and cared about his team, which he dubbed team punishment. This was more than we could say for Ken Shamrock.
This book goes all the way back to the beginning of his life, and it becomes clear early on that Tito had a very tough upbringing. Tito doesn’t like to talk about it but both of his parents were addicted to drugs. The reason he is so street smart when it comes to business, is he did spend a lot of time on the streets as a kid. He even joined a gang, and was nearly shot. Later in the book, he does credit wrestling for helping him get of the streets and for staying in school. I did not know of his connections to Tank Abbott in the early days of the UFC, but they were spelled out in this book. The book did seem very disjointed and I doubt it was 100% written by Tito. However, just as in real life it did come across as authentic, and Tito did cover the majority of the topics honestly. The chapter on Jenna was the most intriguing, and the fact the met on MySpace still cracks me up.
This was a good quick read for MMA or Tito fans, but outside of that core audience there are a plethora of better constructed books about the sport. I still think Jens Pulver’s book is the best to read of the dozen or so MMA Bio’s I’ve read.
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Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
This book gave an exceptional review of the Bond Market in the 1980′s ending with the stock market crash in 1987, and the attempted hostile takeover of Solomon Brothers. This is the fifth book of Michael Lewis I’ve read and he delivered a great story once again.
This story certainly filled in some gaps in my knowledge of the 1980′s economic scene. Discovering this book after I completed “The Big Short” made it difficult to believe the existence of the U.S. bond market for mortgages is younger than I am. As always it is difficult to go back and read an author’s prior works, as they always seem choppy and most author’s get better over time, but Lewis did a great job here for his first foray into a complicated subject for a novel.
With all the consolidation that occurred in the banking and financial industry post 2008 market crash, I still have trouble figuring out which companies have merged with other companies in the 20 years since this book was written.
Once again after reading the inside scoop of on bond salesmen, I’m more assured that anyone managing your money but you is a big mistake. Also, Lewis makes it clear that all a salesman wants to do is push you a sale, whether it works out for you or not, their loyalty is to their commission, and to the firm long before their customers. Parts of the book were dry, but what can you expect from a book about bonds.
I’m very excited to read Boomerang when it comes out in October of 2011, and if nothing else I learned how to play the game liar’s poker. Lewis explains the rules on first four pages of the book, but once you get that far he draws you into the rest.
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 Trump University Real Estate 101: Building Wealth With Real Estate Investments by Gary W. Eldred
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
After reading Donald Trump’s books “The art of the Deal” and the “Art of the Comeback” I picked this book up. It looked more like a text book or how-to so I was excited to dive in after reading his biographical style previous books. It sat on my shelf for a week with that big Trump name sparkling in gold and his face on the cover. I finally got around to reading it and realized he wasn’t the author but only had written the foreword. Robert Kiyosaki slaps his name on purple and black books in a similar way as Trump but I think he has been a bit more successful at this branding. I find this practice somewhat annoying but I have to hand it to both of them at getting the most out of their brands. I hope to one day have other people write books and slap my name on the cover to sell more copies.
So, after ten minutes of feeling tricked by Trump I flipped through and decided to give Gary W. Eldred a shot. He didn’t disappoint in fact he did a fantastic job. As I read more and more real estate books this one surely did have a lot of overlap, but it did excel at making me think about re-purposing houses in a way that would make them more profitable. His thoughts on market segments in Chapter 7 were new to me, and will help me make money in the future. I’m especially referring to the part about college students and seniors. I see these as two rapidly expanding segments and so do the authors.
Also I’ve been guilty of focusing solely on price and not paying attention to some of the other deal points like available financing included in Real Estate deals so this was a good reminder. Using the Comparative Sales, Cost Approach, and Income approach is nothing I have not seen before but using them all together to create an Estimated market value is a logical extension.
In the end this book made me smarter, and isn’t that what all books are designed to do? I’m going to keep picking up Trump University books even if they arn’t actually written by Donald himself.
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 Trump: The Art of the Deal by Donald J. Trump
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Before reading this book I didn’t have a real opinion about Trump. I knew he had made a lot of money and then lost it all, only to make it all back, and now become a reality TV start later in life. I always thought he was a bit arrogant but how many Billionaires aren’t. I am now really impressed by this man who dedicates much of his success to simple hard work. Considering The Art of the Deal was published in 1987 when trump was 40 he really didn’t hit his stride until much later in life.
Reading about the deals he put together really helps me understand New York and its many landmarks much better. Having a father in real estate really shaped his life, but it was his decision to go after bigger and better prime locations that really took him into super stardom. No one remembers the guy who builds lots of low income housing, but they do remember the guy who builds the biggest and the best. In the same way no one watches the WNBA because no one can dunk a basketball. Trump is big and always gets the best locations which makes him memorable.
Learning about his first big deal the Commodore Hotel which is not the Hyatt in NYC, then the building of Trump tower really gave me a greater understanding of him, the 1980s, and real estate in general. The book is packed with information but I didn’t start rapidly dog earing pages until the final few chapters. It does annoy me that he refers to his two years at U-Penn as an undergraduate as going to the Wharton School of Business. Most people refer to Wharton only when talking about an MBA, but then again perception is reality and obviously Trump has mastered that skill. I was also very surprised to see he had some military school background from the pictures in the book.
Going back to the Hotel Business the background on the Hilton family will make me laugh every time I stay in a Hilton in the future. I loved the story that lead to Donald’s acquisition of Trump Marina in AC. I never knew this was planned to be a Hilton property before reading the book. I love learning about places I’ve already been too in real life.
I find this book especially motivating as I feel like I’m in that Cincinnati Kid chapter doing small real estate deals now, biding time to do something big in my 40s.
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I went to Omniture summit this year and enjoyed it more than the one I went to two years ago. Gary Angel’s write up of Summit 2011 is spot on and better than I could probably do it myself. The best part of the Summit was Michael Eisner’s presentation at one of the Keynotes. His Raider’s of the lost Ark video was funny. Hearing how he passed up the opportunity to do SEM on go.com back in the day was depressing to hear. He missed nearly a two billion dollar opportunity. Excellent as always and I really liked the Grand America Hotel in Salt Lake.
 The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
To be honest I read this book month’s ago and never put up a review. While the book is great and very worthy of 5 stars, the video of the last lecture is so much more compelling. I’d advise anyone to stop right now and go view the video then come back and finish reading my review. I dog ear pages of books I read and only tabbed three chapters in this book. They are:
Chapter 28 "Dream Big"
I think he is right that we could used the money spent by NASA to instead fight poverty, but by putting people on the moon it did inspire so many of us to achieve maximum human potential. Giving yourself permission to dream is such a crucial theme in this book, because you never know when your time on this earth might be up. I think this point is understated in this book.
Chapter 35 "Start By Sitting Together"
Here Randy lays out seven rules for working in groups. While this does seem childish to review for adults we all could do much better if we reviewed these once in a while. This chapter is all about treating people how you want to be treated, so yet another instance of the golden rule popping up in the business world.
Chapter 39 "Be the First Penguin"
As I progress in my life I am continuously learning new things. Randy says "Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted". This stems from the notion that when penguins are about to jump into water that might contain predators, well, somebody’s got to the the first penguin. Once again Randy points out how American culture places such a negative connotation on failure. He also reminds us that those who succeed often times have done so only after overcoming many, many failures, which are soon forgotten. This inspires me to move forward, with many things, and to just jump sometimes because hey someone has to be the first penguin right?
So if you watched the lecture and want tot read the book perhaps those are the first three chapters you can skip too.
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