Committee Of Selection 2nd Report Of Session, 2003-04: House Of Lords Paper 58 Session 2003-04

Customer Reviews:

A Great Resource on Communications Disorders.......2003-02-12

Dr. Lue's book, A Survey of Communications Disorders for the Classroom Teacher was an excellent book and resource. I used it for my master's level class, Teaching Written and Spoken Language and it was very useful. In addition, to helping me to better understand language acquisition, I also learned alot about language disorders. Further, the book goes into sufficient detail that it does not presume a certain level of background knowledge needed to successfully use the book. I have added this book to my personal library and would highly recommend it, especially to Special Educators, but a great resource for all educators.

Book Description

Testing the Limits of Teams provides the framework for implementing self-managed work teams in a health care setting and is the perfect companion and follow-up to Becker-Reems' Self-Managed Work Teams in Health Care Organizations (AHA Press, 1994). This completely new book illustrates that through shared work and responsibility, employees and managers at all levels can devise, operate, and evaluate new systems for fulfilling organizational goals. The authors address and explain the opportunities and pitfalls along the road to self-management success and offer numerous cases and examples from teams throughout the health care industry.

Customer Reviews:

The foundation on building teams in health care........1999-04-17

Health care organizations are struggling with the construct of empowerment of employees. Utilizing the basics for business has not been advantageous. Becker-Reems and Garrett have provided the basics and beyond of self-managed work teams with a specific focus for health care. Real examples across the health care continuum are provided. Book is well organized. Each chapter serves as a stand alone section. Information is presented in table format for ease of reading. Team activities are provided for each section. Additionally contact persons are listed for the designated organizations--with phone numbers. Book is excellent for health care organizations and for students studying team development.

Book Description

The explosive growth of the Atlantic slave trade in the second half of the seventeenth century made the international trade in Africans one of the world’s largest industries. This book explores the operation of that industry in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, focusing on the market behaviour of the Royal African Company - the largest English company engaged in the slave trade - and the sugar planters of the Caribbean, who were the trade’s principal customers in English America. A richly detailed portrayal of the slave trade to English America emerges, one that shows it to have been a highly competitive and efficient transatlantic market. In revealing the existence of sophisticated and complex market behaviour in this early period of black slavery in the New World, the book adds to our understanding of the development of large-scale competitive markets, as well as to our knowledge of the efficiency of resource allocation in early English America.

Book Description

A growing number of next generation Christians are eager to learn, grow, and lead in ministry or in the marketplace. Mentoring young leaders, as they face the unique issues of a changing world, has been pastor and Visioneering author Andy Stanley's passion for more than a decade. Here, he shares material from his leadership training sessions, developed to address essential leadership qualities such as character, clarity, courage, and competency. This is the perfect guide for any new leader -- or for the mentor of a future leader!

Straight Talk to Tomorrow’s Leaders

Five characteristics mark the man or woman who will shape the future. Do you have them? Can they be taught? Why are these so critical?

Drawing on two decades of experience mentoring a rising generation, seasoned visionary Andy Stanley shows how to:

Discover and play to your strengths.

Harness your fears.

Leverage uncertainty.

Enlist a leadership coach.

Maintain moral authority.

“Capable men and women will eventually catch, pass, and replace the current generation of leaders,” says Stanley . “Embracing these essentials, you will not only excel in your personal leadership, but ensure a no-regrets experience for those who choose to follow you.”

Customer Reviews:

A Must Read for anyone in leadership.......2007-09-24

This book helped me to stop and think about how I am getting my job done. Was I being efficient and effective? NO! After reading this book I began the process of examining more thorough exactly what my job was and how I went about getting it done. I have found that I get a lot more done now and don't find myself in a tailspin. Great Book!

Blake

Great little book on leadership.......2007-09-01

This is a brief read on leadership. He highlights a few characteristics of leadership. The book is not a paradigm shifting book, but is a quick reminder of the need for futuristic leadership. Andy is a leader and a clear communicator. If you are looking for some easy advice on improving your leadership skills, this is a good book for you. You will be rewarded for your investment.

Leadership for today's Christian.......2007-07-08

A great look on leadership from one of today's most influential Christian leader.

Andy Stanley is a great communicator who uses his talent in this book to inspire readers on to shape the future for tomorrow. Stanley uses memorable stories and vivid examples to explain all of his points clearly.

This book is great for anyone who needs some inspiration on being a influential Christian.

A Good Leadership Book for the Right Reader.......2007-05-04

This book is a great basic starter for younger, growing leaders. It operates around 5 clearly defined essentials that all start with C's for ease of remembering. Author Andy Stanley, a DTS grad and pastor of a large, young church, combines key leadership ideas and principles that he has gleaned from both experience and extensive research.

The book clearly demonstrates that Stanley has read a great many leadership books. This ends up being both a weakness and a strength of this book. On the one hand, you feel like you could have just skipped his writing and read other writers books on leadership, but on the other hand, this book allows you to glean quick tidbits on leadership from various leaders writings all in this one book.

While most of the book feels like common sense, Stanley has a few points that may be enlightening to those beginning their leadership journeys. I'm still at the beginning of this range so I found some statements he made that revealing common myths of leadership to be helpful. My personal opinion is that the two chapters that were actually the most informative were the Clarity-Uncertainty Demands Clarity section and the Coaching-Coaching Enables a Leader to Go Farther, Faster section. Other than these two chapters, the questions at the ends of all chapters are the next best thing about the book. They help you apply what you're reading about directly to your life.

One criticism of the book is that it feels kind of dry. He uses lots of personal illustrations from his life, but they didn't seem very relatable to me. Therefore, they had little success in motivating me, inspiring me, or changing my perspective. I feel like this book is written for readers who have similar leadership strengths as he does, vision-casting and communication. It also seems a little like it's addressing those who are in actual defined leadership roles, and he doesn't really address that some of the younger readers may not know exactly what his or her passion or core strengths are yet. Not everyone can identify them easily; I know this because I am a recent college grad and all my friends are still trying to figure out the answers to those two questions. Furthermore, the questions in the book put things in the terms of employment - it makes it feel like the book is addressed to leadership in the workplace rather than a leadership that encompasses the way you live. This book makes it feel very compartmentalized. My final criticism is that this book doesn't seem as fitting for quiet leaders or for people who are not in leadership roles but are looking to lead up. I understand that one leadership book cannot cover all things. But then perhaps on the cover or in the intro it should specify what audience is best suited for the book. When I read the title The Next Generation Leader, I think college students... but then perhaps that's just me...

Overall, the book is an easy read that refreshes you on leadership principles and may even point out a few insightful things here and there. I would gave this book 3 stars because I would give it 4 for young leaders and a 2 for experienced leaders. This book might make a good graduation gift for college students. It's definitely worth reading at some point, just don't set your expectations too high. :)

The Next Generation is Here ... Now.......2007-03-09

Andy is inspiring. This book will change how you find, coach, and mentor future leaders. Read it ... twice!

Amazon.com

With the state of technology and the world being what they are, it's increasingly apparent that today's fledgling effort to capture and use personal data is merely an embryonic practice about to burst forth bigtime. Making It Personal examines the implications from a corporate point of view, offering suggestions on using personalization tools and techniques to create a win-win situation for all stakeholders in an organization. Bruce Kasanoff, a specialist in personalization, marketing, and the technology that brings them together, begins with the "one-to-one" concept articulated in 1993 by Don Peppers and Martha Rogers (who penned the book's foreword). But Kasanoff takes off in a new direction by focusing on the contradictions inherent in systems designed to boost profits through personalized interactions--and do so without invading privacy. Combining fictionalized anecdotes with real-world research, he explores current practices;, ways that developing technologies may change this tomorrow; how meaningful information might be extracted from the mass of newly available data; and some unintended consequences that could ultimately result. Understanding and using these principles, Kasanoff argues effectively, will lead to "reduced costs, increased revenues, and stronger loyalty" on all levels. -- Howard Rothman

Book Description

We now have at our fingertips access to immense amounts of personal data-from purchasing habits to medical records. Everything we do and everywhere we go leaves a trail; the difference now is that it's all being recorded, analyzed, and disseminated by sophisticated processing systems. The power of these systems is enormous. Businesses use them to enhance customer relationships, distribute knowledge and expertise across a global enterprise, and negotiate more effectively with suppliers, distributors, and partners. The medical, educational, governmental, and non-profit communities are using them to more effectively serve the needs of their constituents.

But there's a dark side. At what point does this data mining cross the line into invasion of privacy, unethical, or even illegal practices? What happens if proprietary information is accidentally released or gets into the wrong hands? Or when human judgment takes a back seat to computer-generated reports?

In Making It Personal, business and technology expert Bruce Kasanoff explores the how to make the most of personalization technologies without crossing that line. In fascinating detail, he describes initiatives underway that sound like science fiction, from biometric facial recognition sensors to employee behavior monitoring systems to geospatial vehicle-tracking devices-all of which are gathering, analyzing, recording, and disseminating information about us. Illustrating these increasingly common practices with examples drawn from all types of organizations, Kasanoff considers the implications, as individuals and businesses become increasingly interconnected. The result is not only a compelling and thought-provoking narrative, but also a practical framework from which to assess the opportunities and threats posed by personalization-and how you and your company will respond.

As technology comes to permeate virtually every aspect of work and life, Kasanoff sees the greatest dangers to personal freedom and privacy coming not from isolated cases of information piracy or misuse but from business leaders in general who stick their heads in the sand and refuse to ask tough questions now about how best to balance personalization and privacy. Making It Personal is a mission-critical briefing for anyone concerned with a phenomenon that is revolutionizing business and will play out in dramatic fashion in the years to come.

Customer Reviews:

How to balance Personalization, Privacy & Profit.......2005-03-14

There are very few books on the personalization issue so far. This is one of them. And it's very good.

The central DILEMMA of Kasanoff's book is this:
No one can enjoy the benefits of personalization if he is not willing to share the personal information necessary to make those benefits possible. And yet, by sharing that information, the person is risking his privacy in the bargain.

And the issue is much more complicated than most publications suggest: "Just as different customers have different needs from your business, different people have different levels of sensitivity with respect to protecting their own privacy".

Kasanoff refers to a story that we have all already heard, but this time it has a different ending: "We would all like to get back to the old-fashioned service where you return to your local merchant and he remembers that you buy large white eggs and that you like a special kind of fabric. But we wouldn't think so wistfully about this type of relationship if the merchant had run off and shared intimate details of your life with the blacksmith, the saloon owner, and the dressmaker".

Here are the four primary INDIVIDUAL BENEFITS OF PERSONALIZATION:
1. SAVE TIME: Eliminate repetitive tasks; remember transactional details; and recognize habits.
2. SAVE MONEY: Prevent redundant work; eliminate service components unnecessary to the person; identify lower cost solutions that meet all other specifications.
3. BETTER INFORMATION: Provide training; filter out information not relevant to a person; provide more specific information that is increasingly relevant to a person's interests; increase the reliability of information; replace "average" information with information specific to that person's environment.
4. ADDRESS ONGOING NEEDS, CHALLENGES, OR OPPORTUNITIES: Provide one-stop services; allow flexibility in work hours, job responsibilities, and benefits; accommodate unique personal preferences; recognize and reward achievement with special treatment.

Here are 11 WAYS TO MAKE IT PERSONAL, i.e. this is how a firm can deliver the benefits of personalization:
1. COMBINE: Merge information a person already has with that of others, to provide additional insights.
2. COMPARE: Show how prices, quality, or specifications of one option match up to others.
3. CONNECT: In most large firms, data exist in "silos" or departments. Firms can connect this data, providing a more accurate picture of the firm's interactions with that person. The flip side of this is that connecting previous disparate data removes a level of privacy.
4. EXPLAIN: Clarify how, when, or why to use a product or service, or to perform a task, precisely when a person needs such help.
5. FIND: Locate a person, product, or service based on supplied specifications.
6. MONITOR: Track the status of events, news, or actions of others.
7. RECOMMEND: Suggest a course of action based on historical data, the current environment, or predictive models.
8. REMEMBER: Most people are still more frustrated about what firms forget about them than what they remember. Mantra: "Never make a customer tell us the same thing twice".
9. REVEAL: Highlight a pattern or conclusion that was not previously evident.
10. SORT: Change the order or grouping of information, making it easier for people to see patterns.
11. TRIGGER: Prompt an action when certain criteria are met, such as the purchase of an item when its price falls below $150.

Finally, Kasanoff suggests that by making two changes in the ways employees are compensated; any company can simultaneously become more profitable and achieve the right balance between privacy and personalization.

Change #1: COMPENSATE EMPLOYEES TO SATISFY MORE NEEDS OF EXISTING CUSTOMERS.
In Kasanoff's experience - and I agree -, most privacy abuses stem from efforts by firms to use personal information to acquire new customers, not to better serve existing customers.

Change #2: DEVELOP MODULAR CAPABILITIES
To make the first change, companies need to accommodate the differences between individuals. Mass customization or Modular capabilities make it profitable for a firm to support personalized relationships. Customization becomes routine and cost-efficient, and in many cases costs will go down, not up. Much of the savings comes from the elimination of waste and the reduction of inventory levels.

Kasanoff was one of the original partners of the Peppers & Rogers Group that coined the term "one-to-one".

Having May 2004 finalised my Graduate Diploma in E-business with a thesis on Online Personalization, I must say that this book was one of my key sources, especially on the complex issue of balancing Personalization, Privacy and Profit.

If you're really interested in personalization, you may want to read my online review of: "The Power of One: Gaining Business Value from Personalization Technologies" by Nirmal Pal, Arvind Rangaswamy (2003).

A final quote from the foreword by Peppers & Rogers:
"Big brother is almost here. His sister is the telemarketing operator who called you during dinner last night. His nephew runs a sweepstakes and magazine-subscription service just outside of London. The same rapid advances in information technology that are pushing businesses into a new paradigm of competition - the one-to-one marketing paradigm - are simultaneously generating more and more opportunities for the abuse of consumer privacy by mass marketers. Making databases of sensitive, individual consumer information available to marketers interested only in next quarter's sales is like providing chain saws to a tribe of slash-and-burn farmers."

Peter Leerskov,
MSc in International Business (Marketing & Management) and Graduate Diploma in E-business

I'm taking this one personally.......2002-01-12

An enjoyable and provocative read, but very importantly, Bruce adjusts the dial and focuses a great deal on stakeholders and employees, who are, after all, critical elements in the achievement of customer satisfaction,loyalty, and profitability.

Bruce provides lots of examples personalization and privacy (and the lack thereof) that make one gasp, think, and question some of the longer term ramifications. He also offers some reasonable solutions and guidelines to help companies prevent a privacy faux pas.

Your next visit to the grocery store, weekend getaway, or web site will never be the same after you read this book!

Enjoy and beware!

Writes like a novelist, inspires like a guru........2001-12-15

Here's an idea: Forget about the web personalization that makes Amazon such a wonderful site, or that has writers from Wired still breathing heavily, and instead imagine a world where personal memory is "everywhere" -- where your every conversation, trip, purchase, phone call, or jog with the dog is recorded, turned into a data file, and shared with parties beyond your control. Kasanoff explores this world, and notes that it's coming the day after tomorrow. This book is one-third business strategy guide, two-thirds global forecast, and the tale is plausible enough that executives who read it may want to pull the CEO aside at the holiday party.

Consider:

- Data trails are proliferating, and most companies have no plans in place to manage the privacy, legal, ethical, moral, managerial or competitive impacts of this information boom.

- A plan requires anticipating new privacy laws -- and there are ways to do this by examining history and the fundamental constructs of personal protection legislation.

- Acting on information can provide the economic benefits outlined in every 1to1 book or CRM software manual, but success requires self-critique. There are proven models to gauge your firm's ability to succeed with new products and services.

- Personalization means moving beyond technology to carefully migrate to a diverse business system, where complexity is constrained to keep costs to a minimum and modular capabilities change everything from product design to employee behavior.

These ideas are powerful. Along the way, Kasanoff shares stories about data pitfalls and exercises that inspire a team meeting at the nearest coffee shop. Consultants can always explain which way the wind is headed, but for a look at the weather beyond the next quarter, I recommend this book.

Informative without being tiresome.......2001-11-22

I started jotting down some one-word descriptions of
Making It Personal while I was reading it-

Insightful
Readable
Practical
Creative
Compelling
Important
Entertaining

But then I forgot about taking notes. I guess I'll just
have to add Absorbing to my list.

Bruce does a wonderful job of presenting personalization
and privacy issues in an amazingly accessible way. It's
not pedantic. It's not ominous. It's not dry. Besides
being extremely topical, it's a darned good read.

A Great Way to Start a Conversation @ Your Company/Client.......2001-11-22

Mr. Kasanoff's book is a great way to open eyes. Whether its within your own corporation or your clients, this book is a great place to get literate about the intersection of privacy issues, 1-to-1/relationship marketing and customer experience. In addition to sketching out scenarios that bring the issues to life, Kasanoff shares helpful frameworks, both tactical and strategic, to help make the connections to your own business issues. I highly recommend reading it and I also recommend using it as a corporate educational tool.

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