Monday, June 15, 2015

一生能有幾次工作? 5 大法則, 決定你的職業生涯 (The Five Patterns of Extraordinary Careers)

詹姆斯・西特林 (James M. Citrin) , 理查德・史密斯 (Richard A. Smith)
online access from Apabi
check holdings in CityU LibraryFind

《華爾街日報》:暢銷書、美國各大媒體一致好評推薦。
《紐約時報》:這是一本高價值、反直覺、啟發人心的書。

為什麼才能和熱忱相同的人,事業成就卻有天壤之別?
為什麼有些人的事業不斷發達,有些人卻走下坡?
為什麼有些人能夠攀上頂峰、繁華似錦,而其他天份相當的人卻從未達到自己的期望。成功的事業真有可能遵照某些模型嗎?

許多人相信,成功若非運氣好,就是僥倖,不過是不成功者的方便口實。同事升官,他好幸運。認識的人領到一筆鉅額獎金,狗屎運。每個人都認定自己和其他人一樣努力,那麼,還有什麼能影響人成功與否?一定是運氣好、時運佳。如果不是運氣好,也許就是政治手腕高明;或許,是靠對老闆逢迎拍馬獲得成功或升遷。許多成就不凡的高階主管,看似輕輕鬆鬆即獲得成功,更強化幸運決定成功的神話。

事實上,生涯成功並不是幸運之神偶然眷顧,好像女明星在等待遞補時,大牌電影製作人正好走進來。人之所以成功,是一連串機會與長期表現的結果。成功無法造假。事實上,道德操守欠佳的職場人士,還能繼續往上爬、停留在最高位的,如鳳毛麟角。即使他們的事業成功了,也是非常脆弱、短暫。

工作人最擔心的莫過於事業生涯的大變動。傳統上,大企業會盡力為員工創造發展機會;但是,在現在這個日益複雜、日漸競爭的商業世界裡,凡事都要靠自己,我們可以選擇的工作和職缺也愈來愈多。目前有四股重要的力量交互運作:

◎ 高階主管汰換率創歷史新高。根據調查顯示,自1998年至2001年之間,中大型企業的執行長汰換率達58%。目前執行長的平均任期是2.75年(較一九九九年少了一年),任期超過十年的執行長僅有12%。

◎ 事業選擇更加不確定。這就意味著有更多的生涯選項,每一個選項都會引出不同的道路。可選的道路雖然增加了,但市場變化無常,也為事業生涯增添風險。(如網路科技產業的發展)

◎ 未來十年之間,你轉換工作的次數,比三十年前一個高階主管一生換工作的次數還多,其原因有二:一方面,減少人力將是企業經營講求成本控管的常態。另一方面,面對可能的資遣命運,再加上實施退休金可攜式個人帳戶制度,員工對於組織也不像過去那樣忠誠。

◎ 已無安全網。在企業縮編狂潮席捲下,過去知名企業翻身殞落,已經沒有什麼事情有保障。你今天加入一家看似可捧金飯碗的公司,明天可能就陷入向下沈淪的風暴。

本書根據研究分析事業發達的頂尖人物所遵循五個簡單的模型,而這五個模型人人皆可管理、運用:
一:了解潛力價驚和經驗價值。知道如何創造職場價值,且能將這些知識轉化為行動力,在每個事業階段創造個人價值。
二:善用20/80法則,凸顯自我表現。擁有非凡事業的人工作績效突出,能提出創新構想,發揮超乎預期的影響力。
三:找到最契合的工作。做決策時放眼長遠目標,會往最適合自身優勢與熱情的方向移動,並找到喜歡並且尊敬的人才一起共事。
四:克服「許可矛盾」(permission paradox)。能克服商業世界最難擺脫的困境:沒有經驗就得不到工作,得不到工作又無法累積經驗。
五:奉行雙贏領導。事業成功的人不會踩在別人身上往上爬,他們是被帶到成功頂峰。

(摘錄自博客來網路書店)

Monday, June 8, 2015

The Opposable Mind: Winning Through Integrative Thinking

Roger L. Martin
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If you want to be as successful as Jack Welch, Larry Bossidy, or Michael Dell, read their autobiographical advice books, right? Wrong, says Roger Martin in The Opposable Mind. Though following best practice can help in some ways, it also poses a danger: By emulating what a great leader did in a particular situation, you'll likely be terribly disappointed with your own results. Why? Your situation is different.

Instead of focusing on what exceptional leaders do, we need to understand and emulate how they think. Successful businesspeople engage in what Martin calls integrative thinking creatively resolving the tension in opposing models by forming entirely new and superior ones. Drawing on stories of leaders as diverse as AG Lafley of Procter & Gamble, Meg Whitman of eBay, Victoria Hale of the Institute for One World Health, and Nandan Nilekani of Infosys, Martin shows how integrative thinkers are relentlessly diagnosing and synthesizing by asking probing questions including: What are the causal relationships at work here? and What are the implied trade-offs?

Martin also presents a model for strengthening your integrative thinking skills by drawing on different kinds of knowledge including conceptual and experiential knowledge.

Integrative thinking can be learned, and The Opposable Mind helps you master this vital skill.

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

成事在天 : 機遇在市場及人生中的隱蔽角色 (Fooled by Randomness)

塔勒波 (Nassim Nicholas Taleb)
online access from SuperStar Digital Library
check holdings in CityU LibraryFind

本書談的是運氣問題,確切地說,是我們在工作與人生中如何看待和處理運氣問題。錯把運氣當成技巧的事——交易市場是個最令人矚目的大舞台。《成事在天》以此為背景,對在我們所有人的生活最缺乏了解的這些因素做了令人折服的分析說明,作者以妙趣橫生,平白易懂的語言,通過具體的人物,成功地探討並解釋了我們在人生和市場中經常會遇到的三大學術問題:歸納問題,幸存者認識偏差以及人類對當今世界的遺傳不適性。 

本書描述了若干個不同人物,其中有些人以自己的方式理解了機遇的意義:他們當中有棒球傳奇人物約吉·貝拉,認識論哲學家卡爾·波普爾,古代世界最智慧的人梭倫,現代金融家喬治·索羅斯,以及希臘旅行家尤利西斯,此外我們還認識了虛構人物尼洛,在自己的交易員業務中,他似乎能理解隨機性所扮演的角色。然而卻也成了自己帶有迷信色彩的愚蠢行為的犧牲品。所有這些角色中最令人一目了然的人,那個在正確地點和正確時間出現的幸運的傻瓜,“最不適者生存”的具體體現者,卻沒有被賦予名字,這類人吸引著忠心耿耿的追隨者,聽任權威們的見解和做法,但是,他們從機遇中獲得的東西沒人能再現,一隻猴子在鍵盤上胡亂敲打,最終有可能打出一篇《伊利亞特》,但是你敢跟它簽合同,讓它打出續篇來嗎?

我們真有能力辨出,誰是交好運的騙子,誰真具備先見之明?

我們確有必要從隨機事件搜尋出那本不存在的信息嗎?

要對運氣女神突發奇想的做為加以防範,對我們來說似乎不可能。不過讀過《成事在天》後,我們會變得多少有點準備。

(摘錄自product.dangdang.com)

Monday, June 1, 2015

A Beautiful Math: John Nash, Game Theory, and the Modern Quest for a Code of Nature

Tom Siegfried
online access from ProQuest Ebook Central
check holdings in CityU LibraryFind

Millions have seen the movie and thousands have read the book but few have fully appreciated the mathematics developed by John Nash's beautiful mind. Today Nash's beautiful math has become a universal language for research in the social sciences and has infiltrated the realms of evolutionary biology, neuroscience, and even quantum physics. John Nash won the 1994 Nobel Prize in economics for pioneering research published in the 1950's on a new branch of mathematics known as game theory. At the time of Nash's early work, game theory was briefly popular among some mathematicians and Cold War analysts. But it remained obscure until the 1970's when evolutionary biologists began applying it to their work. In the 1980's economists began to embrace game theory. Since then it has found an ever expanding repertoire of applications among a wide range of scientific disciplines. Today neuroscientists peer into game players brains, anthropologists play games with people from primitive cultures, biologists use games to explain the evolution of human language, and mathematicians exploit games to better understand social networks. A common thread connecting much of this research is its relevance to the ancient quest for a science of human social behaviour, or a Code of Nature, in the spirit of the fictional science of psychohistory described in the famous Foundation novels by the late Isaac Asimov. In "A Beautiful Math", acclaimed science writer Tom Siegfried describes how game theory links the life sciences, social sciences, and physical sciences in a way that may bring Asimov's dream closer to reality.

(Excerpt from amazon.com)

For more information about John Forbes Nash, Jr., please visit John Nash from Gale Biography in Context.

博弈論的詭計:日常生活中的博弈策略

王春永 編著
online access from SuperStar Digital Library
check holdings in CityU LibraryFind

博弈論的目的在於巧妙的策略,而不是解法。我們學習博弈論的目的,不是為了享受博弈分析的過程,而在於贏得更好的結局。博弈的思想既然來自現實生活,它就可以高度抽象化地用數學工具來表述,也可以用日常事例來說明,並運用到生活中去。沒有高深的數學知識,我們同樣通過博弈論的學習成為生活中的策略高手。孫臏沒有學過高等數學,但是這並不影響他通過運行策略來幫助田忌贏得賽馬。


博弈時時存在,它就在你的身邊。本書就是試圖通過日常生活中常見的例子,來介紹博弈論的基本思想及運用,並且尋求用種智慧來指導生活決策的方法。

(摘錄自amazon.cn)

Monday, May 25, 2015

How to Talk to Anyone: 92 Little Tricks for Big Success in Relationships

Leil Lowndes
online access from EBSCOhost
check holdings in CityU LibraryFind

"You'll not only break the ice, you'll melt it away with your new skills." -- Larry King

"The lost art of verbal communication may be revitalized by Leil Lowndes." -- Harvey McKay, author of “How to Swim with the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive”

What is that magic quality makes some people instantly loved and respected? Everyone wants to be their friend (or, if single, their lover!) In business, they rise swiftly to the top of the corporate ladder. What is their "Midas touch?"

What it boils down to is a more skillful way of dealing with people.

The author has spent her career teaching people how to communicate for success. In her book How to Talk to Anyone (Contemporary Books, October 2003) Lowndes offers 92 easy and effective sure-fire success techniques-- she takes the reader from first meeting all the way up to sophisticated techniques used by the big winners in life. In this information-packed book you’ll find:

• 9 ways to make a dynamite first impression
• 14 ways to master small talk, "big talk," and body language
• 14 ways to walk and talk like a VIP or celebrity
• 6 ways to sound like an insider in any crowd
• 7 ways to establish deep subliminal rapport with anyone
• 9 ways to feed someone's ego (and know when NOT to!)
• 11 ways to make your phone a powerful communications tool
• 15 ways to work a party like a politician works a room
• 7 ways to talk with tigers and not get eaten alive

In her trademark entertaining and straight-shooting style, Leil gives the techniques catchy names so you'll remember them when you really need them, including: "Rubberneck the Room," "Be a Copyclass," "Come Hither Hands," “Bare Their Hot Button,” “The Great Scorecard in the Sky," and "Play the Tombstone Game,” for big success in your social life, romance, and business.

How to Talk to Anyone, which is an update of her popular book, Talking the Winner's Way (see the 5-star reviews of the latter) is based on solid research about techniques that work!

By the way, don't confuse How to Talk to Anyone with one of Leil's previous books, How to Talk to Anybody About Anything. This one is completely different!

(Excerpt from amazon.com)