Tag Archives: Fast Company
Will Krawcheck Unseat Lean-In for Working Women?
A new blockbuster book for women in business rocketed all the way to # 3 in the Wall Street Journal business best-selling list (January 28-29, p. C-10). It may well undercut the popularity of the famous Lean-In best-seller by Sheryl Sandberg.
The book is called Own It: The Power of Women at Work (Crown Books, 2017). authored by Sallie Krawcheck. The book is a certain future selection for us at the First Friday Book Synopsis in Dallas.
Released for sale only on January 17, the book has also found its way into the top 100 of three of the book categories on Amazon.com. She was recently featured in an issue of Fast Company magazine. You can read the feature story about her at this link:
https://www.fastcompany.com/3036587/generation-flux/i-knew-i-would-get-fired-sallie-krawcheck
What is this one about? Here is how it is summarized on Amazon.com:
” [This is] a new kind of career playbook for a new era of feminism, offering women a new set of rules for professional success: one that plays to their strengths and builds on the power they already have.
“Weren’t women supposed to have “arrived”? Perhaps with the nation’s first female President, equal pay on the horizon, true diversity in the workplace to come thereafter? Or, at least the end of “fat-shaming” and “locker room talk”?
“Well, we aren’t quite there yet. But does that mean that progress for women in business has come to a screeching halt? It’s true that the old rules didn’t get us as far as we hoped. But we can go the distance, and we can close the gaps that still exist. We just need a new way.
“In fact, there are many reasons to be optimistic about the future, says former Wall Street powerhouse-turned-entrepreneur Sallie Krawcheck. That’s because the business world is changing fast –driven largely by technology – and it’s changing in ways that give us more power and opportunities than ever…and even more than we yet realize.
“Success for professional women will no longer be about trying to compete at the men’s version of the game, she says. And it will no longer be about contorting ourselves to men’s expectations of how powerful people behave. Instead, it’s about embracing and investing in our innate strengths as women – and bringing them proudly and unapologetically, to work.
“When we do, she says, we gain the power to advance in our careers in more natural ways. We gain the power to initiate courageous conversations in the workplace. We gain the power to forge non-traditional career paths; to leave companies that don’t respect our worth, and instead, go start our own. And we gain the power to invest our economic muscle in making our lives, and the world, better.
“Here Krawcheck draws on her experiences at the highest levels of business, both as one of the few women at the top rungs of the biggest boy’s club in the world, and as an entrepreneur, to show women how to seize this seismic shift in power to take their careers to the next level.
“This change is real, and it’s coming fast. It’s time to own it.”
Follow our website to see the exact month that we will present this book at the First Friday Book Synopsis in Dallas. My feeling is that many working women will find this to be a fresh approach to what seems like to have become a perpetual issue.
Finally, who is Sallie Krawcheck? She may be one of the best-kept secrets in business. This is her biography, as published by the newsroom of Bank of America.com.
“Sallie L. Krawcheck is the former president of Global Wealth & Investment Management for Bank of
America, one of the largest wealth management businesses in the world with more than 20,000 financial advisors across the entire wealth spectrum and $2 trillion in total client assets. Global Wealth & Investment Management provides comprehensive wealth management to affluent, mass affluent, high net worth and ultra high net worth clients, individual and institutional retirement plans, philanthropic management and asset management.
“Before joining Bank of America, Krawcheck was the chief executive officer and chairman for Citi Global Wealth Management, responsible for the Citi Private Bank, Citi Smith Barney and Citi Investment Research. During her time as CEO, she was also a member of Citi’s senior leadership committee and executive committee.
“Krawcheck joined Citi in October 2002 as chairman and chief executive officer of Smith Barney, where she oversaw the global management of the Smith Barney and Citi Investment Research businesses. In 2004, Sallie was appointed chief financial officer and head of Strategy for Citigroup Inc. Prior to joining Citi, Krawcheck was chairman and chief executive officer of Sanford C. Bernstein & Company, where she became one of the most influential voices for research quality and integrity.
“For six straight years, from 2002 to 2007, Fortune recognized Krawcheck as one of the “Most Powerful Women” in business. Forbes magazine, in 2006, listed her as #6 in the rank of the “World’s 100 Most Powerful Women.” She was also the recipient of CNBC’s “Business Leader of the Future Award” in 2007. In 2002, she was recognized as one of Time magazine’s “Global Business Influentials” and, in 2003, Fortune magazine named her the “Most Influential Person Under the Age of 40.”
“A native of Charleston, South Carolina, Krawcheck attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on the Morehead Scholarship and graduated in 1987 with academic honors and a Bachelor of Arts. In 1992, she received a Master of Business Administration from Columbia University.
“An active participant in the affairs of her alma maters, Krawcheck has endowed her former secondary school, The Porter Gaud School, with the Krawcheck Scholarship, a needs-based scholarship awarding full tuition to students of exceptional aptitude. She is a member of the board of directors of Dell Inc., The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Foundations, Inc., and Carnegie Hall; the board of overseers of Columbia Business School; and the board of trustees for The Economic Club of New York.”
As always, we are interested in where this book lands on the New York Times business best-selling list. It is my guess that it will appear and stay on that list for quite some time.
The Daily Stoic is a Major Hit in Business Circles
A book that just won’t go away is Ryan Holiday’s The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom,
Perseverance, and the Art of Living (Portfolio, 2016). For the past two months, it has made numerous appearances on the Wall Street Journal business book best-selling list. The co-author is Stephen Hanselman.
As of this writing, the book is # 5 in two Amazon.com categories of Business Motivation and Leadership.
The book includes “insights and exercises, featuring all-new translations from the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, the playwright Seneca, or slave-turned-philosopher Epictetus, as well as lesser-known luminaries like Zeno, Cleanthes, and Musonius Rufus. Every day of the year you’ll find one of their pithy, powerful quotations, as well as historical anecdotes, provocative commentary, and a helpful glossary of Greek terms. By following these teachings over the course of a year (and, indeed, for years to come) you’ll find the serenity, self-knowledge, and resilience you need to live well.” (Taken from Amazon.com).
From his own website, here is what we learn about the author:
“Ryan Holiday is a media strategist and prominent writer on strategy and business. After dropping out of college at nineteen to apprentice under Robert Greene, author of The 48 Laws of Power, he went on to advise many bestselling authors and multiplatinum musicians. He served as director of marketing at American Apparel for many years, where his campaigns have been used as case studies by Twitter, YouTube, and Google and written about in AdAge, the New York Times, and Fast Company.
“His first book, Trust Me I’m Lying—which the Financial Times called an “astonishing, disturbing book”—was a debut bestseller and is taught in colleges around the world. He is the author of two other books and is now published in 16 languages. He currently lives in Austin, Texas.”
This book doesn’t fit our criteria for presentation at the First Friday Book Synopsis. But, it sure will capture a lot of attention from our attendees.
Do You Know Martin Lindstrom?
On Friday, August 5, I present a synopsis of the best-selling business book, Small Data: The Tiny Clues that Unocover Huge Trends” (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2016) at the First Friday Book Synopsis in Dallas. You can register by clicking HERE.
But, you may not know much about the author, Martin Lindstrom. Here is a bio from the Washington Speakers’ 
Bureau that represents him (see citation below).
“Martin Lindstrom was named one of TIME magazine’s “World’s 100 Most Influential People” and is the author of several New York Times and Wall Street Journal best-selling books, including Buyology (Doubleday, New York, 2008), Brandwashed (Crown, New York, 2011) and Small Data (St. Martin’s Press, 2016). He is a trusted brand-and-innovation advisor to numerous Fortune 100 companies, including McDonald’s Corporation, PepsiCo, American Express, Microsoft, Nestlé, The Walt Disney Company and GlaxoSmithKline.
“Lindstrom is recognized as one of the world’s leading brand experts, having pioneered the introduction of brands on the Internet (1994), using our five senses in branding (2004), introducing neuroscience in advertising (2007) and exploring the next generation of subconscious communication (2010). He was named a top “Thinkers50 Global Management Thinker” in 2015.
“Due to his groundbreaking work, Lindstrom often features in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Bloomberg BusinessWeek, The Washington Post, USA Today, The Economist, Harvard Business Review, The Independent, The Guardian and Der Spiegel. He regularly appears on ABC, CNN, CBS, FOX and the BBC.
“Buyology was voted “pick of the year” by USA Today, and it appeared on ten of the Top 10 best seller lists in the U.S. and worldwide, including The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. His book BRANDsense was acclaimed by The Wall Street Journal as “…one of the five best marketing books ever published.” His books on branding have been translated into more than 50 languages and published in more than 70 countries worldwide.
“Lindstrom is a regular contributor to Fast Company, TIME and NBC’s Today with his popular “Main Street Makeover” TV series.”
Source: https://www.washingtonspeakers.com/speakers/biography.cfm?SpeakerID=4168
Vaden’s Unique Approach to Managing Time Deserves Attention
I won’t spoil the presentation next week at the First Friday Book Synopsis in Dallas, but if you attend, you will certainly find Rory Vaden‘s approach to time management very different from every traditional approach you have ever seen.
Vaden’s best-seller, which debuted last month, is entitled Procrastinate on Purpose (Perigee Books, 201
4). In the book, he provides five permissions that allow you to multiply your time.
His premise is different, yet realistic. We all have the same amount of time. His idea is to ignore methods and tools you have heard about for years. These include prioritizing daily tasks, segmenting parts of your day into specific focused activities, and so forth. Rather, his focus is on understanding and coming to grips with the emotions that get in our way and preventing us from maximizing our time. To Vaden, time is not something you spend, but something you invest.
You will remember his previous blockbuster best-seller, Take the Stairs. Over time, Vaden has become one of the most popular and influential speakers and authors of our time.
Who is he? From his own web site, I copied this biography:
As an award-winning entrepreneur and business leader, Rory Co-Founded Southwestern Consulting™, a multi-million dollar global consulting practice that helps clients in more than 14 countries drive educated decisions with relevant data. He’s also the Founder of The Center for the Study of Self-Discipline (CSSD). Rory is the world’s leader on defining the psychology around modern day procrastination, called Priority Dilution™ – in fact, he coined the term. He speaks and consults on how to say no to the things that don’t matter, and yes to the things that do. His client list includes companies and groups such as: Cargill, The Million Dollar Roundtable, P&G, True Value, YPO, Wells Fargo Advisors, Land O’Lakes, Novartis, and hundreds more. His insights have recently been featured on/in: Fox News, CNN, Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Inc, Fortune, and the New York Times. He is a regular contributor for American Express Open Forum, Huffington Post, and The Tennessean and his articles and insights average more than 4 million views every day.
For more, you need to attend the presentation on Friday. You will hear all about the five permissions.
I can promise you it will be a very different approach to managing time, from someone who is very different himself.
I will see you then!
