Take Command

The most important attribute high-performing organizations have in common is that they are well led. Every organization dreams of having enough leaders. Yet too many organizations take a haphazard or inconsistent approach to leadership development. The result is a dearth of leaders and a failure to leverage the full capacity of the enterprise.

Technology has transformed the way we communicate. We send and receive more and more emails every day. We text. We tweet. We have reduced our communications down to efficient sound bites - and at the same time, many of us seem to know less and less about how to connect. Deeply, profoundly connect.

Collaborative intelligence, or CQ, is a measure of our ability to think with others on behalf of what matters to us all. It is emerging as a new professional currency at a time when the way we think, interact, and innovate is shifting. In the past, "market share" companies ruled by hierarchy and top-down leadership. Today, the new market leaders are "mind share" companies, where influence is more important than power, and success relies on collaboration and the ability to inspire.

The former EVP of Walt Disney World shares indispensible rules for serving customers with consistency, efficiency, creativity, sincerity, and excellence. Lee Cockerell knows that success in business - any business - depends upon winning and keeping customers. In 39 digestible, bite-sized chapters, Lee shares everything he has learned in his 40-plus-year career in the hospitality industry about creating an environment that keeps customers coming back for more. Here, Lee not only shows why the customer always rules, but also the rules for serving customers so well they'll never want to do business with anyone but you.

What do Madonna, Martha Stewart, John Lennon, Ellen DeGeneres, Ben Franklin, Ronald Reagan, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, and Johnny Cash have in common? Each is (or was) a list maker. These successful people all use lists to keep track of their ideas, thoughts, and tasks.

What does it take to win success and influence? Some people think that in today's hypercompetitive world, it's the tough, take-no-prisoners type who comes out on top. But in reality, argues New York Times best-selling author Dave Kerpen, it's actually those with the best people skills who win the day. Those who build the right relationships. Those who truly understand and connect with their colleagues, their customers, their partners. Those who can teach, lead, and inspire.

Did you know that nearly half of salespeople fail to meet their quotas every year? Or that many of the most common sales behaviors drive down sales performance? In today's fiercely competitive marketplace, you can't afford to lose sales that should be yours. But with so much conflicting advice from self-proclaimed "gurus", how do you know which sales strategies actually work? Leading sales trainer, researcher, and CEO of Hoffeld Group David Hoffeld has the answer.

Not long ago, Christine Carter, a happiness expert at UC Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center and a speaker, writer, and mother, found herself exasperated by the busyness of modern life: too many conflicting obligations and not enough time, energy, or patience to get everything done. She tried all the standard techniques - prioritizing, multitasking, delegating, even napping - but none really worked.

The things we want most - peace of mind, fulfilling relationships, to do well at work - are surprisingly straightforward to realize. But too often our best efforts to attain them are built on destructive habits that sabotage us. In Four Seconds, Peter Bregman shows us how to replace negative patterns with energy boosting and productive behaviors. To thrive in our fast-paced world all it takes is to pause for as few as four seconds.

Listeners are offered a first-class education in building, growing, and defending an individual portfolio, one investment strategy at a time. From learning to think like an investor to finding a first stock, from international investing to community-based online tools, this audiobook takes the reader through the essential strategies for building any portfolio, no matter how small its start or how big its ambitions.