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  • The Outsiders

  • Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success
  • By: William N. Thorndike
  • Narrated by: Brian Troxell
  • Length: 5 hrs and 52 mins
  • 4.6 out of 5 stars (130 ratings)

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The Outsiders

By: William N. Thorndike
Narrated by: Brian Troxell
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Publisher's Summary

"It is impossible to produce superior performance unless you do something different." - John Templeton.

What makes a successful CEO? Most people call to mind a familiar definition: a seasoned manager with deep industry expertise. Others might point to the qualities of today's so-called celebrity CEOs charisma, virtuoso communication skills, and a confident management style. But what really matters when you run an organization? What is the hallmark of exceptional CEO performance? Quite simply, it is the returns for the shareholders of that company over the long term.

In this refreshing, counterintuitive audiobook, author Will Thorndike brings to bear the analytical wisdom of a successful career in investing, closely evaluating the performance of companies and their leaders. You will meet eight individualistic CEOs whose firms' average returns outperformed the S&P 500 by a factor of twenty in other words, an investment of $10,000 with each of these CEOs, on average, would have been worth over $1.5 million twenty-five years later. You may not know all their names, but you will recognize their companies: General Cinema, Ralston Purina, The Washington Post Company, Berkshire Hathaway, General Dynamics, Capital Cities Broadcasting, TCI, and Teledyne.

In The Outsiders, you'll learn the traits and methods striking for their consistency and relentless rationality that helped these unique leaders achieve such exceptional performance. Humble, unassuming, and often frugal, these "outsiders" shunned Wall Street and the press, and shied away from the hottest new management trends. Instead, they shared specific traits that put them and the companies they led on winning trajectories: a laser-sharp focus on per share value as opposed to earnings or sales growth; an exceptional talent for allocating capital and human resources; and the belief that cash flow, not reported earnings, determines a company's long-term value.

Drawing on years of research and experience, Thorndike tells eye-opening stories, extracting lessons and revealing a compelling alternative model for anyone interested in leading a company or investing in one and reaping extraordinary returns.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your My Library section along with the audio.

©2012 William N. Thorndike, Jr. (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

What listeners say about The Outsiders

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Fantastic business insights

This audiobook is rich of learning, easy to understand and to listen. A keeper for sure.

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Good insights into how top performing CEOs operate

Good for people who are interested about business and company management/investment decisions. Interesting the high level of idiosyncratic and concentration risk these CEOs were willing to take compared with modern theory of diversification and risk adjusted returns etc.

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Superb book, interesting, insightful and informative. A must listen to anyone passionate about business and investing.

Couldn’t put it down.
A great book, well written with wealth of knowledge.
Looking at the best of the best and what they have done to set them apart.
You don’t have to be interested in business in order to enjoy the and appreciate the stories and lessons. Really enjoyed it. Highly recommended.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Excellent narrative of how to create value

A good account of how a select group of CEO's created unrivalled value for shareholders.
Thorndike describes the self-evident truths of frugality, rationality and relentless focus on operational efficiency that are embodied by the best corporate leaders.
He particularly emphasizes on the importance of capital allocation skills. Frequently, this is what separates the good CEO from the great one.
However, at times the narrative sounds too mechanical and the over-emphasis on quantitative metrics almost seems to drown out some other equally important aspects necessary for corporate success such as customer centricity, creativity and organizational culture. The creation of shareholder value must only be a by-product of a process that creates wonderful products/services/experiemces for both customers and employees. This is the truely successful enterprise. Steve Jobs, Bezos, Elon Mask and many other tech CEO's where known to temporarily surbordinate shareholder interests to those of the customer and their results are equally if not more impressive.

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Different thinking

Another informative book, this book tell u how the 8 different CEOs management defferent from normal CEOs

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Excellent

For anyone interested in being an exceptional CEO... it helps if you’ve studied business as you’ll get more out of it.
Fantastic!!

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A narration of outcomes rather than insights

Not particularly useful for understanding how decisions were made or insights. Much of the book is just listing what happened and the results rather than how decisions were made and why.

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Very hard to get excited while reading this...

I understand this was written a while ago, but the structure of this book as well as the dull narrator make for a very boring audio book.. I do not recommend .

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