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SeptOct2012

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bookshelf PUBLIC NO MORE AUTHORS: Gary C. Fethke and Andrew J. Policano PUBLISHER: Stanford Business Books, US$45 PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES HISTORICALLY haven't dealt well with the harsh realities of dropping revenues and rising global competition, but they'd better get started, warn Fethke of the Univer- sity of Iowa and Policano of UC Irvine. There's no going back to the "low-tuition-high-subsidy financing model that has been the backbone of public higher education for over a century." Creating a new paradigm won't be easy, they acknowledge. It will require transformative adjustments "in the way value is measured, incentives are structured, budgets are allocated, and universities are organized and governed." Schools will need to scrap unprofitable programs and activities, while developing distinctive personalities that attract a targeted student base and align with their clearly defined missions. Write the authors, "We predict that schools that move toward self-reliance, with strategies that identify and implement a financially viable plan, will become the top public universities; those that do not will fall into competitive decline." JUST START AUTHORS: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Charles F. Kiefer, with Paul B. Brown PUBLISHER: Harvard Business Review Press, US$27 WANT TO LOSE 30 pounds, start a new business, change the world? Then study the behavioral pat- terns of serial entre- preneurs, recommend Schlesinger of Babson, Kiefer of Innovation Associates, and jour- nalist Brown. In their lively, chatty book, they argue that entrepreneurs don't just hatch brilliant and fully formed new concepts. "The much more typical path is that they come up with an idea. They take a small step toward implementation to see if anyone is interested, and if it looks like there is potential market acceptance, they take another step forward. If they don't get the reac- tion they want, they regroup and then take another step in a different direction." This act-learn-act-again 66 September/October 2012 BizEd pattern leads to what the authors call "creaction," or combining creation with action. They write, "The future may or may not be like the past, but you don't have to spend a lot of time wondering how it will play out if you plan to shape (i.e., create) it." GROW TO GREATNESS AUTHOR: Edward D. Hess PUBLISHER: Stanford Business Books, US$29.95 HESS DOESN'T BUY into claims that all growth is good. He writes, "There is virtually no support for those beliefs in the fields of econom- ics, finance, accounting, strategy, organizational behavior, complexity theory, or even biology. … In real- ity, the business world is filled with companies that survive by improve- ments, not by constant growth." But he does believe in smart, measured expansion, as long as leaders under- stand how to control it, plan for it, and mitigate its risks. He aims his book at entrepreneurs who've already taken a startup through its first successful stages and want to move to the next level, where their revenues are roughly between US$10 million and $100 million. He bases its concepts on research conducted and taught at the University of Virginia's Darden School, where he is a professor and execu- tive in residence. With its case studies, analy- sis, and clearly written prose, it's a thorough, thoughtful, and valuable read. THE MOBILE WAVE AUTHOR: Michael Saylor PUBLISHER: Vanguard Press, US$25.99 YOU MIGHT THINK the Internet has changed the world of business, but just wait: Mobile computing is poised to disrupt everything, accord- ing to entrepreneur and science historian Saylor. It's not just that reading books, watching movies, lis- tening to music, taking classes, pay- ing with credit cards, and shopping

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