Retail Observer

RETAILOBSERVER.COM JULY 2019 14 Author: John R. Brandt, CEO and founder of The MPI Group, has devoted more than two decades to studying leadership in effective, purpose-driven organizations. An expert on how companies can adapt to the realities of new markets, new corporate structures and new customer expectations, Brandt is an accomplished management innovator and an internationally recognized expert on manufacturing and technology. Before founding The MPI Group in 2003, Brandt followed a unique career path, combining two decades of experience in marketing, management and consulting with a passion for journalism that has earned him more than twenty awards for reporting, writing, and editing. He was publisher and editor-in-chief of IndustryWeek (IW) magazine and served as president, publisher and editorial director of the Chief Executive Group, publishers of Chief Executive, where his leadership transformed the magazine into one of publishing's most surprising comebacks. Publisher: Harper Collins Leadership F ind and kill the corporate stupidity that's driving your customers crazy. CEO and award-winning business writer John R. Brandt offers concrete examples of how any organization large or small and regardless of industry can innovate in ways that will delight their customers and attract top-level talent. Nincompoopery surrounds us all, in the form of terrible customer service, idiotic business processes, and soul-crushing management practices. We lose time, patience, and profits, as stuck-in-the-past organizations actively seek to prevent us and our customers from getting the value we and they deserve. Can't we change this? CEO and award-winning business writer John R. Brandt says we can. In Nincompoopery: Why Your Customers Hate You – And How to Fix It, he leverages research conducted across thousands of companies to show leaders how to find and kill the corporate stupidity that continues to drive customers crazy. Most important, he offers concrete examples of how any organization large or small and regardless of industry can innovate in ways that will delight the customers and attract top-level talent. Brandt has helped hundreds of companies outwit their competitors. In the blunt and often very funny Nincompoopery, he shares his unique blueprint for success. It usually starts by asking simple questions such as: • Why should our customers have to rekey their data multiple times to make a single purchase? • Why are there four levels of approval just to order basic supplies? • Why can't we get qualified candidates for open positions, or provide new employees with decent training? • In short: How did we become such nincompoops? And when will we stop? Nincompoopery offers leaders the answers they need and promises the profits they crave, with a scoop of humor on the side. Enjoy! B O O K R E V I E W NINCOMPOOPERY: Why your customers hate you and how to fix it RO

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