Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/373915
69 BizEd September/October 2014 play out in real-world small businesses. The result is both entertaining and informa- tive as they present idiosyn- cratic individual case studies that illustrate basic business concepts. For instance, when the principle is establish barriers to entry, they visit an Arkansas purveyor of children's furniture (where the market isn't big enough to sustain two players); an Alabama fire-hose manufacturer (who knows that the high cost of investing in equipment will discourage rivals); and a Georgia company that makes supermarket misting systems (and has locked up most of the customers by creat- ing an unbeatable price point). The authors—Mazzeo of Northwestern, Oyer of Stanford, and Schaefer of the University of Utah—display both charm and enthusiasm as they seek to answer the eternal ques- tions: "Does this business have what it takes to succeed?...What does successful growth depend on?" The book offers an easy way to master hard lessons. LEAD I NG CHANG E FROM TH E M I D D LE AUTHOR: Jackson Nickerson PUBLISHER: Brookings Institution Press, US$29.95 UP TO 90 percent of the time, when businesses attempt to imple- ment change, they fail. Nickerson of Washington University in St. Louis hopes to improve those odds with a framework that helps middle managers achieve change. He writes, "Their basic task is to fig- ure out how to get stakeholders up and down as well as across the organiza- tion to change their behaviors, routines, and activities so as to implement an initial (and often fuzzy) vision, conception, or design specified by higher-ups." His framework requires first identifying who the stakeholders are, then developing appropriate approaches for each one. For instance, "complementers/ blockers" are stakeholders who aren't directly involved in the proj- ect but possess some decision rights nonetheless. Nickerson suggests several "allow-in" strategies, such as inviting them to join the team or treating them as customers whose preferences will be considered. Fol- lowing this framework, he believes, will "build extraordinary capabili- ties…that increase the likelihood of successfully achieving change from the middle." IN ANALYTICS in a Big Data World, Bart Baesens of KU Leuven makes a simple statement: "As the data piles up, managing and analyzing these data resources in the most optimal way become critical success factors in creating competitive advantage and strategic leverage." It's not an easy task, but Baesens breaks it down by the types of data to be collected, the techniques used to analyze them, and the situations where data analysis is most useful. It's fairly dense material, filled with technical terms and mathematical equations, but highly useful for researchers and specialists looking for an overview of the field. (Wiley, US$49.95) BETWEEN 1996 and today, industrial manufacturer Alcoa Howmet Dover reduced its annual production of landfill waste from 800 tons to 30. Alcoa Howmet is only one of nine companies profiled in Building a Culture for Sustainability, written by Bard College's Jeana Wirtenberg, who co-founded Fairleigh Dickinson's Institute for Sustainable Enterprise. After presenting an in-depth look at all nine firms, Wirtenberg develops a list of best practices that offer guidance to any company implementing sustainability initiatives. "We are experiencing global economic, ecologi- cal, and socioeconomic justice problems," Wirtenberg writes. "We are at a critical juncture, and there is little time left." (Praeger, US$48) WHILE HUNDREDS of business authors focus on designing strategy or improving sales, very few discuss Aligning Strategy and Sales, as Har- vard's Frank Cespedes does. But strategic plans will fail if they're not effectively implemented on the front line, he notes, and salespeople who don't understand the company's goals will never meet the right quotas. "As a leader in your firm, you can worry prudently and diligently all you want about 'disruptive innovations,' but you ultimately need a sales effort aligned with strategy to do something about it," writes Cespedes. He provides guidelines for merging these two essential functions. (Har- vard Business Review Press, US$32) Don't Miss that makes supermarket