Resources Books

Personal Balanced Scorecard is excellently on time and on target. It is one
of the first tangible and useable means to provide for a person the
opportunity to create, follow, measure and improve his own agenda. With
PBSC, we start the long way towards a society in which the person will
become the central focus point, with a responsibility that will be larger
than ever before. In a world that will be more complex and tougher than seen
and experienced so far. PBSC will make the current but more so the next
generation better and stronger for the "personal age" that is about to
arrive to all of us.-- Professor Roel Pieper, Chairman Favonius Ventures and
former Vice President of Philips Electronics and Compaq Computer Corp.

In the world of organizational development and organizational change, many
theorists have provided models and guidance on attempting to change the
culture through leadership development and instilling a sense of personal
responsibility in all employees. However, no theorist has provided an
infrastructure such that the process that will change the culture is
embedded in the organization. The Personal Balanced Scorecard process is
integrally linked with organizational goals within individual performance
plans for every employee to ensure change actually occurs and far richer
outcomes are realized. It is critical in this time of globalization to take
advantage of the intelligence of every employee and find ways of engaging
them as a whole human being. We have used the PBSC ourselves and we have
used it with clients and we've seen it work.-- Regina M. Bowden Ph.D. and
Eleanor Lester ABD, Organizational Change Managers, Michigan

Personal Balanced Scorecard provides a roadmap for the organizations of the future! Hubert Rampersad is one of the great thought leaders that is both helping organizations increase effectiveness and helping people have better lives. He is helping make the world a better place, and is one of the few consultants who look at the entire picture - not just a small part. --Marshall Goldsmith, recognized by the American Management Association as one of 50 great thinkers and leaders who have impacted the field of management over the past 80 years. He has appeared in: The Wall Street Journal - as one of the top ten executive educators, Forbes - as one of five most-respected executive coaches and The Economist - as one of the most credible thought leaders in the new era of business.

Personal Balanced Scorecard offers individuals a sense of hope and a pathway
to get there. Ultimately, all change is individual and personal and this
book offers a practical guide for helping people turn personal missions into
personal improvement actions. The frameworks and questions focus attention
on the right issues in the right way. --Dave Ulrich, author HR Value
Proposition, partner The RBL Group, and Professor Ross School of Business,
University of Michigan, USA.

Personal Balanced Scorecard is an outstanding contribution to the field of
self- mastery and personal transformation. Written from a pragmatic
viewpoint, this book is likely to help set your agenda for a radical shift
from systems-driven change to selfled change. I often ask, if livelihood is
for life, what is life for? Dr. Hubert Rampersad's work explores that
question deeply and comes up with startling answers. ---Professor Debashis
Chatterjee, Head, Centre for Leadership and Human Values, Indian Institute
of Management, Lucknow, India and author of Leading Consciously.

This is an excellent first book on the subject of private mortgage lending.

If you have no idea if what private mortgage lending is about, it has enough detail for you to understand what the business is about and how to get started.

In my opinion, it does not spend enough time explaining the "Gotchas". It has plenty of information to get you started but not enough to keep you out of trouble.

If you are interested in engaging in this business as a lender, by all means buy this book first, but when you have read it two or three times, be aware that you need to know a lot more about troubled borrowers, real estate inspections and appraisals, real estate title problems, bankruptcy, and local forclosure laws and procedures before you start lending your own money.

This is a very helpful book on the topic of hard money loans. It also touches on investing in discount notes. Even an experienced investor will find some helpful nuggets of information in this book. This book not only showed me the way to safely invest & build personal wealth, but it gave me insight as a mortgage broker looking to place my clients with hard money loans. I called and spoke with co-author Matt Tabacchi recently, and he is still in business with 4 branch offices...I may even place some of my money with him to lend in Florida.

Clark's book covers the basics that any investor will need to know, including why to choose private mortgage investing (and what your other options are) and how to go about doing it. It covers all of the different aspects of mortgages such as fees, interest rates, and even has handy tables to help you out. The appendices are the best feature as they have all the forms you will need as well as a comprehensive glossary (very useful!). This book covers everything you need to know to succeed, but were too scared to ask about. It even has case studies and examples explained with real numbers that help tie the whole thing together. I would recommend this book to anyone wanting to start earning money with private mortgage investments.

Clark and Tabacchi have created a masterpiece of an educational and supportive tool that should become a desk reference for any investor from amateur through industry mogul. By providing the reader with an organized and easy to understand manual on the otherwise opaque investing industry, Clark & Tabacchi display their expertise in this subject matter by guiding the beginning investor through the processes of choice from traditional savings through stocks and bonds on to the lucrative market of Mortgage Investing.
The explanation of the reasoning behind the private mortgage industry that tells you why you would want to find yourself in this industry gets the juices flowing and interests peaked. Your journey includes a thorough exposure to strategies of Mortgage Investing, this resource is a must have companion.

This book is straightforward and gives you a tremendous amount of information about investing in private mortgages. Unlike a lot of books of the investment genre, it does not try to sell you on services provided by the authors. In fact, I wish the book had a bit more reference material for making contacts to get started with this type of investing.

A very exact and daily account of the EIGHT years of our war for independence. I have seen Morristown and Jockey Hollow and bought this book there and so can place myself into the actual scene of some of this story.
A great book that answers the question of why people fight for freedom in spite of opposition and nay sayers. Perhaps the military understand best what is at stake because it is so clear and simple when you are doing the fighting and encountering the foe and friend alike, the hunger and fatigue. It is a wonder we won the war but thankfully there were a lot of private Yankee Doodles out there who knew the score.
I am glad they did not change the language and left it as it was written with minimal footnotes. Much more enriching that way. Buy it and you'll love it.
M Smith

Written a lifetime later by a man who had spent his teenage years fighting the British from New England to Virginia, this is the most fascinating and well-written account of the Revolution I've read. Mr. Martin's narrative voice is so matter-of-fact and wryly humorous that it's hard to believe it's coming to you from the distant past.

There is as much social history as military here, as Mr. Martin describes his inoculation with smallpox, his shock at being introduced to a white Connecticut farmwoman's black husband, and the ubiquity of alcohol.

One is struck, in Mr. Martin's account, by how seldom the British /Hessians and American/French ever bothered to shoot each other. There seems to have been a consciousness of the enemy as a human being which made shooting him difficult. This could be hindsight on Mr. Martin's part, but it does jibe with the fact that the total combat death toll for the war (excluding disease and starvation) was around 5,000 on both sides.

Mr. Martin himself seems to have spent much of the war starving. He was only paid twice-- once when he signed up in 1776, and once in 1781 by French officers who dipped into their own pockets to give him a month's salary. Nor was he ever paid anything after the war by a grateful nation. Then again, given that American troops were fed by commandeering groceries, liquor and livestock from local farms, much of the nation may not have been that grateful.

You might be, though, after reading this book. I was. And it's good to remember that fighting for our nation's freedom, once upon a time, meant fighting on our own land instead of other people's.

A fascinating low-level perspective from the eyes of a soldier. Mr. Martin has a terrific sense of humor and shows how much in common modern day people have with our Revolutionary ancestors. The Editor George Scheer provides a high level view of the same events through footnotes. The dialog can take a little getting use to but the reader will find themselves comfortable with it in short order.

I was looking for a soldier's account of the Revolutionary War and came across this rare memoir in the Jamestown, Virgina Nationa Park Service bookstore. I sure was glad I did.
I have read many soldier's memiors from from all periods of time but never during the Revolutionary War. We have heard about the sufferings of our country's first soldiers but Martin tells us like it was as he lived it. There is not a lot of battle descriptions but he is a master story teller who will take you back in time to the days of the colonies and George Washington's army during America's struggle for independence.
If you love good personal history narratives and want to learn about the Revolutionary War then get this book. This would be an excellent book for classroom study or home school.

Private Yankee Doodle, the diary of Joseph Plumb Martin, is an excellent account of the Revolutionary War told from the soldier's view.

Martin campaigned almost continuously from the beginning of the War through Yorktown (with the exception of the first winter after his initial three month service). He lived much of what have become the hallowed tales of our epic struggle for nationhood. He was at the Battles of Brooklyn, Harlem Heights and White Plains, endured Valley Forge (though for most of that winter stationed away from the camp as a forager), Monmouth, the other terrible winter encampments and Yorktown to name a few. Through it all, Martin marched, froze, starved and suffered for his service. It is remarkable that he kept at it for most of the war. (One reads of the constant lack of food (often for two or days) and is amazed that more soldiers didn't simply just quit.) It is more remarkable that he kept at it in fairly good humor - though he did parade with the Connecticut troops who conducted a minor mutiny over the lack of provisions. (An incident that Washington reported to Congress as more worrisome to the cause than the British force occupying New York.)

Martin is a good storyteller and raconteur. The reader will not find detailed accounts of battle here. In fact, battle is mentioned rather matter-of-factly. What is delightful to find is an account of the day in and day out hardships of life in Washington's army. Stories abound of camp life, foraging, marching, guard duty, scrapes with Torries, the hunt for clothing and the other ever-present challenges that soldiers had to endure and perform to simply survive between battles.

This is a wonderful book that I highly recommend.

If you are still debating, which of the two 1998 Hollywood flicks, "Deep Impact" or "Armageddon", is the better comet catastrophe movie, you will get delivered from this nagging question by reading this 1995 book: none of the above. I am amazed that Hollywood DIDN'T exploit the in reality much more gloomy scenarios of a comet impact's chain reactions leading to the effacement of the human habitat by multiple means.

The book starts out with the realization process of modern human society that comets are one of the biggest threats. Actually, the author thinks that comet awareness hasn't sharpened sufficiently yet and sets out to change that, successfully so for anyone who reads this book. From the discovery of solar system planetory impacts to the ongoing search for the remains of Earth' comet craters and the quest of mapping space in search for the villains of iron and ice, the author lets us know the high probability of global killers. In the process thwarting the current easy-going negligence, caused by what he terms 6-10,000 years of freak climate stability on Earth (equaling relatively comet-free times), responsible for the possibility of the emergence of human civilization and the population boom. Concluding with 10 random computer probability simulation scenarios of how the 20th century could have looked like in parallel universes. In between filling the book with the ugly comet consequences BEYOND cratering, shock wave, mega tsunami and dust-induced perennial nightly winter, I had never heard of before.

Some of my questions from reading other books got solved, most of all the so-called mystery of the Libyan desert glass (in Egypt), which is vitrified sand over a large circular area. The yellowpress book Technology of the Gods: The Incredible Sciences of the Ancients mused about ancient nuclear warfare (I am not kidding), since this isn't a crater (yet mentioning nuclear cratering in another chapter). Whereas already half a decade before, this book had explained the effects of both nuclear and cometory explosions on the ground or in the air, causing either cratering or intense burning. (It is called a meteor, if it doesn't survive Earth' atmosphere and a meteorite, if it reaches the ground.)

The book may be dusted already, after all human knowledge currently doubles every five years. It becomes evident that it was written before September 11th, 2001 and the 2004 Christmas tsunami. Yet both deep impacts on the human psyche are explained in principle in this book: Unusual events eclipsing more deadly continuities. The average earth quake saving more lives by interrupting traffic (accidents) than killing others. More US-Americans killed in post-invasion Iraq than on September 11th. A neo-colonial induced economic tsunami sweeping Africa several times a year. So even on the level of reasoning about human perceptions, this book is worth the read and even some of the obviously dusted parts are translateable to an update of mind.

Actually, there has been an 1997 paperback update of three pages: More historic evidence found including a 580 A.D. match of one of the fictitious simulations about France's Orleans. The most scary part, I may say. Also the 1996 1st time confirmation of one of the theories extrapolated in the first edition of the book a year earlier: Earth "capturing" cometary debris, i.e. forcing it into temporary orbit.

In 1999, a more unorthodox book was first published - referencing this book - suggesting that human civilization had already lived through at least two such global killers - which merged into the flood stories. It suggests, megalithic structures on the Irish/British Isles were used to train people from far away places how to detect future comets and how to rebuild civilization after the strike - with Biblical Enoch and Noah being the ones in the position to apply that training. The book avers much higher tsunamis than "Rain of Iron and Ice", but it is fascinating reading: Uriel's Machine: Uncovering the Secrets of Stonehenge, Noah's Flood and the Dawn of Civilization. In Voyages of the Pyramid Builders: The True Origins of the Pyramids from Lost Egypt to Ancient America a similar historic scenario is described for Sundaland (once dry land of today's south-east Asian island nations world of Indonesia etc.).

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The need for radioastronomy to detect near Earth objects on the day-side is documented in this book. Amateur astronomers have a real opportunity to potentially save all life on Earth. Despite the efforts expended (mostly since 1994, after the impact of the fragments of Shoemaker-Levy 9 on Jupiter) the estimate is that 90 per cent of nearby asteroids are unknown. As David Morrison has warned, nothing can be told about the unknown majority, and the odds are that there will be no warning.

At least four large impacts occurred during the 20th century, the best known being the Tunguska object in 1908. I was a bit startled to learn of the small 1919 impact on Lake Michigan (p 159) having never heard anything about this from elderly folklore-prone relatives.

Perhaps most useful is Lewis' discussion of the various myths about our safety from such impacts.

See also "Night Comes to the Cretaceous" by James Lawrence Powell.

This book by John Lewis is very intriguing read. Roughly 220 pages with fifteen chapters, and easy to read. He explored the threats from space as well discussed the asteroid impacts from the past in our solar system, including that of Mars, Moon, Mercury, and even the impacts on asteroids themselves.

Out of all informative and fascinating chapters in this book, I felt the fourteenth chapter is most chilling to read because the author brings the reader to experience each scenario of impacts from A to J. Each is frightening as one begin to see, as the computer simulations show, what it would be like to be collided with the iron asteroid.

Overall, I felt this book is directed towards bringing the public awareness of the threats from space as it is likely. Not everyone ever believes that Earth will get hit by comets or asteroids, and that we are safe from such threats. This book can help one to understand the grace issue of such threats, and why we would need to look up and be aware of such cosmic events will happen, and it is just the matter of when. This book will surely be added to that awareness.

In my opinion, I really recommend this book.

This book is a natural five-star. It clearly and eloquently discusses the threat from asteroids and comets. The scenario of a SMALL asteroid falling in the Philippine Sea should be eye-opening to even the most jaded. Also especially worth reading are the chapters on Mercury and on computer created scenarios of falls over a century's time. The book maintains a steady pace throughout, and is a must for anyone interested in meteoritics.

This fine book is designed primarily with one goal in mind. Aimed at a popular audience, it is written to counteract the unfortunately widespread myth that no one has ever been killed, or will ever be killed, by a falling asteroid or meteor. John Lewis reworks this statement, reminding us that the way it should be phrased is as follows: "no one as ever been killed or hurt by a meteor or asteroid in the presence of a Western, 20th/21st century journalist or meteoriticist."

This book demonstrates, through statistics and anecdotes, that it is more than just a question of occasional asteroids like the one that killed the dinosaurs, or like the ones in the asteroid movies from the summer of 1999. There is an extremely wide range of asteroids, meteors, and other random space-rocks, of all different shapes, sizes, and compositions. The ones large enough to do fairly serious damage land all over the planet, and substantially more often than many of us tend to believe.

Chapter 14 alone is worth the price of the book. In it, Dr. Lewis shows us computer simulations of several likely asteroid strikes. Let me clarify that -- he presents the results of computer simulations of 10 randomly computer-generated "centuries" on Earth, and what the statistical likelihood of pretty awful asteroid collisions are in each century. Many of the simulations are pretty terrifying. The one that opens the chapter, taking place in the Phillipines, is one of the most horrifying things you'll ever read.

Another valuable part of the book is the table in chapter 13, which lists dozens of damaging asteroid or meteor strikes throughout recorded history, all over the world. Stories like this crop up throughout the book, they aren't just in chapter 13.

The intent of this book is to raise public awareness. It succeeds dramatically. Please buy a copy, and get copies for some of your friends. Two thumbs up.

Very useful. Well written in a very readable format. The somewhat dry, sometimes self deprecating humor kept the discourse lively and never became pontifical.

Bill has written a folksy exhortation to "hang in there" to pastors thinking the church they will transform is the next one. With the usual caveats about gettin' out the door when the attacks are personal & toxic, Bill has a weight of experience and a slew of friend and colleague interviews to say that your best bet is to beat the average stay (now less than 4 years), slowly but steadily empower and train up the lay leadership, and open up the congregation to the possibility that God might just choose to work through them.

This is a great book for any Church or anyone who goes to Church. It reminds us that the color of the kitchen is not as important as the people in your neighborhood. I know of a Church that is dying because they refuse to change and they like it that way. It's sad. Dr. McConnell uses real examples of real people in real congregations and how it affects ourselves and community. A must read!

As a minster who has been in leadership with three different congregations who worked on transformation, I can attest to the veracity and relevance of Bill McConnell's book. He starts right at the heart of ther matter, spiritual awakening and growth as the first key to a transformed congregation. Throughout the book I found truth jumping off the page..."If your church is not growing it' dying"..."we don't tell the truth becasue in church we don't want people to be angry"..."somehow we've let seniority become more inportant in picking leaders than spiritual depth"...it takes purpose, willingness to change, and leadership (all three)to transform and grow a congregation" These are the gems he shares from experience and hard knocks. I am going to use the new study guides he's just completing (Mar 08) to help my church leadership grapple with its spiritual journey. Thx Bill!

What I appreciate about this book is that it is deep but not dense. It contains valuable insights about church transformation that are readily accessible to the reader. It is a perfect book for a leadership group in a local church or a group of pastors to read and discuss together. Bill gives you something to think about as well as something to act on. This book is hopeful and helpful at the same time. It gives you a sense that church transformation is challenging but not impossible. Bill is somehow simultaneously irreverent yet also caring towards the local church and that is a healthy combination.

Having been through various Studer trainings and earning my fire starter pin in the leadership team of a hospital many years ago, I was so excited to see Quint publishing these ideas for the rest of the working world.

I'm now in a different corporate environment and am sharing "Results That Last" with my leadership teams here. The translation into the traditional American corporate environment simply works. The concepts are not only well written and outlined, but also the supplemental figures and diagrams really help to illustrate the tools that make hardwiring behaviors work.

The book is easy to read and get through either as a refresher (for myself) and as a first time read (as it has been for colleagues).

Best part of entire book is on rounding. We are instituting it with our agency to complement customer service training. It can be hard to get people to think beyond the immediate customer service problem and a response that will get rid of the customer. Rounding looks at the systemic issues and implements a plan to ensure they get done.

Results That Last is an excellent companion to the remarkable series of books that Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton about creating and implementing superior strategies (The Balanced Scorecard: Translating Strategy into Action, Alignment: Using the Balanced Scorecard to Create Corporate Synergies, Strategy Maps: Converting Intangible Assets into Tangible Outcomes, and The Strategy-Focused Organization: How Balanced Scorecard Companies Thrive in the New Business Environment).

Researchers report that only about a third of all strategies are successfully implemented. Many couldn't be implemented because the concept was too difficult to do. Others fail because the management cannot bring the right actions to bear. For this latter group, Results That Last can be quite helpful.

Quint Studer has taken the research literature on best practices in motivation, satisfaction, improvement, coordination, communication, and implementation and spelled out a series of leadership and management processes that will help you apply those findings. Even someone who doesn't think of himself or herself as talented in leadership or management will get a lot more done with these methods. For most, it will be more valuable than an MBA degree.

I have two cautions about the book:

1) If your strategy is a mistaken one, you'll still flop.

2) Mr. Studer's experience seems to be mostly in hospitals and consulting. As such there's a lot of fine-grain application in other industries the book doesn't describe. You'll have to find that on your own. By referring to the source best practice studies, you'll fill in some of that gap.

Quint Studer wrote a masterpiece for modern leaders to follow.
The book has a broad application of thoughts, and fits modern business issues. This book is well worth reading and applying for results that last.

In the Introduction to this book, Quint Studer makes the following assertion: "Standardize the right leadership practices and you will find that organizational performance improves across the board...and stays improved." More specifically, results-driven leadership at all levels and in all areas will achieve and then sustain outstanding performance throughout the given enterprise. That's obvious. Here's the challenge: To get the right goals, the right behavior, and the right processes in proper alignment. More specifically:

1. Have stretch goals that everyone understands and supports, then measure performance in terms of progress toward achievement of those goals. At all times, know what is most important and focus on doing it.

2. View behavior from two separate but related perspectives: values and productivity. At companies such as GE and Southwest Airlines, for example, there is zero tolerance of inappropriate behavior no matter how productive the given offender may be. At the same time, people are expected to produce results (Jack Welch calls it "hitting the numbers") or seek career opportunities elsewhere.

Note: I agree with Studer that the behavior of all supervisors must be "standardized," at least to the extent that they have impeccable character, know their stuff, provide constructive criticism whenever it is needed, earn and remain worthy of trust, and do everything humanly possible and appropriate in the best interests of those entrusted to their care. That said, allowances must be made for differences in personality, lifestyle decisions, avocations, etc.

3. Make all processes as simple as possible...but no simpler. Many processes streets that remain essentially unchanged (except for occasional repairs) even as residents of homes, merchants and their customers, and students enrolled in schools come and go. This is especially true of the process by which an organization such as the U.S. Marines develops leadership. "Many are called, a few are chosen" and then all receive rigorous formal training with hands-on daily supervision as they are absorbed by the culture and identify with its values, meanwhile strengthening individual skills, enriching personal knowledge, and - over time - adding increasing value to the organization.

According to Studer, "Evidence-based leadership (EBL) enables us to create results that last. What is EBL? It's a strategy centered on using the current `best practices' in leadership - practices that are proven to redsult in the best possible outcomes. The `evidence,' in this context, is the reams of data collected from study after study that aim to determine what people really want and need from their leaders. When leaders apply these tried-and-true tactics to every corner of our organizations, we achieve consistent excellence. Our organization's success is no longer dependent on individuals. It's hardwired. No matter who leaves, the excellence remains."

Throughout his narrative, Studer explains how EBL enables those who practice it to identify and deal with "High, Middle, and Low Performers," recognize the five critical elements employees want from managers, "manage up" to improve the performance of those they supervise, measure performance fairly and consistently, improve employee selection and retention, "harvest" intellectual capital, take a customer-centric approach, and build a culture around service, and serve as a role model for effective communication, cooperation, and collaboration.

Well-done!

Those who share my regard for this book are urged to check out Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths And Total Nonsense: Profiting From Evidence-Based Management co-authored by Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert Sutton as well as their earlier book, The Knowing-Doing Gap: How Smart Companies Turn Knowledge into Action as well as Edward Lawler's Talent: Making People Your Competitive Advantage, Robert Mittelstaedt's Will Your Next Mistake Be Fatal?: Avoiding the Chain of Mistakes Which Can Destroy Your Company, Michael Levine's Broken Windows, Broken Business: How the Smallest Remedies Reap the Biggest Rewards, George S. Day and Paul J.H. Schoemaker's Peripheral Vision: Detecting the Weak Signals That Will Make or Break Your Company, and Sydney Finkelstein's Why Smart Executives Fail and What You Can Learn from Their Mistakes.

A good read. The concepts are simple to understand and execute... and make sense. The Blue Train concept is common sense for today's complex business world.

It is clear from reading this book that Surinder and Bart have lived this leadership approach. Many authors write theoretical books with little practical experience. They have walked the talk. This book is an excellent guide to values based leadership. It is about leadership, innovation, and strong values. I strongly recommend it.

Riding The Blue Train not only inspired me professionally, but personally as well. It has changed my point of view on the kind of person/employee I strive to be and the type of company/individual leader I envision working for. Kumar and Sayle discuss the Breakthrough Journey, which is a road I highly desire to travel on. "Breakthrough leadership is a product of bold vision, intense focus, and hard work. There are few 'born leaders' in the world from a Breakthrough perspective, but it is a skill one can learn and nurture." This book illustrates how you can accomplish this skill to become a great leader by Riding The Blue Train. I have given this book to many people as a gift, including the management team at my office who are also now Riding the Blue Train! My company now sees our success in the corporate world from a new, energizing perspective.

How many Corporations, Government Branches, and/or Educational systems really understand in how to build a business, or instill justice, or educate our youth? This book advises you must first build the people to be the best they possible can be. This book was inspiring to the degree as a manual in "How to Succeed."It should be required reading in all H.S. and colleges throughout the nation. Lets instill in our people the 5 powers of Insight, Inspiration, Intentionality, Intentional language, and Congruence to establish bold visions as so stated by the authors.As a practitioner in the field of holistic medicine, someone once said future medicine shall prescribe no drugs,thus the wholistic aproach on life.Maybe the Breakthrough Journey (the core message) will bring us into a more positive and healthy relationship with the rest of the world and the future.A unique approach in motivating and stimulating the people. Thumbs up on this book!

I found the book a powerful read and filled with valuable real-life stories of successful leadership using breakthrough strategies. As far as I am concerned it has arrived full steam on platform 1 for books on leadership. It puts the Positive firmly back into Growth and People into Factor. This book is an essential read for all leaders who aspire to drive innovation and transformation through motivating individuals, teams and entire organisations. On top of all the new insights I have gained, I now know how to deal with any complainers: I just ask them: "What do you intend to do about it?"

This book was the second book I got. I thought it was a very good book. I read in like 3 days. I liked the part when Ruthie was trying to act like a guy by doing those gross guy things!! I read over and over again until I got a new 7th Heaven Book. I love to watch the show. I watch it every night when I can or when I'm not doing anything else..... I really hope that you 7th Heaven fans will read this book if you already didn't. If you do I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did!!

i thought this was a good book i mean it was very interesting (for me anyway) this is the only book i will read unless i have to like in school but that is the ONLY book i will read out of school, but i can't read them all as fast as you can make them can you make them. can you make some for the older age levels please because those would probebly be just as good.

I have read alot of 7th Heaven books, and Secrets was my 2ed favorit. I would recomend this book to kids 5-10 no younger because they will start to keep secrets.

Mary and her basketball team get there season cut shore because there grades drop. So Mayr and her team trash the schools gym and the get arressted will the camdens clear her name? read to find out! I would reccomend this book to anybody ages birth to death it has a great moral.

BOOK REVIEW

In this book Lucy one of the sisters. Is on her high school student court team.
Her sister Mary is in her signor year of high school and on the varsity basketball team. The girl's grades dropped so they can't play anymore. So they go out to eat and think about trashing the school gym. Then they sneak in and start to T.P everything and then they graffiti every thing and than they get caught by the police and the school principal and they get in a lot of trouble.

I do recommend this book if they like the T.V show 7th heaven an like to read. I would recommend this book because it is interesting and funny. It was a page turner because at the end of a page it did not tell enough information so it was a cliff hanger . So I kept on reading the book. I did enjoy this genre because I love this T.V show and this was about a show I had never seen. There were surprises in the story like when Mary and her friends got caught and when they decided to trash the school gym and when Simon got suspended for a whole week.

I am finding this book to be inspirational and insighful. I feel called to reach out to seekers and this is giving me confidence that I can do it in a way consistent with the teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, our mother father God.

This is THE manual for seeker small group leaders, or, potential leaders. It's clearly written by someone that has done it. Alot. Some books are written from a theoretical point of view, and that can be good, but this book is written by someone right off the front lines. It's obvious throughout the book. This should be required reading for anyone, or any church, starting a seeker small group program.

I cannot recommend this book more highly - it is the definitive text on how to run one of the world's most important ministries: seeker small groups. Garry has developed an approach to seeker small groups that is counter-intuitive, insightful, and most importantly, proven effective in his 25+ years of leading groups.

Not only does the book offer well-thought-out concepts for approaching seeker small groups, but it gets painstakingly practical in how to apply them. It even offers step-by-step instructions on how to prepare for and run the first few meetings, questions to ask, and logistical tips. Anyone that reads the book will be prepared and inspired to lead a seeker small group, regardless of his/her level of evangelical "giftedness" or experience.

Finally, the book is an engaging and enjoyable read, peppered with captivating stories of individuals whose lives have been changed by the very groups Garry has led or inspired.

If you are considering starting a seeker small group, this is a must-read before launching. If you are not, you owe it to yourself to read this book to understand the immense impact these groups can have on the lives of people far from God.

Not a fan of forming a group just to talk about spiritual things in hopes of being able to share the gospel.

I know for a fact, the majority of people love talking to strangers about spiritual things almost immediately.

Its a lie to think you have to arrange a time and place and to build relationships with people to share the gospel or to get them to a point where they are open to spiritual truths.

The good: This book is written by a great guy with a heart for God. I just don't agree with everything but thats ok. I like the chapters on how to facilitate a small group, keep interest, ask questions, etc. They are valuable insight into the psychology of group management and how people think.

I need to make clear: This book is good. Set up a seeker small group. Its great to do this. I've done it. But 1on1 evangelism is crucial too, even if you don't have the "skills". Just start spiritual conversations with strangers or friends and watch how far they go. The gospel can be shared easily and without force. These seeker small groups are good too, but should not be a major time taker like this book promotes.

Check out thewayofthemaster.com and especially Mark Cahills "One Thing You Can't do in Heaven" for some great evangelism literature that anyone can follow and be encouraged with.

Not sure of how, exactly, my glowing review of Garry's book would be conveyed, I surveyed some other reviews already posted. The most negative stated:

"Its a lie to think you have to arrange a time and place and to build relationships with people to share the gospel or to get them to a point where they are open to spiritual truths."

I would like to thank the author of this review for giving me the words with which to praise Garry's book. If I may paraphrase the line, above, it says that "you don't need to spend so much time in relationship-building in order to accomplish your agenda of sharing the Gospel."

The point of Garry's book, I believe, is that building a relationship IS sharing the Gospel!!! Loving people and creating a safe environment for them isn't a means to sharing the Gospel, it IS the Gospel!!!

As someone involved in vocational ministry, I would like to thank Garry for teaching me how to leave my hidden agenda aside, so that I may accomplish God's agenda. This book breaks the mold of our thinking, where evangelism is relegated to doing anything possible to force the Gospel down a person's throat at any time.

By putting into practice the philosophy of this book, we are able to BE the Good News in a person's life while, at the same time, providing a forum where a seeker may be comfortably introduced to fellowship and accountability as they take their first steps on a path which will eventually lead them to an intimate relationship with our Lord and Savior.

I happened upon this book while looking for some words of wisdom about motivation. I am an educator and pursuing my Masters Degree in Education. I am interested in motivation, and Muna has made his chapter on motivation and job performance so relevant that I can easily translate the metaphor of the tripod to the needs and talents of my students in an effort to increase performance and learning. Thank you, Farid. Excellent read!

The Seven Metaphors was one of the nicest Christmas presents that I recieved this year. It covers seven tools covering various subjects from child upbringing to retirement planning.

This book is valuable for both business management and personal life. For example, the chapter entitled the Helicopter View is very useful for solving business as well as personal problems. I enjoyed this book very much.

Dr. Muna succeeded in distilling a career of valuable experience and wide reading into a very interesting, clearly written, and thought provoking book full of wise comment. I could not put the book down once I started reading it. I highly recommend it.

As a regional director for a multinational company, I found this book extremely helpful in highliting the different ways available to you when you are facing a problem,planning your retirement, or strengthening your leadership quality. I strongly recommend it for any manager who wants to climb up the corporate ladder.

As an expatiate working in Germany, Dr. Muna's book applied to situations that I have encountered in Germany. Although his book only attempts to deal with the management styles in the Middle East, it has a much broader reach that can be applied to many management situations, especially on the Affiliate level in American companies. I found his to be book very insightful and applicable. This is a must read for managers, especially those who work abroad.