Creating Relevance in a Time of Uncertainty


Book Description

Marketing, when you boil it all down, deals with just two things: figuring out who you want to sell to and then determining how you are going to get them to buy your product, service, or idea. In Relevance: The Power to Change Minds and Behavior and Stay Ahead of the Competition, Andrea Coville, who heads a global marketing and public relations agency, successfully showed us how to get today's busy, distracted consumers to buy. Booklist called Relevance a thought-provoking guide to success in today's noisy communications world. Here, in her follow-up work, Coville's focus is on helping you create Relevance in our current moment of uncertainty caused by the pandemic, social unrest, and ever-increasing technological change. She lays out, in step-by-step fashion, what you need to do and how to do it. And Coville also provides numerous case studies--profiling large global companies, smaller firms, nonprofits, and universities--who have created Relevance successfully. It has never been more difficult to get people to listen to what you have to say. Coville explains why you have to create deep, lasting, and mutually satisfying relationships with the people who keep you in business--and then she shows you how to do it. By the time you are done reading, you will have a series of strategies that have been proven to work when it comes to changing minds and behavior, strategies that will help you stay ahead of the competition. You will also be able to craft an effective marketing strategy that will allow your message to reach today's busy, distracted customers (a description that fits just about everyone you are trying to reach). As Richard Cote, executive director for Advancement at the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth, correctly points out: Whether you work for an Ivy League college, a nonprofit organization, or a for-profit enterprise, there is one common thread and path to success: people relationships. That means understanding the needs, the hopes, the aspirations of people and making those come alive in the services and products you represent. Andy's book on Relevance nails this point crisply. You can have the best offering in the world, highly designed and expertly targeted, but without a real, relevant connection to people, it will go nowhere. Her book provides a step-by-step program on not only building relevance to your audiences or customers but sustaining and expanding it. The book, Creating Relevance in a Time of Uncertainty, provides both the diagnosis and the prescription with well-articulated cases and proven methodology. It's a must-read for leaders who seek the people-centered 'secret sauce' that differentiates your organization or enterprise and propels it forward in the midst of tough competition and global economic and pandemic headwinds.




Thrive


Book Description

Thrive is the roadmap of how to grow your business and drive sales in highly shifting, constantly changing economic times. It is the story of those leaders and organizations that have seen consistent growth through several economic crises-companies that were founded in the late 1700’s to early 1900’s and they are still in business thriving today. In this book we share their stories, their struggles, and tell you exactly how they have not only overcome adversity, but thrived through it. Praise for the Book: “We live in a time when uncertainty is the order of the day. THRIVE is a must-read for all who strive to grow intellectually and to succeed through the opportunities an uncertain world offers.” —Ken Langone, Founder, Home Depot, American Billionaire and Philanthropist “Talk about the right book for the right time! What I liked most about THRIVE are the case studies of real companies and real people who weathered the storms and emerged more successful than before. THRIVE is both practical and inspirational. I’ve ordered copies for my entire team.” —Bill Cates, CSP, CPAE, Founder, The Cates Academy for Relationship Marketing, Author of Radical Relevance “In THRIVE, Meridith weaves in 250 years of business history to show how resilient businesses and people find opportunities in every situation. This is a must-read to gain ideas and perspective in a sea of change.” —Mary C. Kelly, PhD, CEO, Productive Leaders, Author of The Five Minute Leadership Guide “You do not merely read this book; you read, you think, you develop next steps. Meridith does a masterful job of detailing companies doing it right and then goes further by adding her insights to create a playbook of what you need to do. Perfect book for the time we’re in right now!” —Mark Hunter, CSP, “The Sales Hunter”, Author of A Mind For Sales “The only certainty in business is there will be times of great uncertainty. It’s how you react when your world—or the world—doesn’t go as planned that determines your future. Meridith studies how companies have thrived in their uncertain times to become global market leaders and shares the proven success strategies that you can implement in your business to do the same. If there was ever a time where our world needed this book, it’s now. Read it. Study it. And thrive!” —Sam Richter, CSP, CPAE, Hall of Fame Speaker, Bestselling Author, and Technology Entrepreneur




Surviving and Thriving in Uncertainty


Book Description

A new book to help senior executives and boards get smart about risk management The ability of businesses to survive and thrive often requires unconventional thinking and calculated risk taking. The key is to make the right decisions—even under the most risky, uncertain, and turbulent conditions. In the new book, Surviving and Thriving in Uncertainty: Creating the Risk Intelligent Enterprise, authors Rick Funston and Steve Wagner suggest that effective risk taking is needed in order to innovate, stay competitive, and drive value creation. Based on their combined decades of experience as practitioners, consultants, and advisors to numerous business professionals throughout the world, Funston and Wagner discuss the adoption of 10 essential and practical skills, which will improve agility, resilience, and realize benefits: Challenging basic business assumptions can help identify "Black Swans" and provide first-mover advantage Defining the corporate risk appetite and risk tolerances can help reduce the risk of ruin. Anticipating potential causes of failure can improve chances of survival and success through improved preparedness. Factoring in velocity and momentum can improve speed of response and recovery. Verifying sources and the reliability of information can improve insights for decision making and thus decision quality. Taking a longer-term perspective can aid in identifying the potential unintended consequences of short-term decisions.




Profiting From Uncertainty


Book Description

What manager is not anxious about the future? We live in a white-knuckled age of rapid technological change and global instability. But uncertainty is not the enemy, says management expert Paul J. H. Schoemaker. It is where the greatest opportunities are. To unlock these opportunities, however, requires a very different approach to strategy and implementation. In this pioneering book, Dr. Schoemaker presents a systematic approach that combines concepts such as scenario planning, options thinking, and dynamic monitoring to create novel strategies for profiting from ambiguity. Building on his experience with more than one hundred consulting projects in fields ranging from health care to manufacturing, from utilities to financial services, Schoemaker shows how major corporations throughout the world have used his pathbreaking methodology to prepare for an uncertain future and profit from it. In this first comprehensive approach to the subject, Schoemaker shows the reader (1) how to develop and analyze multiple industry scenarios, (2) craft nimble strategies with just the right amount of flexibility, (3) implement them using an options approach, and (4) make real-time adjustments through dynamic monitoring. As a leading academic thinker and practitioner, the author draws on the frontiers of decision science, organization theory, strategy, and cognitive psychology to integrate the most practical contributions these various fields have made to navigating uncertainty. More than any other capability, skill in seizing initiatives in shifting, unpredictable circumstances is the key to success. Profiting from Uncertainty provides a road map to do just that. This book was first published in 2002, well ahead of the mega turmoil that befell the world in 2008 and beyond. The methods and tools described here have been used by many companies and are even more relevant today than when originally published. You can’t do without them.




Risky Teaching


Book Description

Risky Teaching examines the role of risk and uncertainty in teaching and learning in higher education. Discussing the current landscape of higher education and the challenges and opportunities we face, this book synthesizes a range of evidence-based and high-impact practices both in and out of the classroom, offering practical strategies and thought-provoking ideas on educational innovation for students and faculty. Covering topics such as taking risks inside the classroom, innovative teaching methods outside the classroom, rethinking assessment, and sustaining creativity as we grow in our careers, this practical resource is for faculty and instructors to work within and through uncertainty. The book also explores the inward challenges and opportunities associated with risky teaching and how institutional leaders can encourage productive risk-taking throughout the organization. This important text is for faculty and instructors in higher education who want to help their students thrive in a complex, unscripted, and disruptive world.




Surfing Uncertainty


Book Description

Exciting new theories in neuroscience, psychology, and artificial intelligence are revealing minds like ours as predictive minds, forever trying to guess the incoming streams of sensory stimulation before they arrive. In this up-to-the-minute treatment, philosopher and cognitive scientist Andy Clark explores new ways of thinking about perception, action, and the embodied mind.




The Uncertainty Mindset


Book Description

Innovation is how businesses stay ahead of the competition and adapt to market conditions that change in unpredictable and uncertain ways. In the first decade of the twenty-first century, high-end cuisine underwent a profound transformation. Once an industry that prioritized consistency and reliability, it turned into one where constant change was a competitive necessity. A top restaurant’s reputation and success have become so closely bound up with its ability to innovate that a new organizational form, the culinary research and development team, has emerged. The best of these R&D teams continually expand the frontiers of food—they invent a constant stream of new dishes, new cooking processes and methods, and even new ways of experiencing food. How do they achieve this nonstop novelty? And what can culinary research and development teach us about how organizations innovate? Vaughn Tan opens up the black box of elite culinary R&D to provide essential insights. Drawing on years of unprecedented access to the best and most influential culinary R&D teams in the world, he reveals how they exemplify what he calls the uncertainty mindset. Such a mindset intentionally incorporates uncertainty into organization design rather than simply trying to reduce risk. It changes how organizations hire, set goals, and motivate team members and leads organizations to work in highly unconventional ways. A revelatory look at the R&D kitchen, The Uncertainty Mindset upends conventional wisdom about how to organize for innovation and offers practical insights for businesses trying to become innovative and adaptable.




Handbook of the Uncertain Self


Book Description

This Handbook explores the cognitive, motivational, interpersonal, clinical, and applied aspects of personal uncertainty. It showcases both the diversity and the unity that defines contemporary perspectives on uncertainty in self within social and personality psychology. The contributions to the volume are all written by distinguished scholars in personality, social psychology, and clinical psychology united by their common focus on the causes and consequences of self-uncertainty. Chapters explore the similarities and differences between personal uncertainty and other psychological experiences in terms of their nature and relationship with human thought, emotion, motivation, and behavior. Specific challenges posed by personal uncertainty and the coping strategies people develop in their daily life are identified. There is an assessment of the potential negative and positive repercussions of coping with the specific experience of self-uncertainty, including academic, health, and relationship outcomes. Throughout, strategies specifically designed to assist others in confronting the unique challenges posed by self-uncertainty in ways that emphasize healthy psychological functioning and growth are promoted. In addition, the contributions to the Handbook touch on the psychological, social, and cultural context of the new millennium, including concepts such as Friedman’s "flat world," confidence, the absence of doubt in world leaders, the threat of terrorism since 9/11, the arts, doubt and religious belief, and views of doubt as the universal condition of humankind. The Handbook is an invaluable resource for researchers, practitioners, and senior undergraduate and graduate students in social and personality psychology, clinical and counseling psychology, educational psychology, and developmental psychology.




The Upside of Uncertainty


Book Description

A science-backed guide for navigating and thriving through uncertainty—based on interviews and insights from world-renowned leaders, innovators, entrepreneurs, artists, and creatives. Whether you're searching for courage to start a new project, change careers, launch a business, develop an idea, or reinvent yourself after a disappointment or life change, you will face uncertainty—that ambiguous and uncomfortable state that often makes us feel confused, anxious, and afraid to act. Though these moments are difficult, they offer opportunities for personal growth, innovation, and creativity. In The Upside of Uncertainty, INSEAD professor Nathan Furr and entrepreneur Susannah Harmon Furr provide a sweeping guide to embracing uncertainty and transforming it into a force for good. Drawing from hundreds of interviews, along with pioneering research in psychology, innovation, and behavioral economics, Nathan and Susannah provide dozens of tools—including mental models, techniques, and reflections—for seeing the upside of uncertainty, developing a vision for what to do next, and opening ourselves up to new possibilities. In our fast-paced, ever-changing world, uncertainty is on the rise. We face it every day. But few of us have been taught the techniques to navigate it well. The Upside of Uncertainty provides the inspiration, tools, and strategies you need to thrive through the inevitable plot twists in your life and career.




Surviving and Thriving in Uncertainty


Book Description

A new book to help senior executives and boards get smart about risk management The ability of businesses to survive and thrive often requires unconventional thinking and calculated risk taking. The key is to make the right decisions—even under the most risky, uncertain, and turbulent conditions. In the new book, Surviving and Thriving in Uncertainty: Creating the Risk Intelligent Enterprise, authors Rick Funston and Steve Wagner suggest that effective risk taking is needed in order to innovate, stay competitive, and drive value creation. Based on their combined decades of experience as practitioners, consultants, and advisors to numerous business professionals throughout the world, Funston and Wagner discuss the adoption of 10 essential and practical skills, which will improve agility, resilience, and realize benefits: Challenging basic business assumptions can help identify "Black Swans" and provide first-mover advantage Defining the corporate risk appetite and risk tolerances can help reduce the risk of ruin. Anticipating potential causes of failure can improve chances of survival and success through improved preparedness. Factoring in velocity and momentum can improve speed of response and recovery. Verifying sources and the reliability of information can improve insights for decision making and thus decision quality. Taking a longer-term perspective can aid in identifying the potential unintended consequences of short-term decisions.