Home Advantage in Sport


Book Description

This is the first book exploring the concept of home advantage (HA), the well-known beneficial effect that players and teams derive from performing at home in all sports throughout the world. Despite the fact that the existence of HA dates back to the origins of organized sport in the late 19th century, its root causes and how they operate and interact with each other are still unclear and remain the topic of intense research involving many disciplines, all with the potential objective of improving team and individual performance. This book covers a broad review of HA divided into three different sections: (i) Section 1 focuses on the theory of HA in sport (the concept of this phenomenon, its quantification, and factors supposedly associated with the HA are explored; (ii) Section 2 analyses the effects of HA in sports related to both male and female athletes, in relation to tactics and strategies, fans, referees, travel, situational variables and the home disadvantage; and (iii) Section 3 studies the HA as it applies to specific sports worldwide such as outdoor sports (football, rugby, cricket, and Australian Football), indoor sports (basketball, futsal, handball, water polo and volleyball), US professional sports, individual sports, racket sports, combat sports, minor sports, disabled sports and the Olympic Games. This book has been written in cooperation with top leading experts in this field worldwide. The book offers a better understanding of the HA effect for MSc and PhD students, athletes, coaches, performance analysts, sport psychologists, sociologists, sport scientists and sport journalists.




The Performance Advantage


Book Description

Are you ready to elevate your leadership and career to the next level? Do you wonder how successful senior leaders stay ahead of the curve and remain on top of their game? Ambition alone won't get you to the top or keep you there. But your performance advantage will. Leveraging her lifelong passion for high performance, Agnes Cserhati – a globally acclaimed performance coach and leadership expert – has distilled decades of experience working with some of the world's top leaders into the 12 key principles that unlock the secret to high performance. With razor-sharp precision, alongside her unrivalled ability to cut to the chase, Cserhati reveals actionable insights that will inspire, challenge, and motivate you to accelerate your success. Master pivotal shifts and strategies that distinguish exceptional leaders and reframe your perspective on success. From resilience and communication to the power of personal branding and influence, this indispensable guide challenges the status quo and uncovers growth opportunities that defy expectations, empowering you to redefine your leadership approach and change your career trajectory. Through real-life examples, game-changing practical insights and actionable expert advice, you'll discover how to: Maximise your own potential for success Drive high performance in yourself and others Master conscious and purposeful growth Your leadership career isn't just about achieving results—it's about upholding extraordinary performance consistently. This book is your expert road map through a transformative journey towards unprecedented professional success. It's time to unleash your performance advantage!




The Advantage


Book Description

There is a competitive advantage out there, arguably more powerful than any other. Is it superior strategy? Faster innovation? Smarter employees? No, New York Times best-selling author, Patrick Lencioni, argues that the seminal difference between successful companies and mediocre ones has little to do with what they know and how smart they are and more to do with how healthy they are. In this book, Lencioni brings together his vast experience and many of the themes cultivated in his other best-selling books and delivers a first: a cohesive and comprehensive exploration of the unique advantage organizational health provides. Simply put, an organization is healthy when it is whole, consistent and complete, when its management, operations and culture are unified. Healthy organizations outperform their counterparts, are free of politics and confusion and provide an environment where star performers never want to leave. Lencioni’s first non-fiction book provides leaders with a groundbreaking, approachable model for achieving organizational health—complete with stories, tips and anecdotes from his experiences consulting to some of the nation’s leading organizations. In this age of informational ubiquity and nano-second change, it is no longer enough to build a competitive advantage based on intelligence alone. The Advantage provides a foundational construct for conducting business in a new way—one that maximizes human potential and aligns the organization around a common set of principles.




Beyond Performance


Book Description

The secret of achieving and sustaining organizational excellence revealed In an ever-changing world where only a third of excellent organizations stay that way over the long term, and where even fewer are able to implement successful change programs, leaders are in need of big ideas and new tools to thrive. In Beyond Performance, McKinsey & Company's Scott Keller and Colin Price give you everything you need to build an organization that can execute in the short run and has the vitality to prosper over the long term. Drawing on the most exhaustive research effort of its kind on organizational effectiveness and change management, Keller and Price put hard science behind their big idea: that the health of an organization is equally as important as its performance. In the book's foreword, management guru Gary Hamel refers to this notion as "a new manifesto for thinking about organizations." The authors illustrate why copying management best practices from other companies is more dangerous than helpful Clearly explains how to determine the mutually reinforcing combination of management practices that best fits your organization's context Provides practical tools to achieve superior levels of performance and health through a staged change process: aspire, assess, architect, act, and advance. Among these are new techniques for dealing with those aspects of human behavior that are seemingly irrational (and therefore confound even the smartest leaders), yet entirely predictable Ultimately, building a healthy organization is an intangible asset that competitors copy at their peril and that enables you to skillfully adapt to and shape your environment faster than others—giving you the ultimate competitive advantage.




Investment Markets


Book Description

Discusses the world economy, looks at stocks, bonds, gold, real estate, options, and futures, and suggests investment strategies




Assessing the Performance Advantage of Public-Private Partnerships


Book Description

This timely book questions the premise that Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) have a performance advantage over traditionally procured projects, an assumption that motivates policymakers worldwide to enter into such contracts. Taking stock of novel research comparing the differences in performance between PPP and traditionally procured infrastructure projects and services, the chapters in this book thoughtfully scrutinise this supposed advantage.




What Makes a High Performance Organization


Book Description

How can today's managers concentrate on what really matters to improve the performance of their organization, to reach outstanding goals? The answer is in What Makes an HPO. The five critical factors of the HPO Framework - Management Quality, Openness & Action-Orientation, Long-Term Orientation, Continuous Improvement & Renewal and Employee Quality - will help you turn your organization into an HPO. This book shows you what to concentrate on, how others have done it, and how to achieve it yourself. The HPO Framework is the result of a global five-year research project into the genuine success factors of High Performance Organizations (HPOs). The HPO Center, led by Dr de Waal, discovered what really works on the ground in every type of organization rather than what managers think should, or might have, worked. In his book André de Waal gives many real-life examples from a variety of sectors including Finance, Retail, Industry, ICT, High Education and Government, all illustrating the successful workings of the HPO Framework in organizations worldwide. Also included are many interviews with HPO leaders at Microsoft, SABMiller, Svenska Handelsbanken, HP, Tata Steel, Umpqua Bank, Unilever and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.




Investigation on Performance Advantage of Functionally Integrated Magnetic Components in Decentralised Power Electronic Applications


Book Description

The functional integration of magnetic components is a known technique in order to enable high power densities for power electronic converters. Magnetic components are mandatory in many power electronic converters and many topologies demand more than one magnetic component. Therefore, the functional integration of magnetic components allows realising several magnetic functions within one component. This technique promises lower total size, losses and costs without switching frequency increase. There are several examples in the literature for coupled inductors, common-differential-mode chokes or transformer-inductor components. One centralised question of this work is to explore the performance advantage of functionally integrated magnetic components in comparison to discrete components. Many applications allow the introduction of simple magnetic structures and standard cores or simple modifications of these (flux bypasses) in order to enable the required component behaviour. The design guidelines introduced in this work enable the design of functional integrated magnetic components with limited effort and, therefore, the application of components which enable superior performance regarding size and power loss for the applications.




The People Advantage


Book Description

The main source of competitive advantage for an organisation rests in its people. Many companies claim that its people are the greatest asset of the company, but the evidence is that few behave accordingly. Indeed, when managers are appointed to new important positions, such as their first general management position, few receive any special training for this role. The evidence is that most appointees are appointed on the basis of their track record, and not through any attempt to evaluate the new position and to match the candidate's objectively measured skill base against the core competencies needed for that job. This book demonstrates the many ways that the careful selection of individuals and teams can add value to the enterprise. It also demonstrates that there are methods by which teams can be enhanced through utilising and understanding the diversity of the different styles of the individuals.




The Playmaker's Advantage


Book Description

Discover the next frontier in sports training—improving your mental game, no matter your age or experience—and how to become the Playmaker, both in your professional and personal life. Coaches search for it. Parents dream of it. Fans love it. Athletes want it. The playmaker on any sports team possesses it: an elusive, intangible quality combining anticipation, perception, and decision-making skills. This quality raises their game above the competition and allows them to pass when no one else can, anticipate the movement of opponents, avoid costly mental mistakes, and ultimately, hold the team together. Now, for the first time, cognitive science research is revealing the secrets of the playmaker’s keen sense of awareness. Just as tests of speed, strength, and agility have provided a baseline of physiological biomarkers, coaches can now capture cognitive metrics including attention, pattern recognition, anticipation, and the ability to take quick, decisive action during the chaos of competition. The Playmaker’s Advantage is a groundbreaking book that will educate athletes of all ages about this essential creative capability in an accessible, easy to understand method.