A review of the latest business thinking from London Business School faculty.

1. READING LIST
A review of the latest thinking from
London Business School faculty.
© Copyright 2014 London Business School

2. Becoming a Better Boss: Why Good Management
is So Difficult
Author: Julian Birkinshaw
Publisher: Jossey-Bass
Management is universal and timeless, but it receives an
endlessly bad press. Birkinshaw has led the intellectual charge
on management’s behalf, first by co-founding the
Management Innovation Lab with Gary Hamel, and now with
this new book which charts the realities of managing in today’s
global organisations. Notable are the range and compellingly
real nature of Birkinshaw’s examples: managers wrestling with
familiar organisational demons, and sometimes winning.
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3. The Proactive Leader: How to Overcome Procrastination
and be a Bold Decision Maker
Author: David De Cremer
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Not a book to linger by in the bookshop, this demands a
quick decision. It asks fundamental and familiar questions:
Why do leaders delay decisions? Are they aware of their own
tendency to procrastinate? Are they able and willing to
prevent it? David De Cremer provides insights and tools to
identify the psychological and situational factors that cause
procrastination in leaders.
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4. Brand Breakout: How Emerging Market Brands
will go Global
Author: Nirmalya Kumar and Jan-Benedict Steenkamp
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
The one piece missing from the jigsaw of the economic
rejuvenation of nations, such as China, is their ability to
create global brands. Kumar and Steenkamp analyse the
reality behind the excitement and chart the rise of brands
which have managed to make the leap from emerging
markets to the world stage. It can and will be done.
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5. The New Business Road Test
Author: John Mullins
Publisher: FT/Prentice Hall
The fourth edition of John Mullins’ essential reading for
would-be entrepreneurs. Mullins identifies seven domains
for the assessment of any market opportunity and guides
you through how to test and improve your idea. It offers a
practical route to discovering whether your brilliant idea is
worth a business plan and likely to make for a successful
enterprise.
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6. The I of Leadership: Strategies for Seeing,
Being and Doing
Author: Nigel Nicholson
Publisher: Jossey-Bass
“From the leader’s point of view, true effectiveness comes
from self-management, the ‘I’ of leadership. On the
leadership journey it is necessary to have conversations.
Some of the most important are with oneself,” writes Nigel
Nicholson, offering a uniquely wide-ranging take on
leadership.
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7. China’s Growth
Author: Linda Yueh
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Over the last 30 years, China has not only doubled its GDP
and income every seven to eight years, it has also lifted 660
million people (or one-tenth of the world’s population) out of
abject poverty. With its 1.3 billion people accounting for
one-fifth of the global population, China’s economic growth
has begun to shape the world and yet the determinants of
its successful development are far from established or wellunderstood. Linda Yueh explains them.
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8. This was first published in Business Strategy
Review Volume 24 Issue 3 – 2013
Visit our website www.london.edu/bsr
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