Books in the Financial Times Series series

Acquisitions have a poor record of creating value for shareholders. Studies have shown that as many as 70% of mergers and acquisitions fail to meet their objectives. Some even bankrupt the acquiring company. Why is this? Managers often have too little experience with the acquisition process or make acquisitions for the wrong reasons.Smarter Acquisitions will make sure you are part of the 30% that get it right. By following ten key steps you can ensure that you get real value from your acquisitions. It covers the entire acquisition process, from identifying targets through to integrating the new company, providing you with the knowledge you need to lead an acquisition or to participate at any stage.Private equity is now a massive force in the marketplace This book gives you an overview of this recently emerging phenomenon and will help you explore when you could profitably incorporate this option into your acquisitions strategy.

Intended for senior executives, this book reveals how our hidden personalities, largely hard-wired since early childhood, affect the way we lead and manage others.

What has neuroscience got to do with branding? The link may not be immediately obvious, but the fact is, our brains select brands in much the same way that Google selects websites. So, just as web marketers play on Googles algorithm to make sure their site appears as high up the search list as possible, brand marketers should play on the brains algorithm to make sure their brand is at the top of their customers minds at the moment they choose which brand to buy. This ground-breaking new book brings the proven effects of hard science to the creative practice of branding. It shows you how to harness this powerful combination to your own advantage by helping you understand how customers brains work when they choose brands. A strong brand cannot be build effectively without taking into account the laws of the brain which, as this book shows, really exist and can be scientifically proven to work. Once you know this, you can apply the familiar branding laws of relevance, coherence and participation more precisely, more confidently and to much greater effect. This means your brand will have a much greater chance of being chosen by customers than your competitors brands. Branding with Brainsshatters the conventional approach to branding, which is based on hunches and intuition, by uncovering the hard, scientific truth about why customers choose some brands over others. Insights into company stories, from Leica to Innocent Drinks, from Starbucks to Schipol International Airport, give you the fascinating truth about how the processes that go on in our brain affect our decisions to buy a particular product or service. All in all, this breathtakingly radical new book from Tjaco Walvis presents a daringly different, state of the art approach to brand strategy that will help you build powerful brands more efficiently, more effectively and more reliably than ever before. Branding really is all in the mind and this book proves it!

Reinvent your supply chain from the outside in leverage customer insight, heuristics and digital tools to meet rising expectations and adapt in a volatile world. Customers have become increasingly demanding, and the operating environment has become more turbulent and complex. Mature companies wishing to survive and thrive in the coming decades must transform themselves to become flexible and market responsive. They need to reconsider their traditional supply chains and find ways to increase the clockspeed of their operation and their decision making without creating more complexity for their staff and partners. But where to start this transformation journey? Most of the worlds largest corporations have logistics networks and supply chains that have evolved over time, many based around systems that drive a one-size-fits-all philosophy, which does not fit anymore. And most have not kept up with the changing cadence of their markets. This book describes the path to a different paradigm; where a set of tailored supply chains are used for in-built flexibility and adaption as the world changes, and where internal capabilities and digital capabilities are consciously aligned with the customers and strategies they serve. Transforming Supply Chains builds on John Gattornas seminal Dynamic Alignment framework; and he and his long-term collaborator Deborah Ellis review the analytics and decision-making tools needed to be effective in the digital age. Case Studies of organisations that excel using the outside-in paradigm that they describe are scattered throughout the book; as are a series of prompts to help kick start your thinking about your own transformation path. Transforming Supply Chains is your guide to designing supply chains that fit, and adapt, and bring competitive advantage - whatever your business and whoever your customers.

'Whether a complete novice, or a professional portfolio manager, this book will give you access to the mindset and techniques of the most successful investors of our time and more importantly, it will help you avoid mistakes. The Great Investors will have a permanent place on my desk.'Mark Sheridan, Executive Director, Nomura International PLC Leading investors such as Warren Buffett, Benjamin Graham, Sir John Templeton, George Soros and Anthony Bolton are known throughout the world. How did these people come to be so successful? Which strategies have they used to make their fortunes? And what can you learn from their techniques?In The Great Investors, Glen Arnold succinctly and accurately describes the investment philosophies of the worlds greatest investors. He explains why they are the best, gives details of their tactics for accumulating wealth, captures the key elements that led to their market-beating successes and teaches you key lessons that you can apply to your own investing strategies. From the foreword: There are some very special people who seem to possess an exceptional talent for acquiring wealth. I want to explore not just the past triumphs of these masters, but also the key factors they look for as well as the personality traits that allow them to control emotion and think rationally about where to place funds. How does a master of investment hone skills through bitter experience and triumph to develop their approach to accumulating wealth?Glen Arnold The Great Investors is the story of a number of remarkable men: John Templeton, George Soros, Warren Buffett, Benjamin Graham, Philip Fisher, Peter Lynch, Anthony Bolton and John Neff. Whether youre new to investing, have had success in the markets, or youre a professional investor or fund manger, youll benefit from reading about their proven, and successful, trading philosophies. The Great Investorswill show you how to: Be a business analyst rather than a security analyst Do your homework and develop a broad social, economic and political awareness Control emotion so as not to get swept away by the market Be consistent in your approach, even when you have bad years See the wood for the trees and not over complicate your portfolio Learn from your investing Be self reliant, stand aside from the crowd and follow your own logic Take reasonable risk

Clear information shows clear thinking, and clear thinking informs, influences and impresses.How often do you stare at uninviting and confusing presentations, notes, reports and information packs and get nothing out of them? It doesnt have to be like this. We could all produce amazingly clear work that has incredible impact if only we knew how. This book shows you how. It is full of ideas, tips and principles that are simple and easy to implement, yet brilliantly effective.You will never look at a business document in the same way again. And your work will impress the people that matter and get the results you want. It guides you through the most effective ways of using all forms of presenting information - tables, charts, slides, flowcharts, etc. Moon also introduces the new WiT (Words in Tables) approach to give impact to your message on all documents and slides.I love Jons work. His tips are hugely useful, his WiT fantastic and ground-breaking, and his book essential reading. If you want to enhance your sales tenders, pitches and slides if you want to win more business get into Jons stuff. Its really, really good. Gavin Duffy, a Dragon on Irelands Dragons Den, top media coach and economics columnist with the Irish Sunday Independent "e;Every once in a while, simple ideas change business forever - this book is full of such ideas. A must-read if you want to do something about all those impenetrable reports, slides and information packs. This book has all the answers and will redefine how you think about business documents."e; Dominic Burke, Chief Executive, Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group plc. "e;This is a vital topic that has been sorely neglected. Jons book changes that. It is crammed with new ideas that are creative, thoughtful, yet practical and relevant for all disciplines of business. Essential reading for everyone in business! "e; Dr Jikyeong Kang, Professor of Marketing and Director of MBA Programmes, Manchester Business School. "e;Ive seen Jons talk and his ideas are full of originality and wisdom. Many ideas are stunningly simple, others are mould breaking. He takes preconceived thinking and turns it on his head. Your business reporting will never be the same again. "e; Michael Izza, Chief Executive ICAEA.

This landmark book by one of the worlds leading business thinkers is about managing, pure if not simple. It tackles the big questions managers everywhere face, such as:How is anyone supposed to think, let alone think ahead, in this frenetic job? Are leaders really more important than managers? Is email destroying management practice? Are managers the only ones who can, or should, manage? How are managers supposed to connect when the very nature of their job disconnects them from what they are managing? How can you manage it when you cant reliably measure it? MANAGING MAKES SENSE OF WHAT MIGHT BE THE WORLDS MOST IMORTANT JOB.