Books in the The FT Guides series

Whether you are writing a proposal, a report, a presentation or an email, this book will show you how to write to persuade staff, colleagues, board directors and customers. The Financial Times Essential Guide to Business Writing demonstrates how your choice of language can influence your reader. It gives you clear examples to show you the dos and don'ts of successful business writing and essential tips that are proven to make your writing more effective.It shows you how to write for different audiences and in different media using style, structure and the psychology of language to your advantage. It also gives you the writing secrets used by the world's best advertising writers, which you can use to great effect in your own business writing.

The Financial Times Guide to Banking is a comprehensive introduction to how banks and banking works. Best-selling author Glen Arnold provides you with a foundation for understanding the wide variety of activities undertaken by banks. He shows you why these global institutions are so important to consumers and finance professionals alike and explains how their activities impact on everyday life. The Financial Times Guide to Banking will give you: - A thorough understanding of all types of banking from retail through to asset management and investment banking. - An overview of global banking including the worldwide evolution of the sector, the influence of cross-border money flows and the importance of modern banking to international development - Expert knowledge about instruments and markets including debt markets, futures markets and swaps and options - Insight into the crucial importance of central banking and government regulation - Answers to the big questions about monetary policy and interest rates, payment systems and banking success

Gain the knowledge and confidence you need to build and manage budgets and forecast financial information. This book demystifies budgets and forecasts, providing simple explanations and clear examples. It includes integrated checklists, goals and milestones, to ensure you are on target to achieve the best results.Part of The Financial Times Essential Guides series: Task-focused and results-orientated, the essential guides are for every manager who wants to move their skills beyond the ordinary to the best.

Want to take your company to the next level? You need a roadmap, a strategy. Preferably one that is simple, workable and saleable. This book provides you with just that. It sets out a straightforward strategy development process, the Strategy Pyramid, and guides you through it. It uses a lively central case study throughout, as well as drawing on examples of how real businesses have developed winning strategies. Whether you are intent on growing your business, or setting out on your start-up, this book offers an uncomplicated, practical and readable guide on how to get the strategy you need for your business to succeed. It offers sound advice on the following areas: Setting goals and objectives Forecasting market demands Gauging industry competition Tracking competitive advantage Targeting the strategic gap Bridging the gap with business strategy Bridging the gap with corporate strategy Addressing risk and opportunityThe FT Essential Guide to Developing a Business Strategy will help businesses of all sizes to chart and realise their growth ambitions.

One of the most important financial plans you can have is saving and investing for your retirement. Quite simply, the success of this plan determines whether youre going to live comfortably after you stop working. The Financial Times Guide to Saving and Investing for Retirement will lead you through a bewildering maze of financial tools and provide advice on crucial investment decisions. It provides everything you need to know about how to save and invest so that you can successfully plan for your retirement. It is packed with invaluable information on taxes, ISAs, pensions, investing across different assets and buying property. The Financial Times Guide to Saving and Investing for Retirement will help you: Identify your financial objectives and work out how to achieve them Learn how to invest for a specific goal and time Find out about taxes and other rules that may impact your wealth Understand why its essential to be actively involved in managing your post-work income

The FT Guide to Social Media Strategy provides a clear roadmap with practical guidance, inspirational case studies and proven methodologies. You'll understand how to use social media and gain competitive advantage by generating better results, making more sales, building stronger and more valuable networks and enhancing the potency of their personal digital brand. You'll also discover plans and processes to manager and mitigate against the risks of social media. This book is broken down into three core sections, focusing initially on the core social media knowledge that every business professional needs, before moving on to the use of social media to develop a personal digital brand and finally an explanation of how to harness the power of social media to boost business performance. Presented in a user-friendly language, with clear guidelines, informative case studies and practical advice, each chapter features a mix of case studies, practical advice, the latest research and intelligence from leading social media specialists and the outcome of interviews with business leaders, marketing and social media experts and industry commentators.