In this section, we hope to feature reviews, mainly of books, but also of events, CDs, cassettes etc.
Vice President-Finance, Sanmar Engineering Corporation.
If you want to make God really laugh, show him your business plan - by Barry J Gibbons
A business book written by a practitioner (the author was the Chairman and CEO of Burger King), this is an amazingly good read. As the title itself indicates, the author takes a “tongue firmly in cheek” look at business situations. The first universal law, according to this modern day Hammurabi, is that “When you have completed, bound, and presented your business plan to the appropriate audience, it contains the one and only scenario that is guaranteed not to happen” (who in business can argue with that?!!). Universal Law 36 states, “If you hit a marketplace hurdle badly, it doesn’t really matter whether you are the Titanic or the iceberg. You’re not going anywhere fast.” (the first time that anybody has ever looked at the iceberg’s point of view). Mostly irreverent, but never irrelevant, this book would have anybody in management nodding in acceptance at the truth of most of what is written.
Beyond the humour (and believe me, there’s a lot of it), there are a number of serious takeaways, distilled from the experience of someone who has run a large corporation. Definitely worth a read.
Tuesdays with Morrie - by Mitch Albom
A totally different genre from the book reviewed above, this book is a touching narration of the author’s interaction with his old school professor, who is on his deathbed. The title refers to their practice of meeting every Tuesday and discussing various aspects of life, relationships
etc. Not pretentious, as some books of this type tend to be, this book really is thought provoking, and makes one take a hard look at priorities. But be warned, this could get a bit heavy at times.