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On the Road Less Traveled: An Unlikely Journey from the Orphanage to the Boardroom
By Glenn Plaskin, Ed Hajim. 2021
A powerful story touched with family trauma, deprivation, and adversity balanced by a life of hard work and philanthropy!On the…
Road Less Traveled is the inspirational story of Edmund A. Hajim, an American financier and philanthropist who rises from dire childhood circumstances to achieve professional success and personal fulfillment. At age three, Hajim is kidnapped by his father, driven from St. Louis to Los Angeles, and told that his mother is dead. His father soon abandons him in order to seek employment—mostly in vain—leaving his son behind in a string of foster homes and orphanages. This establishes a pattern of neglect and desertion that continues for Hajim&’s entire childhood, forever leaving its mark. From one home to another, the lonely boy learns the value of self-reliance and perseverance despite his financial deprivation and the trauma of being an orphan. As time passes, Hajim displays a powerful instinct for survival and a burning drive to excel. A highly motivated student and athlete, he earns an NROTC college scholarship to the University of Rochester; serves in the United States Navy; works as an application research engineer; then attends Harvard Business School, where he finds that the financial industry is his true calling. So begins his rapid ascent in the corporate world, which includes senior executive positions at E. F. Hutton, Lehman Brothers, and fourteen years as CEO of Furman Selz, growing the company more than tenfold. He also creates a happy and abundant family life, though he never forgets what it means to struggle. At age sixty, he is reminded of his painful past when a family secret emerges that brings the story full circle.
Bill Gates - Biografia
By Daniel Ichbiah. 2021

BILL GATES e la saga di Microsoft
By Daniel Ichbiah. 2021
Prima biografia realizzata su Bill Gates, questo libro è stato adattato e pubblicato in molti paesi del mondo : USA,…
Cina, Giappone, India, Corea del Sud, Israele, Ungheria… A lungo considerato un superdotato, un genio della tecnologia, Bill Gates è diventato l’uomo più ricco del mondo grazie ai suoi software. Negli anni 2000, è diventato filantropo, convinto di aver salvato milioni di vite, come ad esempio in Africa. È sempre al centro di mille controversie. Questo libro, aggiornato nel 2020, cerca di fare chiarezza e di fornire più informazioni possibili per far capire ciò che anima questa personalità fuori dal comune. Questo libro racconta la giovinezza di un superdotato chiamato Bill Gates che diventa campione di Informatica al liceo, la creazione del primo BASIC per microcomputer nel 1975 e poi la folle ascesa di Microsoft che renderà Bill Gates l’uomo più ricco del mondo. Seguiamo Gates attraverso mille peripezie : . Come può un ragazzo di 21 anni riuscire a convincere il gigante IBM a fare affari con lui ? . Il periodo difficile di Windows che dura 7 anni fino alla vittoria inattesa. . Com’è riuscito Gates ad imporsi alla maggior parte del pianeta, con un mix di genio e manovre monopolistiche discutibili. . Il processo intentato dal governo americano per abuso di posizione dominante… . Come Gates ha finalmente trovato in Google e Apple dei concorrenti in grado di uguagliare o superare Microsoft. . La sua progressiva riconversione nelle attività umanitarie stabilendo delle priorità che hanno sorpreso i suoi contemporanei. Questo libro è stato scritto da Daniel Ichbiah quando era giornalista specializzato di nuove tecnologie, ciò che gli ha consentito di incontrare regolarmente Bill Gates.
Hot Seat: What I Learned Leading a Great American Company
By Jeff Immelt. 2021
A memoir of successful leadership in times of crisis: the former CEO of General Electric, named one of the &“World&’s…
Best CEOs&” three times by Barron&’s, shares the hard-won lessons he learned from his experience leading GE immediately after 9/11, through the economic devastation of the 2008–09 financial crisis, and into an increasingly globalized world.In September 2001, Jeff Immelt replaced the most famous CEO in history, Jack Welch, at the helm of General Electric. Less than a week into his tenure, the 9/11 terrorist attacks shook the nation, and the company, to its core. GE was connected to nearly every part of the tragedy—GE-financed planes powered by GE-manufactured engines had just destroyed real estate that was insured by GE-issued policies. Facing an unprecedented situation, Immelt knew his response would set the tone for businesses everywhere that looked to GE—one of America&’s biggest and most-heralded corporations—for direction. No pressure. Over the next sixteen years, Immelt would lead GE through many more dire moments, from the 2008–09 Global Financial Crisis to the 2011 meltdown of Fukushima&’s nuclear reactors, which were designed by GE. But Immelt&’s biggest challenge was inherited: Welch had handed over a company that had great people, but was short on innovation. Immelt set out to change GE&’s focus by making it more global, more rooted in technology, and more diverse. But the stock market rarely rewarded his efforts, and GE struggled. In Hot Seat, Immelt offers a rigorous, candid interrogation of himself and his tenure, detailing for the first time his proudest moments and his biggest mistakes. The most crucial component of leadership, he writes, is the willingness to make decisions. But knowing what to do is a thousand times easier than knowing when to do it. Perseverance, combined with clear communication, can ensure progress, if not perfection, he says. That won&’t protect any CEO from second-guessing, but Immelt explains how he&’s pushed through even the most withering criticism: by staying focused on his team and the goals they tried to achieve. As the business world continues to be rocked by stunning economic upheaval, Hot Seat is an urgently needed, and unusually raw, source of authoritative guidance for decisive leadership in uncertain times.
Believe IT: How to Go from Underestimated to Unstoppable
By Jamie Kern Lima. 2021
ARE YOU READY TO BELIEVE IN YOU? &“Game-changing. Authentic. A must-read for every woman! Jamie is the real deal—and that&’s…
rare.&” —Glennon Doyle, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Untamed &“Raw. Real. Powerful. Filled with vulnerability and grit. This book will inspire you to believe in your own power. It&’s a book every woman needs!&” —Sara Blakely, Founder SpanxImagine overcoming the things holding you back, breaking through the barrier of self-doubt and fully becoming the person YOU were BORN TO BE! In Believe IT, Jamie Kern Lima, founder of IT Cosmetics, shares the wild but true story of how a once struggling waitress turned her against-the-grain idea into an international bestselling sensation, eventually selling the company for over a billion dollars and becoming the first female CEO of a brand in L&’Oréal&’s 100+ year history. Faced with self-doubt, body-doubt, God-doubt, down to her last few dollars and told &“No one is going to buy makeup from someone who has your body,&” Jamie reveals for the first time what really went down, how she almost didn&’t make it, how she learned to trust herself, and the powerful lessons you, too, can use to go from underestimated to unstoppable. With radical vulnerability and honesty, Jamie takes you on a journey through deeply personal stories of heartbreak and resilience—including accidentally finding out she was adopted when she was in her twenties and the reverberations this has had on all aspects of her life. Jamie also pulls back the curtain on her fight to change the beauty industry&’s use of unrealistic images, on behalf of all the little girls who are about to start doubting themselves, and all of the grown women who still do. Spellbinding, riveting, with raw vulnerability and down-to-earth warmth, Believe IT shakes your soul and shows you that you, too, have what it takes to believe in yourself, trust yourself, and go from doubting you&’re enough to knowing you&’re enough! Do you have big goals, hopes, and dreams but let rejection get in the way? Do you struggle with feeling like you&’re not enough and like success is something that happens to other people, but have a hard time believing it&’s possible for you? Do you let past mistakes and failures hold you back? Do you know deep down inside that you were created for more, but somehow still doubt yourself? In Believe IT you&’ll discover how to... -Overcome self-doubt -Gain the courage to take risks, an empower yourself and others -Tune into and trust your own intuition -Let go of your mistakes and insecurities -Turn down the volume on your inner critic -Handle the rejection, the haters, and the mean girls -Boost your confidence -Start your dream (and keep going!) -And much more… If you&’ve ever doubted yourself or felt truly underestimated, this book will inspire a new kind of belief and confidence in you and your dreams!
Own the Arena: Getting Ahead, Making a Difference, and Succeeding as the Only One
By Katrina M Adams. 2021
From the former President and CEO of the United States Tennis Association—the first black woman and youngest person ever to…
hold the position—comes a behind-the-scenes look at the leadership skills involved in hosting the U.S. Open, the largest and most lucrative sports event in the world—lessons that can be applied across business and to any life challenge.One of professional tennis’s Grand Slam Tournaments, the U.S. Open has been described as a fourteen-day Superbowl. This single tennis championship, held annually in New York City, attracts top professionals from around the globe, generates more money than any other sporting event—or any other sport over an entire season—and attracts more than 700,000 attendees and millions of television viewers. In Own the Arena, Katrina Adams offers a privileged, singular inside look at this sensational global event, while elaborating on what makes tennis the only sport of a lifetime. She opens with the women’s 2018 championship match between Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams that ended in boos. This was Adams’s last year as president and the whole world was watching. How would she respond? How should the press be handled? What needs to be said to Osaka? Serena? What does this break from decorum mean for the Open and the sport?As Adams shares a wealth of stories from her career and personal life, as well as insights from top tennis professionals, she provides invaluable information on meeting life’s tests both on the tennis court and off. Own the Arena offers fresh perspectives on having presence, being remembered, directing a conversation, and moving boldly in spaces where “you are the only one.” It also covers good sportsmanship—treating others with respect and by being inclusive and open to diverse perspectives. Tennis is said to be 90 percent mental; this book shows how to take the elements of mental fortitude and use them to achieve greatness. By embracing and expressing one’s inner grace and humanity, Adams shows, you can own the arena.
Made in America: Mi Historia
By Sam Walton. 1995
"Es una historia sobre el espíritu empresarial, el riesgo, y el trabajo duro, y sobre saber a dónde quieres ir…
y estar dispuesto a hacer lo que sea necesario para llegar allí. Es una historia sobre creer en tu idea, incluso cuando tal vez otras personas no creen en ella, y sobre apoyarte en tus mejores fortalezas". - Sam Walton Conozca a un genuino héroe popular americano proveniente del mero centro del corazón de los Estados Unidos: Sam Walton, un hombre que convirtió una única tienda de pueblo en Walmart, el negocio minorista más grande del mundo. Rey mercantil indiscutible de finales del siglo XX, Walton nunca perdió el toque de hombre común. Genuinamente modesto, pero siempre seguro de sus ambiciones y sus logros, Walton comparte su extraordinaria biografía con un estilo sincero y directo, y en sus propias palabras inimitables recuenta la historia de la inspiración, el corazón y el optimismo que lo impulsaron a alcanzar el sueño americano.
Brave Love: Making Space for You to Be You
By Lisa Leonard. 2018
When Lisa Leonard said her marriage vows, she was determined to be the best wife she could be. When her…
first son was born with a severe disability, Lisa promised herself she would always be the mother he needed. When she began her jewelry business, Lisa committed to giving it her all.Over the years, the exhaustion of trying to be the perfect wife, mother, and businesswoman took its toll. Lisa knew it wasn’t working. She wanted to change things, but how? Everyone depended on her. So she kept going, kept pushing, kept trying to prove she could do it all.Until one evening, in tears and desperation, Lisa realized that she could no longer be everything to everyone. Somewhere along the way, she had lost herself.In Brave Love, Lisa shares her story of finding truth and wholeness in the midst of life’s competing demands. Brave Love is about what it means to be human, how it feels to be broken and afraid, and what happens when we dare to love deeply. Join Lisa on a journey where you will discover you are worthy and lovable just as you are. You don’t have to try harder or be better. You don’t have to prove yourself and you don’t have to make others okay. In this freedom you will find more peace and more joy. Most importantly, you will learn that as you stop trying to be everything to everyone, you will love others better.
The widow clicquot: The story of a champagne empire and the woman who ruled it
By Tilar J Mazzeo. 2009
Veuve Clicquot champagne epitomizes glamour, style, and luxury. But who was this young widow---the Veuve Clicquot---whose champagne sparkled at the…
courts of France, Britain, and Russia, and how did she rise to celebrity and fortune? In The Widow Clicquot , Tilar J. Mazzeo brings to life for the first time the fascinating woman behind the iconic yellow label: Barbe-Nicole Clicquot Ponsardin. A young witness to the dramatic events of the French Revolution and a new widow during the chaotic years of the Napoleonic Wars, Barbe-Nicole defied convention by assuming---after her husband's death---the reins of the fledgling wine business they had nurtured. Steering the company through dizzying political and financial reversals, she became one of the world's first great businesswomen and one of the richest women of her time. Although the Widow Clicquot is still a legend in her native France, her story has never been told in all its richness---until now. Painstakingly researched and elegantly written, The Widow Clicquot provides a glimpse into the life of a woman who arranged clandestine and perilous champagne deliveries to Russia one day and entertained Napoleon and Josephine Bonaparte on another. She was a daring and determined entrepreneur, a bold risk taker, and an audacious and intelligent woman who took control of her own destiny when fate left her on the brink of financial ruin. Her legacy lives on today, not simply through the famous product that still bears her name, but now through Mazzeo's finely crafted book. As much a fascinating journey through the process of making this temperamental wine as a biography of a uniquely tempered woman, The Widow Clicquot is utterly intoxicating
In The Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives
By Steven Levy. 2011
Few companies in history have ever been as successful and as admired as Google, the company that has transformed the…
Internet and become an indispensable part of our lives. How has Google done it? Veteran technology reporter Steven Levy was granted unprecedented access to the company, and in this revelatory book he takes readers inside Google headquarters--the Googleplex--to show how Google works. While they were still students at Stanford, Google cofounders Larry Page and Sergey Brin revolutionized Internet search. They followed this brilliant innovation with another, as two of Google's earliest employees found a way to do what no one else had: make billions of dollars from Internet advertising. With this cash cow (until Google's IPO nobody other than Google management had any idea how lucrative the company's ad business was), Google was able to expand dramatically and take on other transformative projects: more efficient data centers, open-source cell phones, free Internet video (YouTube), cloud computing, digitizing books, and much more. The key to Google's success in all these businesses, Levy reveals, is its engineering mind-set and adoption of such Internet values as speed, openness, experimentation, and risk taking. After its unapologetically elitist approach to hiring, Google pampers its engineers--free food and dry cleaning, on-site doctors and masseuses--and gives them all the resources they need to succeed. Even today, with a workforce of more than 23,000, Larry Page signs off on every hire. But has Google lost its innovative edge? It stumbled badly in China--Levy discloses what went wrong and how Brin disagreed with his peers on the China strategy--and now with its newest initiative, social networking, Google is chasing a successful competitor for the first time. Some employees are leaving the company for smaller, nimbler start-ups. Can the company that famously decided not to be evil still compete? No other book has ever turned Google inside out as Levy does with In the Plex.
What It Takes: Lessons in the Pursuit of Excellence
By Stephen A. Schwarzman. 2019
From Blackstone chairman, CEO, and co-founder Stephen A. Schwarzman, a long-awaited book that uses impactful episodes from Schwarzman's life to…
show readers how to build, transform, and lead thriving organizations. Whether you are a student, entrepreneur, philanthropist, executive, or simply someone looking for ways to maximize your potential, the same lessons apply.People know who Stephen Schwarzman is—at least they think they do. He’s the man who took $400,000 and co-founded Blackstone, the investment firm that manages over $500 billion (as of January 2019). He’s the CEO whose views are sought by heads of state. He’s the billionaire philanthropist who founded Schwarzman Scholars, this century’s version of the Rhodes Scholarship, in China. But behind these achievements is a man who has spent his life learning and reflecting on what it takes to achieve excellence, make an impact, and live a life of consequence. Folding handkerchiefs in his father’s linen shop, Schwarzman dreamed of a larger life, filled with purpose and adventure. His grades and athleticism got him into Yale. After starting his career in finance with a short stint at a financial firm called DLJ, Schwarzman began working at Lehman Brothers where he ascended to run the mergers and acquisitions practice. He eventually partnered with his mentor and friend Pete Peterson to found Blackstone, vowing to create a new and different kind of financial institution. Building Blackstone into the leading global financial institution it is today didn’t come easy. Schwarzman focused intensely on culture, hiring great talent, and establishing processes that allow the firm to systematically analyze and evaluate risk. Schwarzman’s simple mantra “don’t lose money” has helped Blackstone become a leading private equity and real estate investor, and manager of alternative assets for institutional investors globally. Both he and the firm are known for the rigor of their investment process, their innovative approach to deal making, the diversification of their business lines, and a conviction to be the best at everything they do. Schwarzman is also an active philanthropist, having given away more than a billion dollars. In philanthropy, as in business, he is drawn to situations where his capital and energy can be applied to drive transformative solutions and change paradigms, notably in education. He uses the skills learned over a lifetime in finance to design, establish, and support impactful and innovative organizations and initiatives. His gifts have ranged from creating a new College of Computing at MIT for the study of artificial intelligence, to establishing a first-of-its-kind student and performing arts center at Yale, to enabling the renovation of the iconic New York Public Library, to founding the Schwarzman Scholars fellowship program at Tsinghua University in Beijing—the single largest philanthropic effort in China’s history from international donors. Schwarzman’s story is an empowering, entertaining, and informative guide for anyone striving for greater personal impact. From deal making to investing, leadership to entrepreneurship, philanthropy to diplomacy, Schwarzman has lessons for how to think about ambition and scale, risk and opportunities, and how to achieve success through the relentless pursuit of excellence. Schwarzman not only offers readers a thoughtful reflection on all his own experiences, but in doing so provides a practical blueprint for success.
Pappyland: A Story of Family, Fine Bourbon, and the Things That Last
By Wright Thompson. 2020
The story of how Julian Van Winkle III, the caretaker of the most coveted cult Kentucky Bourbon whiskey in the…
world, fought to protect his family's heritage and preserve the taste of his forebears, in a world where authenticity, like his product, is in very short supply. <p><p> As a journalist said of Pappy Van Winkle, "You could call it bourbon, or you could call it a $5,000 bottle of liquified, barrel-aged unobtanium." Julian Van Winkle, the third-generation head of his family's business, is now thought of as something like the Buddha of Bourbon - Booze Yoda, as Wright Thompson calls him. He is swarmed wherever he goes, and people stand in long lines to get him to sign their bottles of Pappy Van Winkle Family Reserve, the whiskey he created to honor his grandfather, the founder of the family concern. A bottle of the 23-year-old Pappy starts at $3000 on the internet. As Julian is the first to say, things have gone completely nuts. <p> Forty years ago, Julian would have laughed in astonishment if you'd told him what lay ahead. He'd just stepped in to try to save the business after his father had died, partly of heartbreak, having been forced to sell the old distillery in a brutal downturn in the market for whiskey. Julian's grandfather had presided over a magical kingdom of craft and connoisseurship, a genteel outfit whose family ethos generated good will throughout Kentucky and far beyond. There's always a certain amount of romance to the marketing of spirits, but Pappy's mission statement captured something real: "We make fine bourbon - at a profit if we can, at a loss if we must, but always fine bourbon." But now the business had hit the wilderness years, and Julian could only hang on for dear life, stubbornly committed to preserving his namesake's legacy or going down with the ship. <p> Then something like a miracle happened: it turned out that hundreds of very special barrels of whiskey from the Van Winkle family distillery had been saved by the multinational conglomerate that bought it. With no idea what they had, they offered to sell it to Julian, who scrambled to beg and borrow the funds. Now he could bottle a whiskey whose taste captured his family's legacy. The result would immediately be hailed as the greatest whiskey in the world - and would soon be the hardest to find. <p> But now, those old barrels were used up, and Julian Van Winkle faced the challenge of his lifetime: how to preserve the taste of Pappy, the taste of his family's heritage, in a new age? The amazing Wright Thompson was invited to be his wingman as he set about to try. The result is an extraordinary testimony to the challenge of living up to your legacy and the rewards that come from knowing and honoring your people and your craft. Wright learned those lessons from Julian as they applied to the honest work of making a great bourbon whiskey in Kentucky, but he couldn't help applying them to his own craft, writing, and his upbringing in Mississippi, as he and his wife contemplated the birth of their first child. May we all be lucky enough to find some of ourselves, as Wright Thompson did, in Julian Van Winkle, and in Pappyland. <p> <b>A New York Times Bestseller</b>
El negociador: Consejos para triunfar en la vida y en los negocios
By Arturo Elías Ayub. 2021
«Me siento muy agradecido de haber tomado malas y buenas decisiones en mi camino, porque de todas esas experiencias he…
aprendido, y hoy mucho de lo que sé te lo comparto en estas páginas con gran emoción, «es un trabajo pero, sobre todo, con mucha humildad.» Por medio de anécdotas, frases y con el carisma que lo caracteriza, Arturo Elias Ayub, considerado por muchos el Mejor negociador de América Latina, nos cuenta su vida como empresario. Nos dice que emprender viene de la conjunción de varias premisas y que sea cual sea nuestra actividad todos podemos ser emprendedores, siempre y cuando haya una cualidad obligatoria: sentir pasión por lo que se hace. Aquí nos comparte lo que ha aprendido en los negocios y en la vida: desde sus inicios en la tienda de su padre en la calle de Correo Mayor, su paso por el futbol como presidente de los Pumas, hasta convertirse en uno de los empresarios y negociadores más reconocidos de México por su trabajo en uno de los grupos empresariales más importantes del mundo. El negociador es un libro ameno y sustancial, con consejos prácticos que te enseñarán a negociar para mejorar tu sueldo, conseguir un ascenso, resolver situaciones familiares, obtener mejores resultados con tus proveedores y clientes, entre muchas otras cosas, así como a tomar buenas decisiones en tu día a día; dos habilidades clave que, como bien dice el propio Elias Ayub, te ayudarán a lograr prácticamente todo lo que quieres en cualquier aspecto de tu vida.
Misfit: autistic. gay. immigrant. changemaker.
By Andreas Souvaliotis. 2019
Updated and expanded: A new edition of the inspiring memoir by one of Canada's most unusual, successful and socially conscious…
businesspeople."I am different. I have always been different. I grew up scared of being found out, scared of my natural inability to fit in, to conform, to look and sound and dress and behave 'normal.' I was always drawn to the different ones and I observed them with fascination--but the thought of being even a little bit like them mortified me. I was desperate to fit in. . . ." --From MisfitAndreas Souvaliotis was raised at a time when being on the autism spectrum wasn't easily diagnosed or even discussed. Minds like his were simply considered odd. He also knew from an early age he was gay, and it terrified him as he was growing up with openly homophobic parents in one of Europe's least tolerant societies.Andreas's differences made him an outsider, right through to his mid-forties. And then suddenly, everything changed. Misfit is the extraordinary memoir of a man who realized there was strength in his strangeness, that it could be used as a force for good. "It all happened in a flash. On a beautiful spring morning in 2007, sitting in my backyard and licking my wounds from a spectacular career derailment, I came up with a big idea--and I found myself contemplating the most daring and unconventional pursuit of my life." The weird kid from Greece was on his way to making his world, and everyone's world, a better place.Andreas Souvaliotis's inspiring story shows us that everyone has what it takes to trigger positive change, and that none of us should see our differences and quirks as handicaps.• The author is donating all of his proceeds from this book to 6 Degrees, a global charitable initiative that promotes inclusion, diversity, belonging and citizenhip. 6degreesto.com
What it Takes, from $20 to $200 Million: A Memoir
By Jerry Azarkman, Ruth Garcia-Corrales. 2018
What it Takes, from $20 to $200 Million is the true story of a man who with $20 in his…
pocket took a product and started selling it door to door, with ADD, not speaking English nor Spanish, but with the determination of making it happen. He identifies an underserved niche and develops a multimillion dollar operation, selling in Spanish in USA. This is the story of his family, the struggles and achievements and in a few steps it takes all from the start to the developing of a multimillion dollar business.
We all know that we should keep physically fit and mentally sharp throughout life and with the achievement of these…
objectives one ends up having an enjoyable and stress-free leisure. It is likely that this will all take place in a very pleasant natural outdoor environment. However, it is true to say that many people expend much time, effort and money seeking these desirable outcomes, often without sufficient information to know if their project is viable or not, given their personal circumstances. Sports, such as ball games, are unsuitable due to being stressfully competitive and require running which, with age, we find increasingly difficult. Games, such as chess, exercise the mind well but do not require fast reactions and are also competitive. Then there is the ‘gym’, which is usually indoors and requires boring, comparatively slow repetitions or running on a treadmill. So, having taught countless people to cast a fly and had their feedback, Mike Marshall would like to pass on his accumulated knowledge, mostly gathered in parallel with the demands of a senior management career in engineering. This is not a ‘detailed, how to do it’ book, but more a light-hearted anecdotal account of the various key factors leading to successful exploits in a wide range of fly-fishing situations. In this way he hopes to convey the fact that fly fishing, probably unexpectedly, contains all the elements required to create personal physical and mental wellbeing, but is free of the unwanted aspects mentioned earlier.
The Money Man: A True Life Story of One Man's Unbridled Ambition, Downfall, and Redemption
By Joseph Caplan. 2018
The Money Man is an epic story for our times, which will offer hope to many who have seen the…
fruit of their hard work eaten away by the economy, mistakes, poor health, etc. Readers will meet the rich, the famous, the infamous, the powerful, and the powerless in the USA, England, Monaco, France, and Switzerland. The Money Man is a story of determination, love, and faith that includes many page turning stories of extraordinary success and dismal failure.
Housed on the campus of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, the University Musical Society is one of the…
oldest performing arts presenters in the country. A past recipient of the National Medal of Arts, the nation’s highest public artistic honor, UMS connects audiences with wide-ranging performances in music, dance, and theater each season.Between 1987 and 2017, UMS was led by Ken Fischer, who over three decades pursued an ambitious campaign to expand and diversify the organization’s programming and audiences—initiatives inspired by Fischer’s overarching philosophy toward promoting the arts, “Everybody In, Nobody Out.” The approach not only deepened UMS’s engagement with the university and southeast Michigan communities, it led to exemplary partnerships with distinguished artists across the world. Under Fischer’s leadership, UMS hosted numerous breakthrough performances, including the Vienna Philharmonic’s final tour with Leonard Bernstein, appearances by then relatively unknown opera singer Cecilia Bartoli, a multiyear partnership with the Royal Shakespeare Company, and artists as diverse as Yo-Yo Ma, Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Elizabeth Streb, and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. Though peppered with colorful anecdotes of how these successes came to be, this book is neither a history of UMS nor a memoir of Fischer’s significant accomplishments with the organization. Rather it is a reflection on the power of the performing arts to engage and enrich communities—not by handing down cultural enrichment from on high, but by meeting communities where they live and helping them preserve cultural heritage, incubate talent, and find ways to make community voices heard.
After the Roof Caved In: An Immigrant's Journey from Ireland to America
By Charles Kenney, Michael J. Dowling. 2020
The moving story of an Irish immigrant's life, from a poverty-stricken childhood in Ireland to becoming a captain of industry, After…
the Roof Caved In is a powerful, poignant look at how hard work and education enabled one young man to change his life and circumstances completely. Today, Michael J. Dowling is president and CEO of Northwell Health, New York state's largest healthcare provider and private employer, with over 68,000 employees and over 700 facilities. But he grew up in deep poverty in the village of Knockaderry in rural Ireland, in a small home without running water or a stable roof, in a family with little hope for improvement and a place with little opportunity—and he overcame it all to become wildly successful. After the Roof Caved In is Dowling's rags-to-riches story of his life and journey from his destitute youth to his realization of the power of education and his eventual departure from his home to attend university in Cork, and onward through his life as he gradually improved himself and his circumstances. Full of memories both fond and painful, this powerful memoir examines the family dynamics of his childhood—including the lives of his deaf mother and arthritic father—as well as the social systems of the time, the politics and concerns of the day, and the way a variety of disparate events came together to help Dowling change his life completely. Most importantly, it chronicles his lifelong effort to rise above the circumstances into which he was born and to create the sort of life he dreamed possible. For anyone interested in the stories of immigrants, the experiences of the Irish in the mid-20th century, or the value of hard work and education in changing one's life, After the Roof Caved In is an essential read, and a heartfelt, deeply moving meditation on an extraordinary life.
American oligarchs: The kushners, the trumps, and the marriage of money and power
By Andrea Bernstein. 2020
A multigenerational saga of two families who rose from immigrant roots to the pinnacle of U.S. power that tracks the…
unraveling of American democracy. In American Oligarchs, award-winning investigative journalist Andrea Bernstein creates a vivid portrait of two emblematic American families. Their journey to the White House is a story of survival and loss, crime and betrayal, which stretches from the Gilded Age through Nazi-occupied Poland to the rising nationalism and inequality of the twenty-first century. Drawing on hundreds of interviews and over 100,000 pages of documents, many previously unseen or long forgotten, Bernstein traces how the families grew rich on federal programs that bolstered the middle class, and then sheltered their wealth from tax collectors. Wielding half-truths, secrecy, and media manipulation, they blurred the lines between public and private interests, then leveraged political, prosecutorial, and judicial power to avoid legal consequences. At once intimate and sweeping, American Oligarchs reveals how these dynasties encouraged and profited from a system of political dark money that has pushed America to the precipice of oligarchy