Nokia's success story

Books 2 Byte
Winning Across Global Markets
Dan Steinbock
(http://www.josseybass.com/)

How Nokia listens to market signals

It was around 1992-93 that Nokia made the important decision of adopting modularity in mobile phones, recounts Dan Steinbock in Winning Across Global Markets.

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Stretched money

BookValue
Backwaters to Boardroom
Dr Rama Iyer
( http://www.landmarkonthenet.com/)

Financial management of yesteryear

Money stretched more those days, reminisces Dr Rama Iyer in Backwaters to Boardroom, while talking about his experience in IIT-Bombay in the early 1960s. “The scholarship I received was a princely sum of Rs 150 per month… I spent Rs 60 for food, Rs 10 for room rent and Rs 10 on monthly fees,” he recounts.

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Make smart choices

Book Mark
How Fantasy Becomes Reality
Karen E. Dill
(http://www.landmarkonthenet.com/)

From the passenger's seat to the driver's

When we are transported by the world of fiction in the mass media, our attitudes and beliefs change to be more consistent with ideas and claims that take place within the story, notes Karen E. Dill in How Fantasy Becomes Reality.

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Meaning is the motivation in your life

Manage Mentor
How Remarkable Women Lead
Joanna Barsh and Susie Cranston
(http://www.landmarkonthenet.com/)

Find what engages you

All other things — such as talent, education and drive — being equal, it is the centred woman or man who sustains a successful leadership journey, write Joanna Barsh and Susie Cranston in How Remarkable Women Lead.

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Gramin banks, going forward ...

Books of Account
Gramin Banks Bounce Back
N. K. Thingalaya
( http://www.jkshim.ac.in/)

Gramin growth

After 34 years, the gramin banks have come of age, avers N. K. Thingalaya in Gramin Banks Bounce Back. The process of their amalgamation at the state level has enabled them to expand their operational areas and improve viability, he opines. Sophistication is visible in gramin banks in the form of computerised branch operations, use of smart cards, installation of ATMs, deployment of biometric systems, and adoption of core banking solutions (CBS).

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Insurance for the poor

Books of Account
Micro Insurance
Institute of Chartered Accountants of India
( http://www.icai.org/)

Pricing micro insurance

What can help the poor in managing financial risks is micro insurance, says the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India in a recent publication titled Micro Insurance. The Institute sees health insurance as a top priority for the low-income households.

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The greatest spirits in the history of man

Books of Account
Civilisation
Kenneth Clark
( http://www.hachetteindia.com/)

Timeless tale of financial collapse

Chapter three in Kenneth Clark's Civilisation ( www.hachetteindia.com) opens with a description of the Gothic world, as one of chivalry, courtesy, and romance, in which serious things were done with a sense of play, where even war and theology could become a sort of game, and when architecture reached a point of extravagance unequalled in history.

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Before uploading your site

Books 2 Byte
HTML: A beginner's guide
Wendy Willard
(http://www.tatamcgrawhill.com/)

Dos and don'ts before your site is up

You have prepared your homepage and it is time for the public debut. But before you upload your site to a host computer and submit it to directories and engines, tidying it up a little is best, advises Wendy Willard in ‘HTML: A beginner's guide,' fourth edition.

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Multiple services on a single network

Books 2 Byte
Broadband Network Architectures
Chris Hellberg, Dylan Greene, and Truman Boyes
(http://www.prenhallprofessional.com/)

Designing and managing networks

One of the goals of NGNs (next-generation networks) that carriers are deploying is not only to enable new service creation, but to reduce costs, informs Broadband Network Architectures. Cost reduction is achieved by delivering multiple services on a single network instead of maintaining many disparate networks, each with its own expensive circuits and equipment, explain the authors, Chris Hellberg, Dylan Greene, and Truman Boyes.

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Representation of data

Books 2 Byte
Semantic Web Programming
Mike Dean
(http://www.wileyindia.com/)

Construct a web of meaningful data

You may call data the king, but real power comes only when your data can be connected with other data sources to create a linked data web, emphasises the foreword by Mike Dean in Semantic Web Programming.

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The risk of rumours

BookValue
On Rumours
Cass Sunstein
( http://www.landmarkonthenet.com/)

Understanding rumours

False rumours can cause real damage to individuals and institutions, and they can harm the economy, writes Cass Sunstein in On Rumours. “If it is rumoured that a company is about to fail, stockholders might well be frightened, and they might sell. Because of the rumour, the company might be seriously harmed. Rumours can and do affect the stock market itself, even if they are baseless,” he adds.

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Behind the new age consumer ...

Book Mark
The Age of Selfish Altruism
Alan Fairnington
(http://www.wiley.com/)

Four big trends

Last century, we lived in a dog-eat-dog, competitive world, in which greed was good and we were solely motivated by our selfish needs, reminisces Alan Fairnington in The Age of Selfish Altruism.

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QH microfinance

Books of Account
New Issues in Islamic Finance & Economics
Hossein Askari, Zamir Iqbal and Abbas Mirakhor
(http://www.wiley.com/)

Islamic financial innovations

The religious edict against fixed-income securities limits the use of conventional treasury instruments in Islamic economies, notes New Issues in Islamic Finance & Economics: Progress & Challenges.

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Can the Railways sustain the growth?

Books of Account
Changing Tracks
V. Nilakant and S. Ramnarayan
(http://www.landmarkonthenet.com/)

Metrics of a monolith on the move

The success of Indian Railways in recent times can be traced to the right strategy, say V. Nilakant and S. Ramnarayan in Changing Tracks. “The strategy was to: (a) enhance freight volumes, (b) increase freight rates for selected commodities such as iron ore, and (c) focus on high-value, high-margin segments in freight and passenger traffic,” they elaborate.

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Different work habits

Books 2 Byte
Managing Internationally
Kamal Fatehi
(http://www.sagepublications.com/)

Software sharing

Before Ikea, a large home-furnishing company from Sweden, opened its first US store, the IS (information systems) department had to make a variety of modifications to their store systems, narrates Kamal Fatehi in Managing Internationally: Succeeding in a culturally diverse world.

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Russia on the HR front

Books 2 Byte
Building a Future with BRICs
Mark Kobayashi-Hillary
(www.springer.com)

Advantage Russia

Russia is one of the countries with the most skilled and highly qualified labour pools in the world, writes Arkadiy Dobkin in one of the essays included in Building a Future with BRICs: The next decade for offshoring, edited by Mark Kobayashi-Hillary.

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Maintaining a Web site

Books 2 Byte
Joomla! Bible
Ric Shreves
(http://www.wileyindia.com/)

Content management systems…

When a site visitor requests a page by clicking on a link, Joomla! assembles that page by pulling the contents from the database, and then uses the template files for guidance in how to present that information on the page. The merged information is then sent to the user's browser where it is rendered for the visitor to see. Thus reads a broad description in Joomla! Bible by Ric Shreves.

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Fight fiercely in three dimensions

BookValue
Profit Power Economics
Mia de Kuijper
( http://www.landmarkonthenet.com/)

Investing in an era of transparency

The declining cost of information will have enormous implications for investors, writes Mia de Kuijper in Profit Power Economics: A new competitive strategy for creating sustainable wealth. She foresees that investors will be able as never before to construct portfolios of investment opportunities involving businesses that exactly match their desired profiles of cash flows and risk.

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The `concerned consumer'

Book Mark
A Requiem for a Brand
Pradip Chanda
(http://www.rolibooks.com/)

From knowledge to concern

Traditional target audience cluster definitions based on demographics and purchasing power are now pass‚, says Pradip Chanda in A Requiem for a Brand. New clusters are emerging in today's global village, demanding a new appreciation of consumer cohorts that are no longer bound by national boundaries, or traditional values regarding saving, consumption and respect for established orders of doing things, he adds.

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Environment reporting

Book Mark
The Green Pen
Keya Acharya and Frederick Noronha
(http://www.sagepublications.com/)

`Green' in black and white

Many people believe that water is a very `dry' subject, frets Shree Padre in `Water Journalism Warrants Better Attention,' an essay included in The Green Pen. To Padre, the subject of water is so wide, important and deep that to do justice to that we need a battalion of water journalists.

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Never underestimate the value of doing nothing

Say Cheek
The Little Book of Behavioral Investing
James Montier
(http://www.wiley.com/)

Investment lessons from soccer goalkeepers

Investors today appear to be suffering from chronic ADHD when it comes to their portfolio, observes James Montier in ‘The Little Book of Behavioral Investing: How not to be your own worst enemy'.

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As you move up the hierarchy ...

Manage Mentor
Common Sense Leadership
Roger Fulton
(http://www.macmillanindia.com/)

Leaders thrive on ambiguity

Life is so simple at the bottom, with the boss giving you a specific job and you doing it. But as you move up the hierarchy, the work becomes less defined, observes Roger Fulton in Common Sense Leadership. “The boss gives you a mandate to solve a problem, and gives you little else. It is up to you to define the parameters of the task, figure out how to finance it, and find the time to get it done.”

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Takaful undertakings

Books of Account
Takaful Islamic Insurance
Simon Archer, Rifaat Ahmed Abdel Karim and Volker Nienhaus
( http://www.wiley.com/)

Islamic insurance

Conventional insurance, which is based on an exchange of premium payments now for future indemnities in case of specified events, is not valid under Shari'ahlaw due to the uncertainty ( gharar) of the value of the future indemnities, informs Takaful Islamic Insurance.

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Wide-area communication

Books 2 Byte
OSPF and IS-IS: Choosing an IGP for large-scale networks
Jeff Doyle
(http://www.awprofessional.com/)

Enabling large-scale networks

What is a large-scale data-communications network? Apparently an ordinary question, but Jeff Doyle takes this up in the preface of his book OSPF and IS-IS: Choosing an IGP for large-scale networks. He begins by observing that data communication networks and ideas about them have been around since long before the advent of computers.

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Wireless attacks

Books 2 Byte
Hacking Exposed Wireless
Johnny Cache and Vincent Liu
(http://www.tatamcgrawhill.com/)

Wireless security issues

Technical measures alone cannot address all the security-related issues wireless technology has brought about, write Johnny Cache and Vincent Liu in Hacking Exposed Wireless. Creation of policies regarding the handling of wireless security issues and enforcement of the policies will be needed to facilitate risk management, they insist.

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Solutions from Apple

Books 2 Byte
Beginning iPhone SDK: Programming with Objective-C
Wei-Meng Lee
(http://www.wileyindia.com/)

Challenges faced by mobile app developers

One of the most common complaints that the early iPhone programmers made was about the inability to test their applications on actual devices. How odd, you may wonder, that as the owner of the device you can't test your apps on it, notes Wei-Meng Lee in Beginning iPhone SDK: Programming with Objective-C.

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Hunt is about getting new business

Book Mark
The 5 Kick-Ass Strategies Every Business Needs
Robert Grede
(Dreamtech)

Every customer eventually leaves

Buy market share, hunt, farm, develop new products, and merge or acquire. These are the imperatives in Robert Grede's The 5 Kick-Ass Strategies Every Business Needs (Dreamtech). One of the tips he offers for increasing the market share is to make the most of media. Media repetition helps your prospects remember, Grede urges.

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Great Transformation of the 19th century

Book Mark
Patterns of Middle Class Consumption in India and China
Christophe Jaffrelot and Peter van der Veer
(http://www.sagepublications.com/)

Absorption of global consumer culture

While it is undoubtedly true that the IT revolution and other forms of globalisation have drastically transformed our life-world and its patterns of production and consumption in recent decades, we are still largely heirs to the Great Transformation of the 19th century, write Christophe Jaffrelot and Peter van der Veer in Patterns of Middle Class Consumption in India and China.

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Lobbying activities in a democratic system

Book Mark
Business Power in Global Governance
Doris Fuchs
(http://www.vivagroupindia.com/)

The power of lobbying

Transnational corporations (TNCs) today do not just lobby their `home' governments, but simultaneously participate in policy processes in Washington, London, Berlin, and Delhi, for instance, as well as at the European Union or the World Bank, writes Doris Fuchs in Business Power in Global Governance.

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