Questions of Character
by Joseph L. Badaracco Jr.
(HBS Press)

Professor Badaracco argues that serious fiction provides us with memorable characters facing challenges similar to those that confront business leaders. Through analysis of the main characters in Death of a Salesman, The Secret Sharer, The Last Tycoon, and other stories, he addresses issues leaders face, such as the soundness of their vision, their readiness to take on responsibility, the depth of their compassion, and their ability to manage success.

Institutions, Macroeconomics, and the Global Economy
by Rafael Di Tella, Huw Pill, and Ingrid Vogel
(World Scientific Publishing Co.)

Understanding the genesis of financial and currency crises, stock-market booms and busts, and social and labor unrest is crucial in making informed managerial decisions. These phenomena can have a catastrophic effect on firm performance but can also create business opportunities. In this book Professor Di Tella and his colleagues present case studies taught in his HBS course of the same name, which addresses opportunities created by globalization and proposes strategies for managing its risks.

Alignment: Using the Balanced Scorecard to Create Corporate Synergies
by Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton (DBA ’73)
(HBS Press)

Professor Kaplan and his colleague apply their Balanced Scorecard management system to corporate-level strategy, describing how highly successful enterprises achieve powerful synergies by explicitly defining corporate headquarters’ role in setting, coordinating, and overseeing organizational strategy. The book’s case studies, frameworks, and sample scorecards show how to align business and support units, boards of directors, and external partners with corporate strategy and create a governance process that will ensure that alignment is sustained.

Redefining Health Care
by Michael E. Porter and Elizabeth Olmsted Teisberg
(HBS Press)

Professor Porter and his colleague argue that health plans, networks, and hospitals have competed to shift costs, accumulate bargaining power, and restrict services rather than compete in the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of specific health conditions. The book lays out a framework for redefining health-care competition based on patient value: from prevention and diagnosis through recovery or long-term disease management.

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