Bodie, Z., Kane, A., & Marcus, A. (2013). McGraw-Hill/Irwin

The market leading undergraduate investments textbook, Essentials of Investments, 9e, by Bodie, Kane, and Marcus, emphasizes asset allocation while presenting the practical applications of investment theory. The authors have eliminated unnecessary mathematical detail and concentrate on the intuition and insights that will be useful to practitioners throughout their careers as new ideas and challenges emerge from the financial marketplace. The Ninth Edition includes increased attention to changes in market structure and trading technology, while continuing to be organized around one basic theme – that security markets are nearly efficient.

Shaked, I., & Reilly, R. F. (2013). American Bankruptcy Institute.

A Practical Guide to Bankruptcy Valuation helps both practitioners and students navigate the complex task of valuing a bankrupt or other financially distressed business, and provides practical guidance on the selection and application of valuation approaches, methods and procedures. Partially drawn from articles that have appeared in the ABI Journal, the book contains a wealth of information on how solvency and capital adequacy analyses, debtor-in-possession financing, fraudulent conveyance and preference claims, restructuring of debtor securities, sale of bankruptcy estate assets, plans of reorganization, bankruptcy taxation issues and fresh-start accounting issues, among others, are factored into properly valuing a bankrupt company.

Somewhere along the way, something has gone very wrong with the way individuals save and invest. Too often, households are drawn in by promotional suggestions masquerading as impartial investment advice. Consumers get saddled with more risk than they realize. Authors Zvi Bodie and Rachelle Taqqu understand the dilemma that today’s investors face, and with Risk Less and Prosper they will help you find your financial footing.

Smith, D.J. (2011). Wiley Finance.

The book breaks down the calculations necessary for working in the field of fixed income. But it then goes beyond these calculations putting them in practical perspective, explaining how to think about bond math in the context of investment strategy and revealing which numbers prove most useful when dealing with bonds.

Carlile, P., & Nicolini, D. (Eds.) (2013). Oxford University Press.

Although human lives towards the second half of the twentieth century became increasingly mediated by objects and artifacts and have depended heavily on the functioning of technical systems, materiality in a broad sense became relatively marginalized as a topic of research interest. This volume contributes to redressing the balance by drawing together the work of scholars involved in exploring the sociomaterial dimensions of organizational life. It explores how material objects and artifacts are conceived in organizations and how they function in interaction with human agents.

This volume, which brings together prominent academic and practitioner branding experts, advances our understanding of questions fundamental to consumer-brand relationships: from their types, to their properties, drivers, and consequences to consumers and marketers alike. Critical issues regarding the consumer as co-creator of brand meanings as well as the boundaries of the human relationship metaphor to the study of brands add novel insight to our understanding of this rich topic.

Weil, D. (2013). Harvard University Press.

For much of the twentieth century, large companies employing many workers formed the bedrock of the U.S. economy. But today, as David Weil’s groundbreaking analysis shows, large corporations have shed their role as direct employers of the people responsible for their products, in favor of outsourcing work to small companies that compete fiercely with one another. From the perspectives of CEOs and investors, fissuring—splitting off functions that were once managed internally—has been a phenomenally successful business strategy. But from the perspective of workers, this lucrative strategy has meant declining wages, eroding benefits, inadequate health and safety conditions, and ever-widening income inequality. Weil proposes ways to modernize regulatory policies and laws, so that employers can meet their obligations to workers while allowing companies to keep the beneficial aspects of this innovative business strategy.

Beatty, J., & Samuelson, S. (2013). Cengage Learning.

Business Law and the Legal Environment, 6E, uses vivid examples and memorable scenarios to lead students through the full breadth of business law. Focusing on hands-on application and using a conversational writing style, this handy textbook equips students for business challenges from the first page. Plus, by showing students through practice how legal concepts apply to their future careers, Business Law and the Legal Environment, 6E, draws students into the material, helping them study more effectively and diligently.

Introduction To Business Law, 4E, presents the full range of business law topics in a series of brief, quick-reading chapters, perfect for single-semester or one-quarter courses. Accurate, comprehensive, and extremely reader-friendly, the book uses an innovative storytelling style to bring cases and legal concepts to life, highlighting the material’s business applications so students can envision how they’ll apply the content in their careers.

This thought-provoking history of corporate responsibility in the USA is a landmark publication documenting the story of corporate power and business behavior from the mid-eighteenth century to the modern day. It shows how the idea of corporate responsibility has evolved over time, with the roles, responsibilities and performance of corporations coming increasingly under the spotlight as new norms of transparency and accountability emerge. Today, it is expected that a corporation will be transparent in its operations; that it will reflect ethical values that are broadly shared by others in society; and that companies will enable society to achieve environmental sustainability as well as a high standard of living. As we enter the second decade of the twenty-first century, the social, political and economic landscape is once again shifting: the need for an informed public conversation about what is expected of the modern corporation has never been greater.

Preston, L.E, & Post, J.E. (2012). Stanford Business Classics.

Re-released in 2012 as part of the Stanford Business Classics line, Private Management and Public Policy is a landmark work at the intersection of business and society. First published in 1975, it focuses on the management processes that companies use to respond to social issues. The text develops the “principle of public responsibility” as an alternative to the notion that firms have unlimited accountability. It presents one of the first systems-based approaches to corporate responsibility, providing theoretical support for business involvement in public policy. Arguably, the book’s major contribution is its broad outline of an alternative theory of the firm in society—one that offers the possibility of overcoming traditional public and private dichotomies.

Abernathy. F., Colton, K., Baker, K., &, Weil, D. (2011). Lexington Books.

Bigger Isn’t Necessarily Better examines the performance and operation of the US homebuilding sector based on a detailed survey of large home builders conducted by the authors in the period of the great building boom of the 2000s. In contrast to the many books that have focused on the financial side of the housing sector prior to the Great Recession, the book examines the operational side of the industry and what did, and, more importantly, what did not, happen during the period of unprecedented growth. The authors also discuss what homebuilders can learn from other industries as they face a challenging future.

Samuelson, W., & Marks, G. (2011). John Wiley & Sons.

The 7th Edition of Managerial Economics continues to provide real-world examples and necessary decision-making skills for making thoughtful and advantageous managerial decisions. Samuelson & Marks build on their strong behavioral coverage to better target this current and “hot topic” in business. This new edition includes general updates and revisions throughout including updated sections on behavioral economics, game theory, and price theory, and new problems for every chapter.

With Beatty and Samuelson’s exciting fourth edition of Legal Environment, today’s students are given personal experience in applying legal concepts to real-life issues using practical exercises found throughout the text. From the very first chapter, the authors’ superb writing fascinates, drawing students into the concepts of business law within the context of vivid examples and memorable scenarios.

Chatterjee, K., & Samuelson, W. (2013). Springer.

The new Game Theory and Business Applications is the second edition of the scholarly book, first published in 2001 as part of Springer’s International Series in Operations Research & Management Science.

Kim, J. (2012).  Korean Management Association.

Growth 3.0, written in Korean but applicable to leaders across many industries and economies, is  for managers and entrepreneurs of small or large firms who have gradually sensed that their growth is becoming more difficult to sustain. This growth slowdown, often referred to as the S-curve phenomenon, signals that a company’s relatively easier growth opportunities are being exhausted, and raises the need for the management leadership to explore a different mechanism for future growth. Growth 1.0 is propelled by the expansion of market and customer base. Growth 2.0 is achieved by enhanced market competitiveness enabled by improved cost efficiencies and quality performance. In contrast to these “relatively easier growth” phases, Growth 3.0 must be pursued by more mature and innovative approaches. Growth 3.0 requires deeper and wider understanding of customer needs and value requirements. Firms should develop more accurate insights about how their customer’s value equation evolves and where disruptive innovations might create radically different value propositions. This kind of customer and market insight can only be discovered when diverse information from different business functions (e.g., front-line sales staff, customer service call centers, and technical support) is compared against more typical market research data. Contact Professor Jay Kim for more information about Growth 3.0.

In the spirit of the “butterfly effect,” metaphorically describing the sensitivity to initials conditions of chaotic systems, this book builds an argument that “innovation butterflies” can, in the short term, take up significant amounts of effort and sap efficiencies within individual innovation projects. Such “innovation butterflies” can be prompted by external forces such as government legislation or unexpected spikes in the price of basic goods (such as oil), unexpected shifts in market tastes, or from a company manager’s decisions or those of its competitors. Even the smallest change, the smallest disruption, to this system can steer a firm down an unpredictable and irreversibly different path in terms of technology and market evolution.

Careers Around the World explores the very meaning of what a career for individuals is in different countries, cultures, professions and age groups. What does career success mean for people around the world? What are key career transitions, and how are they best managed in different cultures? As those questions have not yet been investigated in the literature of careers across cultures and generations, the authors have taken an approach that led to hearing the answers directly from working people around the globe.

How can application of a positive lens to understanding social change and organizations enrich and elaborate theory and practice? This is the core question that inspired this book. It is a question that brought together a diverse and talented group of researchers interested in change and organizations in different problem domains (sustainability, healthcare, poverty alleviation and education). The contributors to this book bring different theoretical lenses to the question of social change and organizations.

In his recent book Managing Leadership Transition for Nonprofits: Passing the Torch to Sustain Organizational Excellence, published in March 2011 by FT Press and coauthored by Susan Egmont and Laura Watkins, he notes that a significant percentage of today’s nonprofit organizations are led by baby boomers expected to retire sometime within the next decade. With 1.4 million nonprofits in the U.S.–and another 40,000 created every year, equaling 15-20% of the economy in many of our nation’s cities–the crisis of leadership that’s poised to erupt in the nonprofit sector could make waves throughout the broader marketplace.