10 Books to Inspire Your Business for 2008

We Are Smarter Than Me by Barry Libert and Jon Spector. Many small-business owners are so consumed by their ideas that they forget to reach out to others to get a reality check or to leverage the experiences of other people. This book talks about the online phenomena of online social and business networks and how networks of people collaborating can develop and implement great ideas.

Libert and Spector analyze business successes that have come from online networking and the dos and don'ts of participating in a network or community. In fact, the authors have created wearesmarter.org, a Web site where readers can go to learn more about "community best practices."

Change to Strange: Create a Great Organization by Building a Strange Workforce by Daniel Cable. The problem many start-ups face is that the founder looks for people like him or herself. My company, PromptPayment, is currently hiring, and I have emphasized to the leadership team that we need to diversify the personalities and the experiences of the people we hire, or else we will fall into the trap of viewing the market in a less than dynamic way.

Dr. Cable is a business professor at North Carolina University. His book focuses on how to build a diverse workforce of people from different walks of life and experiences, and looks at new ways of measuring their impact on business. It's very thought-provoking.

Secrets of Great Rainmakers by Jeffrey Fox. Many professionals who become consultants are experts in their field and are very good at developing a quality product. The problem is that many don't have sales experience or training in business development, which is crucial to long-term success. This book is about how to develop superior business development skills, so you can bring in new revenue and opportunities.

Competing in a Flat World: Building Enterprises for a Borderless World by Victor and William Fun and Jerry Wind. This is the next level of understanding about the "flattening" of the world, as described in Thomas Friedman's book The World is Flat. The authors write about how to build a global company through the forging of international relationships and leveraging the Internet. The book includes many good examples of companies that are successfully executing this strategy.

One of these companies, General Motors GM, had always built factories in the countries where it was selling cars. The problem is that these factories never spoke to each other, and efforts were being duplicated. In rebuilding itself for the "borderless" world, GM has eliminated duplication and now shares resources to lower costs and improve its competitive position.

No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs by Dan Kennedy. This is part of a series of small books for entrepreneurs that discuss sales, marketing and management. Because of the speed at which business moves, time management (the focus of this book in the series) is in short supply for many entrepreneurs. The book talks about how to develop manageable to-do lists, so you don't feel overwhelmed and how to be pickier about the activities you get involved in, so you conserve your time.

The problem with most of us is that we get into ruts that we have a hard time working our way out of, because we get so comfortable doing the same things over and over again. Reading books stimulates the mind with new ideas and approaches to solving old problems. So take the time to read one or two of these books before you ring in the new year.