Author: Biz India

Book Review: The Successful Physician: A Productivity Handbook for Practitioners

Author: Marshall O. Zaslove, MD Publisher:  Jones and Bartlett Learning – 307 pages Book Review by:  Nano Khilnani This is a very useful book for time-challenged physicians by Dr. Marshall O. Zaslove, who has conducted over 500 seminars on personal and professional productivity for major medical organizations. Among those are American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, the International College of Surgeons and Kaiser Permanente. The purpose of this book is to help doctors become more productive streamlining, modernization and improvement in efficiency.  Part of that process means getting organized on a professional as well as a personal level, since each affects the other closely. It contains some 140 practical ways to reduce hassles, pressures, risks, urgencies and worries. The productivity techniques laid out in this book to help doctors save time on non-essential chores and enable them to focus on the essential tasks of their practice were compiled by the author from doctors through many means. Among them are: emails, interviews, letters, phone calls and questionnaires. Insight and detailed understanding of the problems doctors face on a day-to-day basis was gained from discussions in Dr. Zaslove’s seminars on physician productivity. The author also spoke to medical technicians, nurses, office managers, operating room personnel, pharmacists, physician assistants and others in the medical field. Learning never stops, as has been said, and much can be learned by doctors...

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Book Review: The Richest Man Who Ever Lived

Author: Steven K. Scott Publisher: Waterbrook Press, 265 pages Book Review by Nano Khilnani I had heard and read about this book several times, and I really did not “get around” getting it and reading it until recently. This is a fantastic book. I will tell shortly why I think this is a must-read if you want to not only learn to acquire riches, but live a happy and satisfying life. Written by multi-millionaire Steven K. Scott, it is based on the Book of Proverbs from the richest man who ever lived who was also the wisest one: Solomon, who succeeded David as King of Israel and reigned from 971 B.C. to 931 B.C. Steven K. Scott is a popular national speaker on the subject of personal and professional achievement. and is the author of five international bestsellers. He is cofounder of American Telecast Corporation, and along with his partners, he has created more than a dozen corporations that have achieved more than a billion dollars in sales. Scott points out that just as there are physical laws in the universe – the law of gravity and the law of motion, for example – there are also “laws of living” which, when obeyed, can improve our relationships with family members, friends, even strangers, and lead us to success. If you’re in business, a part of those strangers are your...

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Book Review: The Product Manager’s Handbook – Fourth Edition

Author:  Linda Gorchels Publisher:  McGraw-Hill – 392 pages Book Review by:  Sonu Chandiram A product manager’s job is not just to help create good products for a company to sell but to deliver superior satisfaction to customers: the users of the products, the author Linda Gorchels points out. In a typical company that supplies products to consumers, there are product developers on the one hand and there are product marketers and sellers on the other. The product manager’s position is somewhere in between development and marketing-selling The product manager’s function is a critical one of communication with both the designers, engineers and plants of factories of a company (the upstream components) and the marketing, advertising and sales people (the downstream teams). Gorchels states that while a company’s engineers and designers may have the knowledge to provide answers to whether a product can be built, it is the product manager who can provide insight – based on data from and knowledge of customers – whether a product should be built.  The stories of products, ranging from huge successes to dismal failures, are her guide to decisions or recommendations to top management. Decisions on whether or not to create a product and offer it in the market to test its acceptance and sales sustainability can be important ones. The cost of creating a new product can be quite high, but keep...

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Book Review: The Physician’s Guide to the Business of Medicine

Author: Jeffrey T. Gorke Publisher: Greenbranch Publishing  –  155 pages Book Review by:  Nano Khilnani Books on the business aspect of medicine are rare, and rarer still are good ones on this subject. This one is not just good; it is truly exceptional. We cannot expect doctors of medicine to be masters of business, so this book helps fill the gaps in business knowledge and experience that physicians typically have. This useful guide, written basically for the young doctor getting into private medical practice, is divided into two “books.” Book One is entitled “The Job Search” and Book Two is named “On to Business.” The author Jeffrey T. Gorke, taking into account the prevalent condition of doctors not having sufficient business knowledge and experience, explains in simple sentences how to not only take a telescopic view of the finances of a medical practice but also look at it under a microscope. And after that, how to make both pictures better. Do you want to hold the line down on your expenses so that your net income is larger? You can do that by eliminating unnecessary outflows of money. Want to make your financial picture look even prettier after keeping your expense structure stable? You can do that with some creative thinking by offering some new services or adding to your list of patients, thereby increasing your revenues. Want to...

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Book Review: The Other Barack

Author: Sally H. Jacobs Publisher: Public Affairs Books – 297 pages Book Review by: Sonu Chandiram It is not an easy job for journalists to go back into history and write a detailed biography of anyone, much less a deceased person such as the father of the current president of the United States, Barack Hussein Obama. So for Sally H. Jacobs, a veteran reporter on international, national and breaking news for over two decades at the Boston Globe, –  one of the most respected of U.S. daily newspapers – to have accomplished this feat, is truly remarkable and deserves much kudos. She has distinguished herself in journalism by having won the George Polk Award and other forms of recognition in this field. What makes this accomplishment even more commendable is that it involved flying into and out of Nairobi and Honolulu, tracing the relatives and friends of the other Barack Obama (the father) in Kenya and Hawaii, interviewing them, compiling all the relevant information, placing the events in chronological context and finally, putting the pieces of the complex puzzle together and creating a mosaic that made sense of it all.. Of the other Barack, Sally Jacobs writes: “a man of brilliance, one whose probing intellect enabled him to soar above his peers in the scrubby tropical bush in which he was raised.” But he did not live up to...

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