Ford Library

I grew up in Thomasville, NC, and if your first thought was furniture, you are correct. In fact, Thomasville was a two industry town. In a state known for three products – tobacco, textiles, and furniture – we had numerous knitting mills and we had Thomasville Furniture.

In the 1960s, jobs were plentiful in Thomasville. We had everything a small town could want or need. Belks department store stocked our school clothes, the Tasty Bakery baked our birthday cakes, and The Big 3 auto dealerships sold us our cars. Thomasville Furniture was to thank for much of this largesse. Then it slipped away.

Textiles left in the 80s, but furniture remained. Then NAFTA struck, and slowly those companies, who had been so loyal to their employees, moved to places not named after the town where they began. Finally, the entry of China into the WTO was the final blow to my hometown.

As I write this, Thomasville Furniture is out of business, and the grand showroom, headquarters, and giant Plant C are on the auction block, unlikely to be sold to another big employer.

Beth Macy, author of Factory Man, details Bassett VA, a company town less than 75 miles from Thomasville. Both the company and the town are named for the J.D. Bassett family. Mr. J.D. got his start in lumber before luring away the furniture industry from Michigan. Using the local resources, abundant forests and subsistence farmers, he not only made a less expensive product but also produced it faster than any of his competitors. Along the way, he raised the standard of living from poverty to middle class for his workers, while reminding his family it was these people who helped make their fortune.

Macy details Mr. J.D. and his heirs in this story of what community meant to its founder and how that was slowly dismantled by competition and greed, so, like Thomasville NC, furniture is no longer crafted in Bassett. From the ruins, though, we meet JDIII, or John Bassett III. Like his grandfather, JDIII believed in buying the best machinery, hiring the best people, and working them hard. He was eventually pushed out of Bassett Industries and started his own furniture company, Vaughan-Bassett, in nearby Galax, where he learned that no matter how efficient his production lines were, he couldn’t beat the prices offered by offshore competition dumping bedroom suites and dining room sets onto the US market.

Against his own Bassett relatives, friends, and industry insiders, JDIII charged the US International Trade Commission with shirking its responsibilities. Ms. Macy works her way through the D.C. law firms and courts to show the reader the machinations of trade law enforcement. We see retailers wanting nothing more than the lowest price. We see American furniture executives wanting nothing more than their companies’ survival, regardless where the furniture is made. And incredibly, we see a glimmer of hope for US manufactured products.

Grosz, Stephen. The examined life : how we lose and find ourselves. W.W. Norton, 2013.

Someone commented today that the unexamined life was not worth living.  I strongly disagree as some of the happiest people I know are the least introspective.  Yet profound satisfaction and understanding of our actions and feelings comes from examining one’s life.

And so while on vacation in June, I borrowed a Ford Library Kindle and read the book, The Examined Life: How We Lose and Find Ourselves.  Written by London psychoanalyst Stephen Grosz, this remarkable book tells the stories of his patients, who come to him troubled by complex emotions or their own puzzling behavior.

As a practicing therapist, Grosz is trained in deep listening and attentiveness, and he uses conversations with his patients to reveal unconscious desires or masked anger.  He helps his patients understand themselves so they can live a happier and more fulfilled life.  As Grosz shares the stories of his patients’ lives and work, he teaches about love and loss, intimacy and separation, change and acceptance.

The Examined Life is a captivating look at the hidden feelings that drive our behavior, and is recommended to anyone wanting to deepen their own sense of self or to improve their relationships with others.  This brief book is an excellent choice for Labor Day holiday reading and is available on the Ford Library’s Best Sellers Kindles and in print in the book stacks. Also available as an online audiobook.

© Meg Trauner & Ford Library – Fuqua School of Business.
All rights reserved.

UPDATED! – Ford Library will be hosting exams for Masters of Management Studies (MMS) students from 8AM – 12 Noon on Tuesday and Wednesday, August 26-27. The change (from 9am to 8am) in Library access hours has been made at the request of the faculty instructor.

This means the Library will be closed during these hours (8am -noon, 8/26 & 8/27) for browsing and individual study use. The following, limited library access will be available during the above exam hours.

• Closed reserve textbooks and requested (on-hold) books may be picked up at the Library circulation desk.
• Library materials to be returned can be placed in the drop box to the right of the Library doors. Fines will not accrue for materials that are unable to be turned in during the exam hours.
• If you need research assistance during the above hours, please email or chat with us HERE.
• Access to the Library Database Room and its printers will be available.

Normal access to the Library stacks and Library services will resume each day shortly after the exams have concluded. Space is at a premium here at Fuqua, and we greatly appreciate your understanding as the Library works to accommodate the academic needs of our MMS classes.

If you have questions or concerns, please contact us at library@fuqua.duke.edu.

Here are the remainder of this month’s new DVD titles:

Bad Words
Blue Ruin
Half of a Yellow Sun
Hank and Asha
Last Days
Make Your Move
Oculus
Orphan Black, season 2
The Other Woman
Rio 2
Transcendence
Under the Skin

You may browse the entire DVD collection via the library catalog.

Vaynerchuk, Gary. Jab, jab, jab, right hook : how to tell your story in a noisy social world. HarperBusiness 2013.

The annoying title of this new book about social media marketing masks its excellent content. Author of other well-received books on branding on the internet, media consultant Gary Vaynerchuk offers his formula for developing social media content.

Vaynerchuk begins by explaining that creating social media campaigns is like boxing. Strategy is key. Companies patiently build authentic relationships with their customers, one jab (conversation, engagement) at a time. Eventually, it is time to deliver a bruising swing (right hook) that will knock out customer resistance, increasing sales and market share.

Beautifully illustrated, this book contains many examples from Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram and Tumblr containing successful and failed content. For each platform, Vaynerchuk shows how to produce content that is fresh and unique, followed by 10 to 30 examples of branded posts, with both poor form and perfect execution. In each case, Vaynerchuk delivers a color commentary about what makes it good or bad, criticizing aesthetics, images, links, text, tone, timing, tagging and more as he guides the reader in the art of strategic storytelling.

This engaging and informative book is recommended to those who are using new ways to communicate with customers.

© Reviewer: Meg Trauner & Ford Library – Fuqua School of Business.
All rights reserved.

Ford Library and Duke University Libraries are pleased to partner with OverDrive to offer downloadable audiobooks that you can enjoy on all major computers and devices, including iPhones®, iPads®, Nooks®, Android™ phones and tablets, and Kindles®.

Ford Library recently added multiple copies of the most popular business audiobooks including Now Habit, Blink, Nudge, Focus, and David and Goliath. These titles and more are on our list of business audiobooks on OverDrive.

To get started, click on a title link in the list document, and then click on the Get it @ Duke button. If the audiobook is available, click on the Borrow button, and enter your Duke NetID. If it is on loan, click on the Place a Hold button, and enter your Duke NetID.

Audiobooks can be streamed using the free OverDrive Media Console app, which can be downloaded on all major desktop and mobile devices.

To learn more about this resource, to recommend a title, or to give us feedback on the project, please visit Ford Library’s OverDrive Audiobooks webpage.

Here are the first new DVD titles for the month:

Anna
Cuban Fury
The Den
Divergent
Five Dances
I’ll Follow You Down
Lullaby
The Suspect
Le Week-end

You may browse the entire DVD collection via the library catalog.

In 2013 the New Yorker reported that “women in business were more likely than men to drop out of the workforce or have their careers interrupted a decade after earning their M.B.A.s, because of family considerations… Thirteen per cent of women weren’t working at all, compared to one per cent of men.” And among Harvard college graduates with professional degrees, women with M.B.A.s had the lowest labor force participation rates.

To have it all – to be professionally successful and to be happy with their family life – has been a dream of professional women for 50 years.  Maybe one day, women will have it all.  In the meantime, three new books in the Ford Library help women to cultivate their professional potential and to create a fulfilled life.

What Works for Women at Work by Joan C. Williams and Rachel Dempsey
Women need to be more savvy than men in office politics so they can advance their careers in the competitive workplace.  Using interviews of successful women including women of color, this book reports on workplace challenges, such as: Women must prove themselves over and over again; Women must navigate the “assertiveness” tightrope; Women are pushed aside after bearing children.  Includes strategies and practical advice. Also available as an eBook.

The Orange Line  by Jodi Ecker Detjen et al.
Author Jodi Ecker Detjen earned an MA from Duke University.  She and two co-authors were high achieving professionals who faced unexpected challenges after having children.  In their new book, they examine barriers in the workplace, and analyze the assumptions among career women that hold themselves back from realizing their potential.  They offer practical advice for creating a life that integrates work, family and the self. Also available as a Kindle eBook.

Women, Change the World by Michelle Patterson
Brief profiles of 40 high-profile women working in business, technology and NGO’s are followed by their own thoughts, challenges and triumphs, designed to inspire others to live and work with courage.

© Reviewer: Meg Trauner & Ford Library – Fuqua School of Business.
All rights reserved.

McArdle, Megan. The up side of down : why failing well is the key to success. Viking, 2014.

Anyone who is admitted to an elite university like Duke is successful.   Duke students graduate at the top of their high school class or undergraduate institution, and have positive experiences in their first employment opportunities.  Many Duke students have never experienced failure and would find it devastating if they did. A new book written by a Chicago MBA, a self-described spectacular failure, explains that mistakes are important learning experiences.

Business journalist Megan McArdle writes about the advantages of failure in her new book, The Up Side of Down.  She describes her failed summer internship at Merrill Lynch, and her failure to garner a permanent offer from the firm.  She accepted a position with a technology firm just before 9/11 and was laid off before her start date.  Eventually she accepted a lower-paying position as a journalist for the Economist, and grew to become an internationally known and respected business writer.

McArdle analyzes how decline happens in business, using companies like Solyndra and GM as examples.  Successful technology companies take calculated risks, using failure as a tool to grow the business.  McArdle also writes about mistakes in health care and in journalism.  Throughout the book, she explains problems with perception, such as the role of bias and loss aversion in reacting to a crisis.

Some reviewers take issue with some of the facts in McArdle’s book.  Fair enough. And in places, the material may be recycled from previous work.  But the writing is engaging and personal, interesting throughout.  Recommended.

© Reviewer: Meg Trauner & Ford Library – Fuqua School of Business.
All rights reserved.

Occasionally we’ll highlight interesting DVDs in the collection that you may have missed when they were first released. Here are three older titles:

• Sorcerer, a new addition to the collection though an older title, follows a four-man team who must transport a volatile cargo of nitroglycerin over 200 miles of treacherous terrain to stop a potentially disastrous oil fire. Director William Friedkin’s previous films included The Exorcist and The French Connection, but Sorcerer had the colossal misfortune to be released one month after Star Wars.
• Gattaca is a science fiction thriller starring Uma Thurman, Ethan Hawke, and Jude Law. Hawke plays an “In-Valid”, a natural-born human, doomed to low-level work in futuristic caste society while Law plays a disabled genetically engineered “Valid”, those groomed for high-level corporate jobs. With Law’s help, Hawke attempts to subvert the system, but runs into trouble when he becomes a murder suspect.
• One more thriller, The Devil’s Backbone, ends the list. Hellboy’s  Guillermo del Toro directs this supernatural story set during the final days of the Spanish Civil War. The 12-year-old protagonist, Carlos, arrives at Santa Lucia School and uncovers a host of secrets and the ghost of a murdered student.