The Microsoft Edge - Hardcover

The Microsoft Edge, by former Microsoft manager Julie Bick, outlines approximately five-dozen administrative tactics that are successfully used within the company. Based upon her own experiences and those of 40 other managers, it presents them in short "lessons" that focus on hiring and retaining top employees, introducing new products and maintaining their momentum, conducting business online, and developing positive relationships with both internal and external partners. Some (like "on the Web you can alter your product or promotion daily by measuring responses and tweaking as you go") may seem obvious, but Bick's supplementary details (explaining, for example, exactly how the CarPoint site's option-pricing feature was reconfigured when logs showed few visitors using it) are truly instructive. And while the book definitely shows Microsoft in the best possible light, some of its most illuminating material concerns the handling of notable problems--such as the total failure of the highly publicised "Bob" software, and the inability to debug a consumer tax-preparation programme in time for its intended launch. --Howard Rothman

"Looking for a book to read on your next business flight? Try All I Really Need to Know in Business I Learned at Microsoft.... You'll want to make this book one of your action items".-- Associated Press