Fixing The Game

Martin (management, U. of Toronto, Canada) uses the National Football League as his most prominent example to show that it is possible to end the destructive pattern of increasing volatility, dropping investor returns, and generally bad behavior among executives that is crippling American capitalism. Some of his concepts include realigning executive compensation with real-world markets and not expectations, rethinking board governance and the parts board members play, and whittling down power of hedge funds and monopoly pension funds.

American capitalism is in dire straits, caught in a perilous pattern of increasing volatility, decreasing investor returns, and ongoing bad behavior by executives. And it’s getting worse. Since the turn of the twenty-first century, we’ve seen two massive value-destroying market meltdowns and a string of ethics breaches, including accounting scandals, options-backdating schemes, and the subprime mortgage debacle. Just what is going on here? Is it the inevitable decline of the American economy? Is it the new normal in a technology-enabled global marketplace? Or is it possible that the very theories we’ve embraced to underpin our capital markets are actually producing these crises? In Fixing the Game, Roger Martin reveals the culprit behind the sorry state of American capitalism: our deep and abiding commitment to the idea that the purpose of the firm is to maximize shareholder value. This theory has led to a massive growth in stock-based compensation for executives and, through this, to a naive and wrongheaded linking of the real market—the business of designing, making, and selling products and services—with the expectations market—the business of trading stocks, options, and complex derivatives. Martin shows how this tight coupling has been engineered and lays out its results: a single-minded focus on the expectations market that will continue driving us from crisis to crisis—unless we act now. Using the National Football League as his primary example, Martin illustrates that it is possible to take a much more thoughtful and effective approach than we now do to the intersection of the real and the expectations markets and to governance in general in the capital markets. Martin shows how we can act to end the destructive cycle, including: • Restructuring executive compensation to focus entirely on the real market, not the expectations market • Rethinking the meaning of board governance and role of board members • Reining in the power of hedge funds and monopoly pension funds Concise, hard-hitting, and entertaining, Fixing the Game advocates seizing American capitalism from the jaws of the expectations market and planting it firmly in the real market—and it presents the steps we must take now to do so.

Major League Baseball claims it hasn't had a game fixed by gamblers since 1919. No points have been shaved in the NBA since 1954. And the NFL states no game of theirs has come under outside influence – ever. These, however, are lies. The proof resides in FBI files only recently uncovered and discussed in Larceny Games.

On September 27, 1865, gambler Kane McLoughlin paid William Wansley $100 to ensure that the Brooklyn Eckfords would beat the Mutuals of New York. Wansley bribed Mutuals shortstop Tom Devyr and third baseman Ed Duffy to join the plot. The result was a 23-11 win by the Eckfords in a game marked by "passed balls and...muffed easy flys." Baseball was faced with its first gambling scandal. This is a comprehensive account of gambling and game fixing scandals that have gripped the nation. Attention is rightly focused on the best known incidents (e.g., the Black Sox scandal and the Pete Rose case), but the lesser known scandals are covered in-depth as well. Included are two chapters on game fixing scandals in the minor leagues.

The Fix is the most explosive story of sports corruption in a generation. Intriguing, riveting, and compelling, it tells the story of an investigative journalist who sets out to examine the world of match-fixing in professional soccer. From the Introduction Understand how gambling fixers work to corrupt a soccer game and you will understand how they move into a basketball league, a cricket tournament, or a tennis match (all places, by the way, that criminal fixers have moved into). My views on soccer have changed. I still love the Saturday-morning game between amateurs: the camaraderie and the fresh smell of grass. But the professional game leaves me cold. I hope you will understand why after reading the book. I think you may never look at sport in the same way again.

Those who have been lured by the sound of skate blades slicing into fresh ice, by the incomparable speed, split-second decisions, and everything-or-nothing attitude of the game know that hockey can seem like its own world. It's all-consuming and exhilarating, boasting its own language and complex morality code. Yet in another light, that tight community can turn insular; the values of teamwork and humility can manifest as collective silence in the face of abuse and discrimination, issues which have been brought to the forefront of the sport as many share their stories for the first time. In Game Misconduct, reporters Evan Moore and Jashvina Shah reveal hockey's toxic undercurrent which has permeated the sport throughout the junior, college, and professional levels. They address the topic with a level of passion that comes from being rabid hockey fans themselves, and from experiencing its exclusivity first-hand. With a sensitive yet incisive approach, this necessary book lays bare the issues of racism, homophobia, xenophobia, bullying, sexism, and violence on and off the ice. Readers will learn about notable players and activists fighting for transformation as well as those beyond the spotlight who are nonetheless deeply affected by hockey's culture of inaction. Both a reckoning and a roadmap, Game Misconduct is an essential read for modern hockey fans, showing the truth of the sport's past and present while offering the tools to fight for a better future.

“McGonigal is a clear, methodical writer, and her ideas are well argued. Assertions are backed by countless psychological studies.” —The Boston Globe “Powerful and provocative . . . McGonigal makes a persuasive case that games have a lot to teach us about how to make our lives, and the world, better.” —San Jose Mercury News “Jane McGonigal's insights have the elegant, compact, deadly simplicity of plutonium, and the same explosive force.” —Cory Doctorow, author of Little Brother A visionary game designer reveals how we can harness the power of games to boost global happiness. With 174 million gamers in the United States alone, we now live in a world where every generation will be a gamer generation. But why, Jane McGonigal asks, should games be used for escapist entertainment alone? In this groundbreaking book, she shows how we can leverage the power of games to fix what is wrong with the real world-from social problems like depression and obesity to global issues like poverty and climate change-and introduces us to cutting-edge games that are already changing the business, education, and nonprofit worlds. Written for gamers and non-gamers alike, Reality Is Broken shows that the future will belong to those who can understand, design, and play games. Jane McGonigal is also the author of SuperBetter: A Revolutionary Approach to Getting Stronger, Happier, Braver and More Resilient.

Mindful thinking is the new competitive edge Science confirms the distinction between the biological brain and the conscious mind. Each day, a game of mind versus matter plays out on a field defined by the problems we must solve. Most are routine, and don’t demand a more mindful approach. It’s when we’re faced with more difficult challenges that our thinking becomes vulnerable to brain patterns that can lead us astray. We leap to solutions that simply don’t work. We fixate on old mindsets that keep us stuck in neutral. We overthink problems and make them worse. We kill the ideas of others, as well as our own. Worse, we keep doing these things, over and over again, naturally and instinctively. But it doesn’t have to be that way. In Winning the Brain Game, author and creative strategist Matthew E. May explains these and other “fatal flaws” of thinking, catalogued over the course of ten years and hundreds of interactive creative sessions in which he gave more than 100,000 professionals a thought challenge based on a real case far less complex than their everyday problems. Not only did less than 5% arrive at the best and most elegant solution, but the solutions given were remarkably similar, revealing seven observable problem-solving patterns that can block our best thinking. Calling on modern neuroscience and psychology to help explain the seven fatal flaws, May draws insights from some of the world’s most innovative thinkers. He then blends in a super-curated, field-tested set of “fixes” proven through hundreds of creative sessions to raise our thinking game to a more mindful level. Regardless of playing field, mindful thinking is the new competitive advantage, and the seven fixes are a magic set of tools for achieving it. Winning the Brain Game will lead you to better decision-making, higher levels of creativity, clearer strategies, and overall success in business, work and life. Matthew E. May is a five-time author and recognized thought leader on strategy and innovation. A popular speaker, facilitator, and seminar leader, he confidentially coaches executives, artists, and athletes, and conducts custom thinking sessions for leading organizations all over the world.