Can you name any recent descendants of Cornelius Vanderbilt who didn't build one but two massive fortunes during the Gilded Age? After the third and fourth generations, the money started evaporating quickly, but why?

Katherine Howe is the co-author of Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty. During this conversation, we explore some of the fascinating stories she uncovered with her co-author, Anderson Cooper that spans six generations of the Vanderbilt family.

Rob Hart's book, The Warehouse, is a speculative dystopian thriller.

The central character is an online retailer called Cloud - think Amazon in the distant future dominating its rivals which has devastating effects on small retailers across the country.

Cloud's founder is dying of cancer, so he's on a farewell tour visiting all of the company's distribution centers. Is he a hero or is he delusional?

Two other characters find out how far Cloud will go to make the world a better place, but for whom? Paxton starts his employment at the very place that robbed him of everything. What's his story? And Zinnia seems like she's a better fit for a CIA operative, not a warehouse order picker. What's up her sleeve?

Rob is the first fiction writer to be interviewed on CFO Bookshelf.

We learn from Atticus in To Kill a Mockingbird, "You never really understand a person until you consider things from their point of view … until you climb into their skin and walk around in it."

Elvis Pressley used to sing, "Before you abuse, criticize and accuse, walk a mile in my shoes."

What may seem so apparent to many is not to others. In this conversation, we unpack the big ideas and linkages between business success and customer empathy with Dr. Natalie Petouhoff, the co-author of Empathy in Action.

Jeff Sands is the author of Corporate Turnaround Artistry. Before fixing and mending other companies' broken income statements and balance sheets, he had to fix his own.

During this conversation, we also learn about the debt stacks, myths of bankruptcies, the five stages of a turnaround, the three types of turnaround CEOs,  and what Jeff calls the salvation process. 

If you think Netflix was the cause of Blockbuster's failure, you'll change your mind after you hear Alan Payne explain the reasons for this company's demise.

Alan was a longtime owner of a chain of successful Blockbuster stores. He was also featured in the Netflix 2020 documentary, The Last Blockbuster.

Alan's new book is Built to Fail, and we learn four reasons for Blockbuster's eventual bankruptcy which started with poor leadership at the CEO level.

If I could only pick one book for any financial leader to read about company culture, it would be Patty McCord's book, Powerful.

In this episode, two CFOs break down the big ideas in Patty's book which include the role of the culture-centric HR professional, making decisions on facts vs. data, annual performance reviews, variable pay, learning every aspect of a business, and teams vs. families.

Have you ever worked with a software vendor who said their solution would save you as much as $1 million annually?

Or how about the big data warehousing project where the lead consultant says this project could lead to significantly more revenues?

When you accept projects with these types of claims, have you gone back one year later to find out the actual cost savings you thought realized?

Our topic on this show is the book entitled, Project Profitability by our guest, Reginald Lee. We explore project salience, mental models for project prioritization, and informational and instructional-centric projects.

Glenn Hopper is the author of Deep Finance: Corporate Finance for the Information Age. 

Glenn is a likable expert who helps the rest of us better understand artificial intelligence, data science, and ERP solutions.  As a hands-on, self-taught digital expert, his writing is still easy to understand.

In this conversation, some of the big ideas we cover are the differences between machine and deep learning, practical applications of data science in smaller businesses, and comparing comprehensive ERP solutions with best-of-breed tools that are stacked together.

For too many years than I can count, I've been listening to the audio version of How to Become a CEO by Jeffrey Fox annually. The book is a simple, to-the-point book discussion that applies to any position, even an officer in the military.

In this conversation, we hear about admitting fault, damaging emails, mastering one big new thing every year, the power and impact of handwritten notes, and a few classic books.

Professor Jim Shein of the Kellogg School of Management is one of my favorite turnaround experts, and he's the author of my favorite book in this space, Reversing the Slide.

Some of the big ideas we address are how to get started in this field of work, the role of strategy in turnarounds, the 13-week cash flow forecast, and a handful of case studies.

We also learn who is best suited for this type of work, CEOs or CFOs.