Tempus takes a distinctly technical turn as it scrolls through the pages of three books giving contrasting views of the future.

Books by Bill Gates, Tom Peters, and John McKean are reviewed:
Rating                 Author               Title 
Worth Buying     John McKean   Information Masters
Worth a Look     Bill Gates          Business at the Speed of Thought
Worth Buying     Tom Peters       New Rules for the Economy

Information Masters: Secrets of the Customer Race John McKean What goes round comes around. Companies that helped put the corner shop out of business now aspire to the type of relationship with their customers that the village stores once had. But, says author John McKean, American executive director of the Centre for Information Based Competition, very few succeed in making databases achieve what gossip and neighbourly concern were able to do, no matter how hard firms struggle to create market segments of one. He estimates that fewer than one in 20 companies achieve the full potential of their customer relationship initiatives. The problem is that firms focus on the technology, not the people who have to make it work. This book shows how companies can engage all the organisation in becoming information masters, attacking their rivals in ways the competition cannot even imagine. The answer: put the money into people skills, processes and building a customer focused culture. John Wiley and Sons. ISBN 0471988014. 15.99