Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
A former editor with the Wall Street Journal and author of a biography of Malcolm Forbes, Winans traces the rise of investor Tisch from his first investment in hotels in 1946 (at the age of 23) through the failed merger of CBS and QVC in 1994. He portrays Tisch, whose cooperation on this book he enjoyed, as an extraordinary businessman whose main objectives in doing deals were to protect the rights of shareholders and to generate as much cash as possible for himself and his fellow shareholders. Tisch’s investment strategy was to identify undervalued assets and then gain a controlling position in the company to improve its profits, a process that often involved asset sales and staff layoffs. While his business style won Tisch admirers on Wall Street, it attracted little public notice until he took control of CBS in 1986. Winans devotes about half his book to Tisch’s restructuring efforts at CBS, and while this is a relatively familiar tale, Winans approaches it from a different point of view, namely, one sympathetic to Tisch. Indeed, Winans presents Tisch as CBS’s savior, who confounded his many critics by leading the company back to the top of the network competition. Depicting Tisch as a businessman with a conscience, Winans gives readers a solid, if overly flattering, account of the career of one of America’s most powerful men.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Tisch is likely to have remained an anonymous self-made millionaire were it not for his purchase of a controlling interest in CBS, which allowed him to replace William Paley as chairman. Tisch’s cost-cutting finance background, clearly in conflict with the corporate culture at CBS, caused turmoil that continues to plague the company. Winans, formerly on the editorial staff of the Wall Street Journal and the author of Malcolm Forbes: The Man Who Had Everything (LJ 9/15/90), chronicles Tisch’s life spent buying undervalued assets that have positive cash flow and waiting for the market to reward him with higher prices. This biography lacks balance, with Winans giving Tisch at least a moral victory on those rare occasions when his business decisions fail. Buy only for the most complete business collections.
Joseph Barth, U.S. Military Acad. Lib., West Point, N.Y.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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