More than 2 1/2 years ‘in the making’, the SOLE-authored Global Logistics For Dummies (ISBN: 978-1-119-21215-7, John Wiley & Sons, $26.99, 336 pages) is scheduled to arrive in US bookstores on/about 11 December (today!)  With its addition to the Wiley For Dummies imprint (now in its 26th year), Global Logistics For Dummies (or ‘GLFD’ as the writing team fondly calls it) is designed to help companies and individuals weigh the pros and cons of expanding their logistics operations into global markets, and describes the pitfalls that can be anticipated (or not!) – when considering whether to set up new manufacturing and distribution operations ‘overseas,’ expanding domestic sales into new foreign markets, providing logistics support services to foreign customers, or providing humanitarian and disaster relief logistics support to an international relief effort.  In addition to the ‘technical’ sections, the volume includes a For Dummies-standard “Parts of Ten” section that includes Ten “Stars” of Global Logistics (Chapter 21), Ten Examples of Logistics Gone Wrong (Chapter 22), Top Ten Resources (Chapter 23), and a comprehensive Glossary.

When the John Wiley & Sons, UK For Dummies Commissioning Editor approached SOLE waaaaayyyy back in May 2015, it was after Wiley had completed a comprehensive international search for an organization that could provide a For Dummies volume with technical ” … information on how to implement a global logistics strategy is made accessible to the general consumer/business market, and SMEs in particular, who might not know how to tackle what could be seen as quite a complex area of business strategy” (A. Knight, 5/5/15 ‘Potential Writing Project with Wiley Publishers’ email). Once “Corporate SOLE” got over the surprise of the unsolicited proposal, the contract was signed on 18 July 2015, a writing team was pulled together, parts/sections were assigned, and the project became a reality in February 2016 with the submission of the first completed chapter (of what was subsequently to become a 23-chapter – plus glossary, introduction, front and back ‘matter’ like the table of contents/acknowledgements/author information).  Those first seven months were spent learning how to submit the manuscript in their electronic format, estimating what the contents would look like/cover (the Table of Contents alone took 3 months to develop to the sub-sub-section level so the Wiley management team could ensure it wouldn’t ‘compete with’/duplicate any of their other For Dummies volumes), AND being put on hold for over 3 months while Wiley moved the majority of the For Dummies‘management team’ responsibilities from the UK to the US (with a commensurate turnover in a number of project-critical positions).

But, enough of the background in this “Extra! Extra!” notice.  We’ll let you read Phil Frohne’s account (Phil authored Parts II and III of the volume) of the global logistics of writing a global logistics book – to includeSOLE‘s ‘first hand’ experience with intellectual property violation hazards. [Spoiler alert: The pre-printing electronic file was ‘pirated’ (and has appeared Internet-wide as an unauthorized e-book) somewhere in Wiley’s production process – before the first volume came off the printing presses!]  Suffice it to say, it will probably be a long while before any of the writing team signs up for another book.

In the meantime, our sincerest appreciation goes out to all of you who so patiently and good-naturedly dealt with the delays and hiccoughs you may have experienced while we wrestled this alligator to the end.  At the same time we were putting in all those author-hours SOLE‘s designation programs volume increased significantly, and – as some of you may likely have directly felt the effects of – on more than one occasion we had to deal with major IT hardware and software failures with their resulting loss of e-mails and files. (More on that in the new year’s editions.)  As we may have hinted at in a much-earlier (!) edition of the SOLEtter, your patience – and loyalty to SOLE – will not go ‘unrewarded.’