The books
NBOP writes a book series. NBOP does not require it, no assessment is built from it, and buying it changes nothing about how a candidate is assessed. This page exists so that the relationship between the two is legible before anyone spends money.
Volumes, all published, illustrated and typeset.
Formats for every volume. Paperback at $19.99, Kindle at $9.99.
Required in order to sit any assessment, and buying one confers no advantage.
The standard the assessment is actually built from, in full.
Principles of Practice
Six volumes. One covers the core practice of reading an operation across all eight domains. The other five apply the standard inside a single endorsement niche, and are named exactly as the endorsements are named.
There is no volume for a domain. Domains are what the standard describes; endorsements are what a certificant can hold. The series follows the credential, not the syllabus.
Mind
The core practice. How an operator perceives the state of an operation across all eight domains, and why competent operators misread it.
Paperback $19.99, Kindle $9.99 PaperbackKindleIntegrated Operations
Why the work at a seam is rarely dropped, and what actually has to be shared for a handoff to hold.
Paperback $19.99, Kindle $9.99 PaperbackKindleMarketing Operations
Why almost every marketing number measures the delivery system, and why the wrong ones rise as a business drifts from its buyer.
Paperback $19.99, Kindle $9.99 PaperbackKindleRevenue and Sales Operations
Why a business can add units, add revenue, and lose money on every one of them, while every number it watches says it is growing.
Paperback $19.99, Kindle $9.99 PaperbackKindleCustomer Success Operations
Why the renewal date is a recording rather than a measurement, and why the decision was usually made before the purchase.
Paperback $19.99, Kindle $9.99 PaperbackKindleAI and Automation Operations
Why automation almost never fails at the task, and why the check that would catch it needs somebody who could still do the work themselves.
Paperback $19.99, Kindle $9.99 PaperbackKindleWhy the series was written before the data arrived
NBOP has committed to publishing the findings of its job task analysis, including the ones that contradict the draft standard. What each endorsement niche actually contains, and how it should be weighted, is one of the things that analysis decides.
All six volumes were written before any of them published. That was deliberate. First editions are pre endorsement data by design, and second editions follow once the assessment has produced data of its own. A volume that had to be defended against the board's own findings would cost the board the only thing it has.
Where a volume exists to correct something NBOP has already published, it says so, because leaving an uncorrected version standing is worse than publishing early.
What the books are not
Purchase of this book is not required in order to sit any National Board of Operations Professionals assessment and confers no advantage. The assessment is built from the published standard, not from this book.
That is a claim, and a claim of this kind is worth nothing unless something enforces it. These are the arrangements that do:
- The standard is published free and in full. Everything an assessment covers is readable without paying anything.
- Item writers come from the standards committee and are not the author of the books.
- The author of the books does not see items, does not sit on scoring, and does not adjudicate individual results.
- There is no version of any assessment that is easier if you bought something.
It is a way to learn the work. It is not a way to pass.
Availability
All six volumes are published in paperback at $19.99 and as Kindle editions at $9.99. Each paperback carries its own ISBN, and every volume links to both listings from its own page.
This page said, before the listings existed, that when they appeared these pages would carry the identifier and the link and nothing else would change. That is what happened. The standard is still what an assessment is built from and buying a book still confers no advantage.
The books are not the credential
Nothing here is required in order to sit an assessment.
The assessment is built from the published standard. The books are a way to learn the work, and the standard is what you are measured against. Reading it costs nothing.