No one makes it alone. But there’s a reason why some people can get investors or bosses to believe in them while others cannot. And that reason has little to do with experience, pedigree or a polished business plan. Backable people seem to have a hidden quality that inspires others to take action. We often chalk this up to natural talent or charisma…either you have “it” or you don’t.    After getting rejected by every investor he pitched, Suneel Gupta had a burning question: could “it” be learned?   Drawing lessons from hundreds of the world’s biggest thinkers, Suneel discovered how to pitch new ideas in a way that has raised millions of dollars, influenced large-scale change inside massive corporations, and even convinced his 8-year old daughter to clean her room. Inside are long-held secrets from producers of Oscar-winning films, members of Congress, military leaders, culinary stars, venture capitalists, founders of unicorn-status startups, and executives at iconic companies like Lego, Method, and Pixar.  Backable reveals how the key to success is not charisma, connections, or even your resume, but rather your ability to persuade others to take a chance on you. This groundbreaking book will show you how.

    Based on fifteen years of research at the Harvard Negotiation Project, Difficult Conversations walks you through a step-by-step proven approach to having your toughest conversations with less stress and more success. You will learn: -- how to start the conversation without defensiveness-- why what is not said is as important as what is-- ways of keeping and regaining your balance in the face of attacks and accusations-- how to decipher the underlying structure of every difficult conversationFilled with examples from everyday life, Difficult Conversations will help you on your job, at home, or out of the world. It is a book you will turn to again and again for advice, practical skills, and reassurance.

    All our lives we’ve been told that games are distractions—playful pastimes, but unrelated to success. In Game Frame, Aaron Dignan shows us that the opposite is true: games produce peak learning conditions and accelerated achievement. Here, the crucial connection between the games we love to play and the everyday tasks, goals, and dreams we have trouble realizing is illuminated. Aaron Dignan is the thirty-something founder of a successful digital strategy firm that studies the transformative power of technology in culture. He and his peers were raised on a steady diet of games and gadgets, ultimately priming them to challenge the status quo of the modern workplace. What they learned from games goes deeper than hand-eye coordination; instead, this generation intrinsically understands the value of adding the elements of games into everyday life. Game Frame is the first prescriptive explanation of what games mean to us, the human psychology behind their magnetic pull, and how we can use the lessons they teach as a framework to achieve our potential in business and beyond. Games are a powerful way to influence and change behavior in any setting. Here, Dignan outlines why games and play are such important trends in culture today, and how our technology, from our iPhones to our hybrid cars, primes us to be instinctive players. Game Frame tackles the challenging task of defining games and the mechanics that make games work from several perspectives, then explores these ideas through the lens of neuroscience. Finally, Dignan provides practical tips for using basic game mechanics in a variety of settings, such as motivating employees at work or encouraging children at home, giving readers the tools to develop their own games to solve problems in their everyday lives. Illuminated throughout with a series of real-world examples and hypothetical scenarios, Game Frame promises a crash course in game design and behavioral psychology that will leave the reader—and, by extension, the world itself—more productive. Revolutionary, visionary, practical, and time-tested, Game Frame will change the way you approach life.

    500 CEOs.An instant classic, this revised and updated edition of the phenomenal bestseller dispels the myths about starting your own business. Small business consultant and author Michael E. Gerber, with sharp insight gained from years of experience, points out how common assumptions, expectations, and even technical expertise can get in the way of running a successful business.Gerber walks you through the steps in the life of a business—from entrepreneurial infancy through adolescent growing pains to the mature entrepreneurial perspective: the guiding light of all businesses that succeed—and shows how to apply the lessons of franchising to any business, whether or not it is a franchise. Most importantly, Gerber draws the vital, often overlooked distinction between working on your business and working in your business.The E-Myth Revisited will help you grow your business in a productive, assured way.

    Learn to think like the greatest creative minds of our era—to question, challenge, and create new rules for your ideas of love, education, spirituality, work, happiness, and meaning. The Code of the Extraordinary Mind is a blueprint for retraining our minds to hack everything—how we work, love, parent, and heal—and learn to succeed on our own terms. No matter where you’re starting from, you can build a life that’s truly extraordinary and make a dent in the universe. In this book, you will learn to bend reality, question the brules, transcend the culturescape, embrace your quest, practice consciousness engineering, live in blissipline, and push humanity forward. You will question your limits and realize that there are none. Your understanding of the world around you and your place in it will change, and you will find yourself operating at a new, extraordinary level in every way—with happiness, purpose, fulfillment, and love.

    Humorous, direct, and—most important of all—effective, these keys will help you change how you view and "do" your problems—from difficult relationships to enhancing sexuality and resolving conflicts of all kinds. The next time you have a problem, try one of these Solution Keys:Break Problem Patterns: Change any one of what you usually do in the problem situation by doing one thing different! Example: If you usually get angry and defensive, sit quietly and listen.Find and Use Solution Patterns: Import solutions from other situations where you felt competent. Examples: What do you know on the golf course that you forget when you get behind the wheel of your car? What do you say to resolve a problem with an angry customer that you don't say to your angry partner?Shift Your Attention: Focus on what you would like to have happen rather than on what is happening.Grounded in therapeutic practice, Do One Thing Different will put you back in control of your emotions and your life.

    Questioning—deeply, imaginatively, "beautifully"—can help us identify and solve problems, come up with game-changing ideas, and pursue fresh opportunities. So why are we often reluctant to ask "Why?"Berger's surprising findings reveal that even though children start out asking hundreds of questions a day, questioning "falls off a cliff" as kids enter school. In an education and business culture devised to reward rote answers over challenging inquiry, questioning isn't encouraged—and, in fact, is sometimes barely tolerated.And yet, as Berger shows, the most creative, successful people tend to be expert questioners. They've mastered the art of inquiry, raising questions no one else is asking—and finding powerful answers. The author takes us inside red-hot businesses like Google, Netflix, IDEO, and Airbnb to show how questioning is baked into their organizational DNA. He also shares inspiring stories of artists, teachers, entrepreneurs, basement tinkerers, and social activists who changed their lives and the world around them—by starting with a "beautiful question."Berger explores important questions, such as:- Why aren't we nurturing kids' natural ability to question—and what can parents and schools do about that?- Since questioning is a starting point for innovation, how might companies and business leaders begin to encourage and exploit it?- And most important, how can each of us re-ignite that questioning spark—and use inquiry as a powerful means to rethink and reinvent our lives?A More Beautiful Question outlines a practical Why / What If / How system of inquiry that can guide you through the process of innovative questioning—helping you find imaginative, powerful answers to your own "beautiful questions."

    Yet, companies continue to manage this new breed of employee with techniques designed for the Industrial Age. As this critical sector of the workforce continues to increase in size and importance, that's a mistake that could cost companies their future. Thomas Davenport argues that knowledge workers are vastly different from other types of workers in their motivations, attitudes, and need for autonomy--and, so, they require different management techniques to improve their performance and productivity.Based on extensive research involving over 100 companies and more than 600 knowledge workers, Thinking for a Living provides rich insights into how knowledge workers think, how they accomplish tasks, and what motivates them to excel. Davenport identifies four major categories of knowledge workers and presents a unique framework for matching specific types of workers with the management strategies that yield the greatest performance.Written by the field's premier thought leader, Thinking for a Living reveals how to maximize the brain power that fuels organizational success. Thomas Davenport holds the President's Chair in Information Technology and Management at Babson College. He is director of research for Babson Executive Education; an Accenture Fellow; and author, co-author, or editor of nine books, including Working Knowledge: How Organizations Manage What They Know (HBS Press, 1997).

    This new guide by America's #1 professional in the art of persuasion focuses on the most essential part of the sale—how to make them say "Yes, I will!" Zig Ziglar lets you in on the secrets of his own sure-fire, tested methods:Over 100 successful closings for every kind of persuasionOver 700 questions that will open your eyes to new possibilities you may have overlookedHow to paint word pictures and use your imagination to get resultsProfessional tips from America's 100 most succesful salespeopleDo what millions of Americans have already done—open this book and start learning from Zig Ziglar's Secrets of Closing the Sale!

    Burger teaches at Wiliams College; Starbird at The University of Texas at Austin. Here, they “reveal the hidden powers of deep understanding (earth), failure (fire), questions (air), the flow of ideas (water), and the quintessential element of change that brings all four elements together. By mastering and applying these practical and proven strategies, readers develop better thinking habits and learn how to create their own successes.”Brilliant people aren't a special breed--they just use their minds differently. By using the straightforward and thought-provoking techniques in "The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking," you will regularly find imaginative solutions to difficult challenges, and you will discover new ways of looking at your world and yourself--revealing previously hidden opportunities.The book offers real-life stories, explicit action items, and concrete methods that allow you to attain a deeper understanding of any issue, exploit the power of failure as a step toward success, develop a habit of creating probing questions, see the world of ideas as an ever-flowing stream of thought, and embrace the uplifting reality that we are all capable of change. No matter who you are, the practical mind-sets introduced in the book will empower you to realize any goal in a more creative, intelligent, and effective manner. Filled with engaging examples that unlock truths about thinking in every walk of life, "The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking" is written for all who want to reach their fullest potential--including students, parents, teachers, businesspeople, professionals, athletes, artists, leaders, and lifelong learners.Whenever you are stuck, need a new idea, or want to learn and grow, "The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking" will inspire and guide you on your way.

    Green and Robert M. Galford to bring us the essential tool for all consultants, negotiators, and advisors.In today's fast-paced networked economy, professionals must work harder than ever to maintain and improve their business skills and knowledge. But technical mastery of one's discipline is not enough, assert world-renowned professional advisors David H. Maister, Charles H. Green, and Robert M. Galford. The key to professional success, they argue, is the ability to earn the trust and confidence of clients. To demonstrate the paramount importance of trust, the authors use anecdotes, experiences, and examples -- successes and mistakes, their own and others' -- to great effect. The result is an immensely readable book that will be welcomed by the inexperienced advisor and the most seasoned expert alike.

    Learn the principles and guiding philosophies of Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Warren Buffett, Oprah Winfrey, and many others through illuminating conversations about their remarkable lives and careers. For the past five years, David M. Rubenstein—author of The American Story, visionary cofounder of The Carlyle Group, and host of The David Rubenstein Show—has spoken with the world’s highest performing leaders about who they are and how they became successful. How to Lead distills these revealing conversations into an indispensable leadership guidebook. Gain advice and wisdom from CEOs, presidents, founders, and master performers from the worlds of finance (Warren Buffett, Jamie Dimon, Christine Lagarde, Ken Griffin), tech (Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Eric Schmidt, Tim Cook), entertainment (Oprah Winfrey, Lorne Michaels, Renee Fleming, Yo-Yo Ma), sports (Jack Nicklaus, Adam Silver, Coach K, Phil Knight), government (President Bill Clinton, President George W. Bush, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Nancy Pelosi), and many others. -Jeff Bezos harnesses the power of wandering, discovering that his best decisions have been made with heart and intuition, rather than analysis. -Richard Branson never goes into a venture looking to make a profit. He aims to make the best in field. -Phil Knight views Nike as a marketing company whose product is its most important marketing tool. -Marillyn Hewson, who grew up in a fatherless home with four siblings in Kansas, quickly learned the importance of self-reliance and the value of a dollar. How to Lead shares the extraordinary stories of these pioneering agents of change. Discover how each luminary got started and how they handle decision making, failure, innovation, change, and crisis. Learn from their decades of experience as pioneers in their field. No two leaders are the same.

    Rather, other factors can be even more crucial such as identifying our passions and following through on our commitments.Drawing on her own powerful story as the daughter of a scientist who frequently bemoaned her lack of smarts, Duckworth describes her winding path through teaching, business consulting, and neuroscience, which led to the hypothesis that what really drives success is not genius, but a special blend of passion and long-term perseverance. As a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Duckworth created her own character lab and set out to test her theory.Here, she takes readers into the field to visit teachers working in some of the toughest schools, cadets struggling through their first days at West Point, and young finalists in the National Spelling Bee. She also mines fascinating insights from history and shows what can be gleaned from modern experiments in peak performance. Finally, she shares what she's learned from interviewing dozens of high achievers; from JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon to the cartoon editor of The New Yorker to Seattle Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll.Winningly personal, insightful, and even life-changing, Grit is a book about what goes through your head when you fall down, and how that not talent or luck makes all the difference.

    Now the acclaimed author of What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast shows how real working women with families are actually making the most of their time.“Having it all” has become the subject of countless books, articles, debates, and social media commentary, with emotions running high in all directions. Many now believe this to be gospel truth: Any woman who wants to advance in a challenging career has to make huge sacrifices. She’s unlikely to have a happy marriage, quality time with her kids (assuming she can have kids at all), a social life, hobbies, or even a decent night’s sleep--but what if balancing work and family is actually not as hard as it’s made out to be? What if all those tragic anecdotes ignore the women who quietly but consistently do just fine with the juggle?Instead of relying on scattered stories, time management expert Laura Vanderkam set out to add hard data to the debate. She collected hour-by-hour time logs from 1,001 days in the lives of women who make at least $100,000 a year, and she found some surprising patterns in how these women spend the 168 hours that every one of us has each week. Overall, these women worked less and slept more than they assumed they did before they started tracking their time. They went jogging or to the gym, played with their children, scheduled date nights with their significant others, and had lunches with friends. They made time for the things that gave them pleasure and meaning, fitting the pieces together like tiles in a mosaic—without adhering to overly rigid schedules that would eliminate flexibility and spontaneity. With examples from hundreds of real women, I Know How She Does It proves that women don’t have to give up the things they really want.

    Using Chinese military genius Sun Tzu’s strategies as a guide, Brown examines why some companies triumph while others crumble.Business is a fight for survival. In business as in war, leaders match their wills in pursuit of opposing outcomes, they devise strategies, and marshal resources for victory. Success can turn on the smallest of details; a single tactical blunder can topple an empire. Ultimately, one side triumphs—and victory is all that matters.David Brown, host of the hit podcast Business Wars, masterfully frames some of the biggest business rivalries in history using revered Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu’s insights and pragmatic advice. Each rivalry he examines tells a story of combined wits, strategies, and resources. Brown chronicles the rise of companies as they vanquish rivals, formulate innovative plans, and adapt to keep up with shifting societal needs. The goal? Stay ahead of the competition and emerge victorious as an industry titan.By compiling powerful insights uncovered over hundreds of episodes and more than a year of in-depth research, Brown has developed a formula for business intrigue that uses popular history as a hook to lure readers in. The stories in The Art of Business Wars are fascinating, but the lessons we draw from them—about determination, ingenuity, patience, grit, subtlety, and other traits that contribute to a victorious enterprise—are invaluable, whether you're a software-slinging freelancer or the CEO of a multinational manufacturer.