Obvious Adams (Illustrated): The Story of a Successful Businessman


Robert Rawls Updegraff - 2013
    Hardly anyone has heard of it, but those who do swear by it, and they tend to be some of the world's top copywriters. For example, Gary Bencivenga, who retired in 2003 as the world's most effective and highest paid copywriter, named Obvious Adams as one of the most important copywriting and business books he's ever read. Some say that Bencivenga was given the book by David Ogilvy himself, the father of modern advertising. And some even whisper that the allegorical character of Obvious Adams is a veiled reference to Claude Hopkins, whose work is studied by serious marketers to this day. So make use of this treasure that you hold in your hands. Read it once, to enjoy the story. Then read it a second time, to appreciate the wisdom that it shares. Make notes in the margins, and carefully apply what you learn - and your future customers will thank you for having done so!

Rhythm: How to Achieve Breakthrough Execution and Accelerate Growth


Patrick Thean - 2014
    In order to burst through ceiling after ceiling and innovate with growth, a company must develop a reliable system that prompts leaders to be proactive and pivot when the need arises.You also need to learn simple systems to empower everyone in your company to become and stay focused, aligned, and accountable.In Rhythm, you’ll discover all this and more, including:• How to identify potential setbacks and avoid them;• Think-Plan-Do rhythm to fire up and maintain great execution;• The inside scoop from growth companies showing you how they turned their potential setbacks into opportunities;  • Practical tools that you can use immediately;• The habits you should start building to achieve your own breakthroughs.Patrick Thean’s process applies to any growing business and ensures that your organization gets into the habit of achieving success, week after week, quarter after quarter, year after year.Get your copy now and start leading your business towards successful growth today!

The Talent War: How Special Operations and Great Organizations Win on Talent


Mike Sarraille - 2020
    It's the hidden asset that never shows up on the balance sheet, despite being the driver for a company's true value. And now, in this hypercompetitive business environment, the war for talent has never been more important, or more complex. Of eight hundred CEOs and six hundred C-suite executives polled in 2019, the overwhelming majority cited the ability to attract and retain top talent as their number one concern.For your organization to win, you need to attract and retain the best talent. But without the right strategy or mindset, you won't be able to do so--and you won't be able to compete. After all, your people, not your product or service, are your strongest competitive advantage.When it comes to winning on talent, no one does it better or more consistently than the US Special Operations community. Their success comes down to their people and a widely held foundational belief: Talent + Leadership = Victory.The Talent War explores how US Special Operations Forces assess, select, and develop their world-class talent. You'll learn how to adopt a talent mindset, the single greatest weapon you can possess in the war for talent. When your organization reflects this mindset, you will hire, train, and develop the right people, and put them in the best positions to make decisions that allow you to retake the advantage and win the war.

Brag!: The Art of Tooting Your Own Horn without Blowing It


Peggy Klaus - 2003
    The renowned communication expert's subtle but effective plan for selling your best asset - yourself - without turning off those you're trying to impress.

Scrappy Project Management: The 12 Predictable and Avoidable Pitfalls That Every Project Faces


Kimberly Wiefling - 2007
    Unfortunately most of these are PREDICTABLE and AVOIDABLE. Tact and diplomacy can only get you so far in the wild and wacky world of project work. A combination of outrageous creativity, sheer bravado and nerves of steel will serve you far better than any fancy-schmancy Microsoft Project Gantt chart!'Scrappy Project Management' is about what REALLY happens in the project environment, how to survive it, and how to make sure that your team avoids the predictable and avoidable pitfalls that every project faces.

How I Built This: The Unexpected Paths to Success from the World’s Most Inspiring Entrepreneurs


Guy Raz - 2020
    Great ideas often come from a simple spark: A soccer player on the New Zealand national team notices all the unused wool his country produces and figures out a way to turn them into shoes (Allbirds). A former Buddhist monk decides the very best way to spread his mindfulness teachings is by launching an app (Headspace). A sandwich cart vendor finds a way to reuse leftover pita bread and turns it into a multimillion-dollar business (Stacy’s Pita Chips).   Award-winning journalist and NPR host Guy Raz has interviewed more than 200 highly successful entrepreneurs to uncover amazing true stories like these. In How I Built This, he shares tips for every entrepreneur’s journey: from the early days of formulating your idea, to raising money and recruiting employees, to fending off competitors, to finally paying yourself a real salary. This is a must-read for anyone who has ever dreamed of starting their own business or wondered how trailblazing entrepreneurs made their own dreams a reality.

What Makes the Great Great


Dennis Kimbro - 1996
    In What Makes the Great Great, the author explores the strategies and thought processes of successful African-Americans. Through dozens of interviews and the inspirational stories of people like John H. Johnson, Publisher of Ebony magazine, Condoleeza Rice, Provost of Stanford University, and Ann Fudge, President of Maxwell House Coffee, Dr. Kimbro outlines the nine strategies that determine success.According to Dr. Kimbro, being great depends on a commitment to making dreams come true: "All high achievers make choices, not excuses." He believes we all have the seeds of greatness in us, and his book gives readers the tools to discover and nurture those seeds, showing hem how to motivate themselves to master every aspect of their lives.

Read to Lead: The Simple Habit That Expands Your Influence and Boosts Your Career


Jeff Brown - 2021
    It's responsible for unlocking limitless creativity and influence. It's known to reduce stress, improve decision-making skills, and make you a better leader. What is it? Reading. And it's the single best thing you can do to improve yourself professionally.Reading more and better books creates opportunities for you to learn new skills, rise above your competition, and build a successful career. In Read to Lead you'll learn- why you need to read like your career depends on it- the five science-backed reasons reading will help you build your career- how to absorb a book into your bloodstream- a technique that can double (or triple!) your reading speed- tips on creating a lifetime reading habit- and moreIf you want to lead a more satisfied life, have more intelligent conversations, and broaden your mind, you need to read to lead!

The Fred Factor: How passion in your work and life can turn the ordinary into the extraordinary


Mark Sanborn - 2002
    Because of that, he is constantly going the extra mile handling the mail – and sometimes watching over the houses – of the people on his route, treating everyone he meets as a friend. Where others might see delivering mail as monotonous drudgery, Fred sees an opportunity to make a difference in the lives of those he serves.We’ve all encountered people like Fred in our lives. In THE FRED FACTOR, Mark Sanborn illuminates the simple steps each of us can take to transform our own lives from the ordinary – into the extraordinary. Sanborn, through stories about Fred and others like him, reveals the four basic principles that will help us bring fresh energy and creativity to our life and work: how to make a real difference everyday, how to become more successful by building strong relationships, how to create real value for others without spending a penny, and how to constantly reinvent yourself. By following these principles, and by learning from and teaching other “Freds,” you, too, can excel in your career and make your life extraodinary. As Mark Sanborn makes clear, each of us has the potential be a Fred.THE FRED FACTOR shows you how.

Move Your Bus: An Extraordinary New Approach to Accelerating Success in Work and Life


Ron Clark - 2015
    Includes a foreword by bestselling author and FranklinCovey executive Sean Covey.Teamwork is crucial to the success of any business, and as acclaimed author and speaker Ron Clark illustrates, the members of any team are the key to unlocking success. Imagine a company as a bus filled with people who either help or hinder a team's ability to move it forward: drivers (who steer the organization), runners (who consistently go above and beyond for the good of the organization), joggers (who do their jobs without pushing themselves), walkers (who are just getting pulled along), and riders (who hinder success and drag the team down). It's the team leader's job to recognize how members fall into these categories, encourage them to keep the "bus" moving by working together, and know when it's time to kick the riders off.In the tradition of Who Moved My Cheese? and Fish!, Move Your Bus is an accessible and uplifting business parable that illustrates Clark's expert strategies to maximize the performance of each member of a team. These easy to implement techniques will inspire employees and team leaders alike to work harder and smarter and drive the organization to succeed.

The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick)


Seth Godin - 2007
    Godin shows that winners quit fast, quit often, and quit without guilt--until they commit to beating the right Dip.Every new project (or job, or hobby, or company) starts out fun...then gets really hard, and not much fun at all. You might be in a Dip--a temporary setback that will get better if you keep pushing. But maybe it's really a Cul-de-Sac--a total dead end. What really sets superstars apart is the ability to tell the two apart.Winners seek out the Dip. They realize that the bigger the barrier, the bigger the reward for getting past it. If you can beat the Dip to be the best, you'll earn profits, glory, and long-term security. Whether you're an intern or a CEO, this fun little book will help you figure out if you're in a Dip that's worthy of your time, effort, and talents. The old saying is wrong--winners do quit, and quitters do win.

No B.S. Business Sucess: The Ultimate No Holds Barred, Kick Butt, Take No Prisoners, Tough & Spirited Guide


Dan S. Kennedy - 1993
    You want sugar-coated cliches that go down easy? Seek them elsewhere - this book isn't for the faint heart. Kennedy steers you along the bumpy road to growing a business, showing you potholes along the way.Expose yourself to Dan's "25 Eternal Business Truths" and prepare for a lot of chin-rubbing insight. Get Dan Kennedy's take on your sales, cash flow, payroll, productivity, and on getting out of trouble wherever it arises. It's the kind of streetwise wisdom his readers (and high-paying consulting clients) swear by - all the way to the bank.

Give and Take: A Revolutionary Approach to Success


Adam M. Grant - 2013
    But today, success is increasingly dependent on how we interact with others. It turns out that at work, most people operate as either takers, matchers, or givers. Whereas takers strive to get as much as possible from others and matchers aim to trade evenly, givers are the rare breed of people who contribute to others without expecting anything in return. Using his own pioneering research as Wharton's youngest tenured professor, Grant shows that these styles have a surprising impact on success. Although some givers get exploited and burn out, the rest achieve extraordinary results across a wide range of industries. Combining cutting-edge evidence with captivating stories, this landmark book shows how one of America's best networkers developed his connections, why the creative genius behind one of the most popular shows in television history toiled for years in anonymity, how a basketball executive responsible for multiple draft busts transformed his franchise into a winner, and how we could have anticipated Enron's demise four years before the company collapsed - without ever looking at a single number. Praised by bestselling authors such as Dan Pink, Tony Hsieh, Dan Ariely, Susan Cain, Dan Gilbert, Gretchen Rubin, Bob Sutton, David Allen, Robert Cialdini, and Seth Godin-as well as senior leaders from Google, McKinsey, Merck, Estee Lauder, Nike, and NASA - Give and Take highlights what effective networking, collaboration, influence, negotiation, and leadership skills have in common. This landmark book opens up an approach to success that has the power to transform not just individuals and groups, but entire organizations and communities.

The E-Myth Manager: Why Most Managers Don't Work and What to Do About It


Michael E. Gerber - 1900
    Drawing on lessons learned from working with more than 15,000 small, medium-sized, and very large organisations, Gerber has discovered the truth behind why management doesn′t work and what to do about it. Unearthing the arbitrary origins of commonly held doctrines such as the omniscience of leader (Emperor) and the most widely embraced myth of all擨e E-Myth Manager offers a fresh, provocative alternative to management as we know it. It explores why every manager must take charge of his own life, reconcile his own personal vision with that of the organisation, and develop an entrepreneurial mind-set to achieve true success.

How to Be Everything: A Guide for Those Who (Still) Don't Know What They Want to Be When They Grow Up


Emilie Wapnick - 2017
    While seemingly harmless, the question has unintended consequences. It can make you feel like you need to choose one job, one passion, one thing to be about. Guess what? You don't.Having a lot of different interests, projects and curiosities doesn't make you a "jack-of-all-trades, master of none." Your endless curiosity doesn't mean you are broken or flaky. What you are is a multipotentialite: someone with many interests and creative pursuits. And that is actually your biggest strength.How to Be Everything helps you channel your diverse passions and skills to work for you. Based on her popular TED talk, "Why some of us don't have one true calling", Emilie Wapnick flips the script on conventional career advice. Instead of suggesting that you specialize, choose a niche or accumulate 10,000 hours of practice in a single area, Wapnick provides a practical framework for building a sustainable life around ALL of your passions.You'll discover:•  Why your multipotentiality is your biggest strength, especially in today's uncertain job market.•  How to make a living and structure your work if you have many skills and interests.•  How to focus on multiple projects and make progress on all of them.•  How to handle common insecurities such as the fear of not being the best, the guilt associated with losing interest in something you used to love and the challenge of explaining "what you do" to others. Not fitting neatly into a box can be a beautiful thing. How to Be Everything teaches you how to design a life, at any age and stage of your career, that allows you to be fully you, and find the kind of work you'll love.