It draws upon the experiences of thousands of demonstrations, both delivered and received from vendors and customers. The distinctive "Do the Last Thing First" concept generates a "Wow!" response from customers. The Great Demo! method is presented simply and clearly, and is elaborated more fully in each successive chapter, providing a rich toolkit for software sales teams. Real-life anecdotes, examples, and axioms offer humorous and effective punctuation. Updated with new best practices, tips and techniques, this second edition now includes a complete chapter on remote demonstrations--an area of increased activity and unique challenges. An additional chapter on managing evaluations (for fun and profit) extends the utility of the book to those in sales and management. Great Demo! is a terrific read on an airplane or between customer visits. It offers a straightforward process for creating and delivering highly compelling software demonstrations, excellent advice, tips, and the occasional epiphany.

    It has led nothing short of a revolution in the entertainment industries, generating billions of dollars in annual revenue while capturing the imaginations of hundreds of millions of people in over 190 countries. But to reach these great heights, Netflix, which launched in 1998 as an online DVD rental service, has had to reinvent itself over and over again. This type of unprecedented flexibility would have been impossible without the counterintuitive and radical management principles that cofounder Reed Hastings established from the very beginning. Hastings rejected the conventional wisdom under which other companies operate and defied tradition to instead build a culture focused on freedom and responsibility, one that has allowed Netflix to adapt and innovate as the needs of its members and the world have simultaneously transformed.Hastings set new standards, valuing people over process, emphasizing innovation over efficiency, and giving employees context, not controls. At Netflix, there are no vacation or expense policies. At Netflix, adequate performance gets a generous severance, and hard work is irrel-evant. At Netflix, you don't try to please your boss, you give candid feedback instead. At Netflix, employees don't need approval, and the company pays top of market. When Hastings and his team first devised these unorthodox principles, the implications were unknown and untested. But in just a short period, their methods led to unparalleled speed and boldness, as Netflix quickly became one of the most loved brands in the world.Here for the first time, Hastings and Erin Meyer, bestselling author of The Culture Map and one of the world's most influential business thinkers, dive deep into the controversial ideologies at the heart of the Netflix psyche, which have generated results that are the envy of the business world. Drawing on hundreds of interviews with current and past Netflix employees from around the globe and never-before-told stories of trial and error from Hastings's own career, No Rules Rules is the fascinating and untold account of the philosophy behind one of the world's most innovative, imaginative, and successful companies.

    It doesn’t matter whether you feel confident; it matters what you actually do.Author Kara Goldin turned her unsweetened flavored water into one of the most successful beverage businesses of our time and has been named one of InStyle’s Badass 50, Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business, Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs and EY Entrepreneur of the Year for Northern California.Undaunted is a rare opportunity to gain insights and proven advice unlike anything you’ll find in the conventional business press. Kara combines real honest stories from her life with observations that might just change how you think about your own.Whether you want to get healthy, start a company, break an addiction, find a new career or just grow in life, Undaunted will inspire you to just go for it and help you find the courage to get there.As she started to achieve her goals, Kara found herself being called “fearless”, “confident” and even “unstoppable,” but nothing could be further from the truth. In Undaunted she shares real stories about her own fears and doubts, the challenges she encountered and what she did to overcome them to eventually build a great business and a life she loves.Her secret? Be Undaunted. Deal with your fears. Move forward despite uncertainty. Turn criticism into motivation. Just go for it!Setbacks will come, but Kara shows you can learn from failures and frustrations and keep advancing toward your true purpose. What if not having “the right” credentials or vast industry experience was the secret to making things happen? And what if we didn’t let our fear of failure stop us?Part autobiography, part business memoir and lots of insights on self-development, Undaunted offers inspiring stories that impart lessons that any reader can apply to their own path. While most motivational business and life books try to offer quick fixes, Undaunted focuses on long-term success, showing you how to take control of breaking down barriers and moving forward. Undaunted won’t solve your problems and challenges. You will. But it will help you see through other’s experiences that it’s possible to do so.Accept your fears, but decide to be Undaunted.

    Rogers argues that digital transformation is not about updating your technology but about upgrading your strategic thinking. Based on Rogers's decade of research and teaching at Columbia Business School, and his consulting for businesses around the world, The Digital Transformation Playbook shows how pre-digital-era companies can reinvigorate their game plans and capture the new opportunities of the digital world.Rogers shows why traditional businesses need to rethink their underlying assumptions in five domains of strategy--customers, competition, data, innovation, and value. He reveals how to harness customer networks, platforms, big data, rapid experimentation, and disruptive business models--and how to integrate these into your existing business and organization.Rogers illustrates every strategy in this playbook with real-world case studies, from Google to GE, from Airbnb to the New York Times. With practical frameworks and nine step-by-step planning tools, he distills the lessons of today's greatest digital innovators and makes them usable for businesses at any stage.Many books offer advice for digital start-ups, but The Digital Transformation Playbook is the first complete treatment of how legacy businesses can transform to thrive in the digital age. It is an indispensable guide for executives looking to take their firms to the next stage of profitable growth.

    In The Last Diet., she shares how the same evidence-based tools she used effectively with her clients who struggle with addiction helped her to lose over a hundred pounds, increase her self-esteem, and transform her habits around food and negative self-talk. Diets often offer quick, short-term fixes and so-called miracle cures, but the real challenge is managing weight and changing habits over a sustained period of time. Everybody's journeys and needs are different: it’s about shifting the way we communicate with ourselves and our bodies every single day, in every aspect of our lives. Shahroo’s revolutionary kindness method gives readers the tools to embrace self-kindness and self-respect and in doing so change the narrative of health. Using a custom-tailored plan, The Last Diet. will help you identify where your unhealthy habits come from, teach you how change them, and show you what to do when you slip up. Shahroo guides you through every step, helping you to draw out your own wisdom and find motivation to change your long-term habits and lose weight – for good.

    Air Force, and USAA. He teaches his clients that innovation isn't just about generating occasional new ideas; it's about staying consistently one step ahead of the competition.Hire people you don't like. Bring in the right mix of people to unleash your team's full potential. Asking for ideas is a bad idea. Define challenges more clearly. If you ask better questions, you will get better answers. Don't think outside the box; find a better box. Instead of giving your employees a blank slate, provide them with well-defined parameters that will increase their creative output. Failure is always an option. Looking at innovation as a series of experiments allows you to redefine failure and learn from your results.Shapiro shows that nonstop innovation is attainable and vital to building a high-performing team, improving the bottom line, and staying ahead of the pack.

    At first I thought I was the only one who felt that way, but then I started to talk to people and realized we're becoming the "I'm, but" generation. When we talk about what we do for a living we inevitably say, "I'm a teacher, but I want to be an artist." "I'm a CPA, but I'd love to start my own business." "I'm a _____, but I want to be a ______." All too often, we hear that dreaming big means you quit your day job, sell everything you own, and move to Guam. But what if there were a different way? What if you could blow up your dream without blowing up your life? What if you could go for broke without going broke? What if you could start today? What if you already have everything you need to begin? From figuring out what your dream is to quitting in a way that exponentially increases your chance of success, Quitter is full of inspiring stories and actionable advice. This book is based on 12 years of cubicle living and my true story of cultivating a dream job that changed my life and the world in the process. It's time to close the gap between your day job and your dream job. It's time to be a Quitter.

    In Red Thread Thinking, Kaye shows you how to weave originality from disparate information and turn it into a product or service that can shake up the marketplace--and your business.What sets Red Thread Thinking apart from other books is that it reveals exactly how to identify and understand hidden cultural codes and shifts in consumer perceptions that speak to emerging and existing markets and, as a result, catapult fresh products to iconic status.A mold-breaking system, Red Thread Thinking sharpens your innovation skills and can assist in problem solving, whether preparing a talk, pitching a project to your colleagues and boss, managing staff in a more productive way, or taking business to a new level. Learn the ways of Red Thread Thinking:Red Thread One: "Innovation--It's All in Your Head"--We can fire up our brains to become better at observing and interpreting what we see around usRed Thread Two: "Everything Old is New"--Take a fresh look at the past to gain remarkable advantageRed Thread Three: "People: The Strangest Animals in the Zoo"--Know what makes your market tick, and you'll know what makes them spendRed Thread Four: "What You See Is What You Get"--Learn how to create an entirely new and accessible "language" to make your product stand out and be universally understoodRed Thread Five: "The Force of Passion"--Persevere, review, and refine your ideas without compromising your integrity or core beliefs.Red Thread Thinking teaches you to activate your own knowledge and resources to make better connections, have more and superior insights, and apply history as a valuable source for future-leaning innovation--without the need for high-cost development.

    Written by the former Creative Director of OgilvyOne, Dave Birss, this book offers a brilliant new system for conceiving original and valuable ideas. It looks at how to frame the problem, how to push your thinking, how to sell the idea and build support for it, and how to inspire others to have great ideas. It proves that any organization - and any department within an organization - can become a fertile environment for ideas.Combining a practical research-based system with fascinating insights and inspiring and humorous writing,the book is also accompanied by the problem-solving system RIGHT THINKING. This is a tool that shows organizations a more effective way to generate more effective ideas and is based on the thinking in the book. This is available online and in person from the author.

    Cracking the PM Interview is a comprehensive book about landing a product management role in a startup or bigger tech company. Learn how the ambiguously-named "PM" (product manager / program manager) role varies across companies, what experience you need, how to make your existing experience translate, what a great PM resume and cover letter look like, and finally, how to master the interview: estimation questions, behavioral questions, case questions, product questions, technical questions, and the super important "pitch."

    The reality: The biggest thing you won't learn in college is how to succeed professionally.Some of the smartest, most successful people in the country didn't finish college. None of them learned their most critical skills at an institution of higher education. And like them, most of what you'll need to learn to be successful you'll have to learn on your own, outside of school.Michael Ellsberg set out to fill in the gaps by interviewing a wide range of millionaires and billionaires who don't have college degrees, including fashion magnate Russell Simmons, Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and founding president Sean Parker, WordPress creator Matt Mullenweg, and Pink Floyd songwriter and lead guitarist David Gilmour. Among the fascinating things he learned: How fashion designer Marc Ecko started earning $1000 a week in high school with his own clothing business, and later grew it into an empire. How billionaire Phillip Ruffin went from lowly department store employee with no college degree, to owner of Treasure Island on the Vegas Strip. How John Paul DeJoria went from homelessness to billionaire as founder of John Paul Mitchell Systems Hair Care Products.This book is your guide to developing practical success skills in the real world. Even if you've already gone through college, the most important skills weren't in the curriculum-how to find great mentors, build a world-class network, learn real-world marketing and sales, make your work meaningful (and your meaning work), build the brand of you, master the art of bootstrapping, and more.Learning the skills in this book well is a "necessary" addition to any education. This book shows you the way, whether you're a high school dropout or a graduate of Harvard Law School.

    In Working Backwards, these two long-serving Amazon executives reveal and codify the principles and practices that drive the success of one of the most extraordinary companies the world has ever known. With twenty-seven years of Amazon experience between them, much of it in the early aughts—a period of unmatched innovation that brought products and services including Kindle, Amazon Prime, Amazon Studios, and Amazon Web Services to life—Bryar and Carr offer unprecedented access to the Amazon way as it was refined, articulated, and proven to be repeatable, scalable, and adaptable.With keen analysis and practical steps for applying it at your own company—no matter the size—the authors illuminate how Amazon’s fourteen leadership principles inform decision-making at all levels and reveal how the company’s culture has been defined by four characteristics: customer obsession, long-term thinking, eagerness to invent, and operational excellence. Bryar and Carr explain the set of ground-level practices that ensure these are translated into action and flow through all aspects of the business.Working Backwards is a practical guidebook and a corporate narrative, filled with the authors’ in-the-room recollections of what “Being Amazonian” is like and how it has affected their personal and professional lives. They demonstrate that success on Amazon’s scale is not achieved by the genius of any single leader, but rather through commitment to and execution of a set of well-defined, rigorously-executed principles and practices—shared here for the very first time. A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin's Press

    In Hollywood, a movie is given a single weekend to succeed before being written off. In Silicon Valley, a startup is a failure if it doesn't go viral or rake in venture capital from the start. In publishing, a book that took years to write is given less than three months to sink or swim. These brutally shortsighted attitudes have choked the world with instructions for engineering a flash-in-the-pan and littered the media landscape with fads and flops. Meanwhile, the greats, the stalwarts, the household names, are those who focus on a singularly different, possibly heretical, idea: that their work can and should last. For instance, Zildjian has been one of the premier makers of cymbals since its founding in 1623--and shows no signs of quitting. Iron Maiden has filled stadiums for forty years, moving some 85 million albums without the help of radio or television. Robert Greene's first book, The 48 Laws of Power, didn't hit the bestseller lists until over a decade after it was first released, and since then has sold more than 1 million copies worldwide. These works Ryan Holiday calls Perennial Sellers. They exist in every creative industry--timeless, dependable resources and unsung moneymakers, paying like blue chip annuities. Like gold or land, they increase in value over time, outlasting and outreaching any competition. And they're not flukes or lucky breaks--they were built to last from the outset. Holiday shows readers how to make and market their own classic work. Featuring interviews with some of the world's greatest creatives, and grounded in a deep study of the classics in every genre, this exciting new book empowers readers with a foundational set of innovative principles. Whether you have a book or a business, a song or the next great screenplay, this book reveals the recipe for perennial success.

    Yet certain challenges never go away. That's what makes this book "must read." These are the 10 seminal articles by management's most influential experts, on topics of perennial concern to ambitious managers and leaders hungry for inspiration--and ready to run with big ideas to accelerate their own and their companies' success.If you read nothing else - full stop - read:Michael Porter on creating competitive advantage and distinguishing your company from rivalsJohn Kotter on leading change through eight critical stagesDaniel Goleman on using emotional intelligence to maximize performancePeter Drucker on managing your career by evaluating your own strengths and weaknessesClay Christensen on orchestrating innovation within established organizationsTom Davenport on using analytics to determine how to keep your customers loyalRobert Kaplan and David Norton on measuring your company's strategy with the Balanced ScorecardRosabeth Moss Kanter on avoiding common mistakes when pushing innovation forwardTed Levitt on understanding who your customers are and what they really wantC. K. Prahalad and Gary Hamel on identifying the unique, integrated systems that support your strategy

    Who are these people, what motivates them, and why should you care?Consider these facts: Everything around us is turning into computers. Your typewriter is gone, replaced by a computer. Your phone has turned into a computer. So has your camera. Soon your TV will. Your car was not only designed on computers, but has more processing power in it than a room-sized mainframe did in 1970. Letters, encyclopedias, newspapers, and even your local store are being replaced by the Internet.Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age, by Paul Graham, explains this world and the motivations of the people who occupy it. In clear, thoughtful prose that draws on illuminating historical examples, Graham takes readers on an unflinching exploration into what he calls “an intellectual Wild West.”The ideas discussed in this book will have a powerful and lasting impact on how we think, how we work, how we develop technology, and how we live. Topics include the importance of beauty in software design, how to make wealth, heresy and free speech, the programming language renaissance, the open-source movement, digital design, internet startups, and more.