A comprehensive and informative handbook for those who see a book as a useful step on their career paths.
A guide to publishing that focuses on using authorship for professional positioning.
In this debut business book, Hall, the CEO of the hybrid-publishing company Greenleaf Book Group, guides would-be authors through the process of publishing a book, developing a platform, and generating income from book sales, speaking engagements, and other related pursuits. She offers strategies for developing publishable ideas, understanding the market, and approaching the traditional and self-publishing processes. Along the way, the book identifies common challenges—such as the fear of criticism and the difficulty of making time for writing—and provides workable solutions for each problem. Readers unfamiliar with publishing-industry practices will find the overview of copyright, retail sales, and marketing particularly useful. Hall discusses developing material for multiple channels, using a publication to drive a speaking career, licensing content and trademarks, and establishing credentials, citing authors Gary Vaynerchuk, Suze Orman, and Joe Cross as examples of success. The book makes it clear that its intended audience isn’t people looking to make writing their sole career (“After all, you are probably not a writer by trade,” notes one aside), and it encourages readers to hire writing coaches and ghostwriters if their own skills are insufficient: “knowing how to delegate is a sign of leadership.” But although the book does acknowledge that not all ideas are best presented in book form, it doesn’t urge readers to ask themselves whether a book intended to accelerate one’s career as an “influencer” is actually a necessary addition to the “crowded marketplace.” Readers who pursue this path will find Hall’s book to be an effective tool, as well as an object lesson: Hall’s company name appears on 15 pages, ensuring that readers won’t forget it.
A comprehensive and informative handbook for those who see a book as a useful step on their career paths.Pub Date: May 27, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-62634-514-0
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Greenleaf Book Group Press
Review Posted Online: March 30, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
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These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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