(Part 3) Best business management & leadership books according to redditors
We found 4,460 Reddit comments discussing the best business management & leadership books. We ranked the 1,469 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the products ranked 41-60. You can also go back to the previous section.
Articles from reputable sources are a decent source of knowledge, but some quality business books will get you an infinitely better understanding of concepts. Here is my personal business book list if you want to get a "universal generalist" understanding of business:
I am graduating with a Bachelor of Commerce Honors degree in May and I can easily say that one of these books (average price ~25$) has significantly more content than most individual classes I have taken (~600$). However, keep in mind that business knowledge and business acumen are two entirely different things. Knowledge is easily obtainable through books like these, and acumen is the result of applied experience with decision making. In short, it is one thing to be book smart, but it is another to get out there and actually apply it. No one can give you that in the form of an article or book - you have to do that yourself.
edit: added links to amazon
I can’t recommend highly enough 3 books on good visualizations in business (and everywhere else)
Report format for abstract/methods/etc vs PowerPoint for salespeople varies dramatically from company to company, so I don’t have any good recommendations there. But in the “a picture is worth a thousand words” world, visualizations really matter.
If you've never read the book, go read the book. Absolutely fantastic.
http://www.amazon.com/Dilbert-Principle-Cubicles-Eye-Management-Afflictions/dp/0887308589
Please understand, all three are generally speaking fairly senior roles.
A Project Manager (obviously) manages projects.
Most PMs have a background in business or a technology area that they were good at, but discovered and got really good at managing projects.
An IT PM needs to know a little bit about damned near all technology areas - just enough to know when they need to bring in another resource.
An IT PM needs to know when they are being lied to. The business sets due-dates, and the PM needs to organize resources to meet those dates. Some resources don't want to give accurate or realistic estimates on how long their components will take, which has a snowball effect on project components that depend on that component...
Above all else, a PM must have excellent communication & organizational skills.
Formal Project Management is practically a religion, and this is their holy text: PMBOK
More info here: http://www.pmi.org/certifications/types/project-management-pmp
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A Technical Consultant is a specialist with significant experience & expertise in a given technology area. They know how a particular widget works, and how most businesses tend to use and integrate said widget into an organization. The deeper the history of knowledge and longer the track record of successful projects, the more a consultant tends to be paid.
A consultant will usually be brought in as a resource to be managed by a Project Manager.
The consultant has answers to questions and design or implementation recommendations that will be used by the incumbant technology teams to integrate the widget into their company.
Sometimes a company will engage a consultant and pay them to do everything. You are the expert - just make the widget work, and tell us when you are done. This is a clear indication of a terrible company, with piss-poor management. How will you keep the widget working if you don't know how it works, or how it was implemented in the first place?
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A Solution Architect is a Technical Consultant who has expertise in not just a specific widget, but the entire technology area and/or business operation that will use the widget. They can design or modify your business or technology department or infrastructure to best use a new widget.
These are among the most senior of technologists.
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Question for you:
What happened for you when you went to Google and searched for "wiki project manager" or "wiki technical consultant" or "wiki solution architect" ?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_manager
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_technology_consulting
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solution_architect
The reason I ask the question is that nearly all IT staff members are paid to solve problems of one sort or another.
Learning something new is just another problem to solve.
If you hope to succeed and excel in this career, you really need to improve your ability to answer questions of this level on your own.
>ignore it altogether
this is up for debate. there's a theory/business thinking called "disruptive business/disruptive technology," and one of its main tenets is that a company should go the lengths to "ignore" what its customer base is saying... but the tenet is followed up with a statement that says that a company should do all in its power to seek out new innovations the customer is not expecting or doesn't know of.
customers don't know everything, and sometimes it's not a bad idea to ignore them while you cook up some fancy new features (iPhone's visual voicemail for example).
what RIM did was the opposite of this. It's apparent that while they were caught up in their own success, their hubris led to them thinking they did not have to worry about the iPhone and its encroachment of the business sector.
They failed to notice that the walls between one's 'corporate career' and 'personal life' have been coming down over the years. Devices that make one's personal life easy to manage have now found themselves in the 'corporate career' zone, all thanks to a well developed UI and lots of research into HCI.
you can read more about this stuff in this book, it's pretty good stuff:
Strictly speaking I'm not surprised. Not because I'm an Apple Fanboy (I am - but for "right" reasons ;-) ).
But really just because if you look at the financials of each company over the last 10 years and look at how the product lines and marketing are handled, it's pretty obvious (since ~2000 to me anyway) Microsoft was going to and probably has now, hit a brick wall on revenue growth and innovation to drive more.
Where was Microsoft going to grow when Windows adoption has been stagnant and the compounding rate of adoption drying up compared to 1990s norms. Think about all those corporate users still using Win2K and WinXP; this is a very, very bad juju because corporate IT are one of the big 3 customer bases for Microsoft. And then there's Office. Between these two, there really are no other reliable cash cows in their stable of products. None.
XBox is a promising product line expansion but is it big enough to float Microsoft? I don't think so. Maybe highly profitable as an independent spin-out but where does that leave Microsoft itself? And the market size for games vs. the market size for tablets. Things that make you say "hmmm".
The laughable (when idiots spout it) and simple fact is that high market share doesn't assure revenue growth - in fact above, say 60-80% share, it seriously works against you if your products are in late adoption.
The classic Wintel PC is in late adoption as is the broader class of "computing devices" which includes all computers and tablets. Windows and Office are in late adoption as software products. And these are cash cows? What's really going to replace them? And they will have to be replaced. More Windows? More Office? LOL ROFL! Just like more Burroughs mainframes? That's all that's needed!
Tablets themselves are early adoption as a subclass. The point is, that you don't want high market share in late adoption in a rapidly changing technology. The Innovator's Dilemma describes why this is bad - it create inertia against innovation and it limits your revenue growth opportunities. It's the "why" of where Burroughs or Connor are today. Microsoft has all the classic symptoms.
Simply stated: Microsoft should have not been so aggressive in growth in the past - they wouldn't have this problem now. A simply lack of self-discipline and self-control in as much in opposition as Apple reeks with self-discipline and self-control.
Thus Microsoft's problem is akin to how Apple doesn't have the same problem now even though both companies are about the same age (give or take a year). Although you can think of this as karma for being assholes during the 1990s - it's really just that there's a real physical organization/economic mechanism behind it. Or... karma is real and physical!
Corporate IT is one of Microsoft's three major customers. Another is ISVs (most of whom were the VB6 weenies alienated in ~2000). Sure many people adopted .NET/VB7/C# etc. but Microsoft also lost a large and enthusiastic (blindly so in most cases) part of their mojo. Kind like Apple kicking out the trendy hipsters and expecting all to go well.
The third leg are Wintel HW vendors who have their own disconnects with the end-user markets. All insist on keeping customers at "arm's length".
And, no, end users are not in the top-three of Microsoft's customer base. Microsoft will say otherwise but it's BS lies or self-delusional lies they tell themselves: the supply chains tell the real story. And that is and always has been a serious problem for them despite their successes.
Further the market architecture of the Wintel system is fatally flawed for late adoption innovation - Microsoft's primary customers are 1-2 supply chain links up from actual end-users of their products.
Similarly Intel itself and most of the Wintel HW vendors are 2-3 supply chain links up from the actual end-users as well. This disconnect is part of why the A4 and A5 exist!
Then compare this with Apple which has 0 supply chain links from the customer, end users, for both HW and SW and it's pretty damn obvious who is going to "own late adoption" for computing appliances.
Late adoption requires "appliance-ification" of your product which can not be done at a distance like these supply chain gaps create. No, it's not a matter of "good top-down management" - it's that "bottom-up emergent activity" can't survive or thrive with supply chain gaps. Not when you have to design things by committee across corporate legal entity barriers.
This is why you need to do both HW and SW together - a goodly part of why Apple has its success. And this is why it's a fatal market flaw for Wintel. Which Android has chosen to replicate also. Brilliant! Duh!
As an entrepreneur I've always seen this kind of "it's not my job; I do SW (HW) not HW (SW)" behavior as a wonderful, heaven-sent opportunity to skewer larger competitors. It's an Aikido thing: use their weaknesses as your strengths so they their attempt to muscle you ends up damaging themselves more. It works surprisingly well. It seems to be working for Apple too.
The funny/sad part is all the Geeks who try to defend Wintel/Linux or Android who manage to irrelevantly talk right pass the iPad-buying public with specs and tech-weenie justification that mean absolutely nothing most paying customers. It's like trying to impress the prom queen with your slide rule skillz. It doesn't even register as rational or relevant. Nobody who matters (has money and want to spend it) cares.
You see a lot of these Geeks never lived through the actual leading edge period of PCs nor have most seen an entire technology cycle to even know what early or late adoption look like or how they are different in terms of selling or buying processes. In an early adoption environment, geeks have some power to (de)leverage sales.
I think that's what most of these folks are trying to tap into with spec-talk and nerd-talk about the L33t Pwr2 of Android or OSS or Wintel. The problem is the higher order technology adoption of computer devices is not in early adoption - only the subtechnology of tablets is so in terms of majority buyers, it's a late adoption buying process, not early adoption.
In that world, geeks are nearly powerless to influence most buying decisions because you are so tiny in number and the buyer market made up of non-Geeks so enormous in number. It's a Bayesian statistic prior population thing.
It's the early adoption phase when Geek outnumber or have parity with early adopter buyer markets that Geeks can play the role of "diffusion process gatekeeper". Not in late adoption though. It's a different game at that point. And Apple knows that game far better than all of the Wintel, OSS and Android crowd combined. Funny-Sad.
I've gotten a lot of emails that look exactly like this one and I immediately delete them because they're spam. You need to answer two fundamental questions: Why should they trust you? and Why should they pay attention to you? You're not giving them a reason to trust you because you're essentially a nobody with no track record. You're not giving them a reason to pay attention to you because there's nothing personalized or unique to them about this email, you talk way too much about yourself, and you don't talk enough about what you can ultimately do for them.
Here's a breakdown of the current email:
> I'm Joe, a Web Developer from X.
Intro is alright. Before that you might want to say, "Hi $name,".
> Recently I found your website, and, was curious if you would be interested in working towards building a new one?
Why? What's the business case for a new website over their old website? What's the benefit?
> I currently work for a web agency in X, who offer web services for small, medium, and, large businesses, though I'm looking for further work to help businesses in the area.
Is it you or the agency offering services? This is confusing. Help businesses do what exactly? You could say, "At $web_agency I've worked on projects for multi-million dollar businesses such as X, Y, Z but now I'm leveraging my experience to help businesses like yours in $your_market do A, B, C."
> I have worked on hundreds of websites and have been working in the industry for nearly 6 years.
But what results did you get? Did you increase sales by X% for ABC company? What can you do for them? Don't make it about yourself.
> Additionally, I have a strong knowledge in SEO, which can help your website perform better within Google's search results.
What's SEO? Why should they care?
> I am really good at what I can do, and, can offer an agency service with non-agency prices.
Don't tell, show. And don't compete on price, please...
> Let me know if this is something you would be interested in.
> If you would like chat and organise a meeting to discuss this further, feel free to email me back, or call me on X
Why not create an attention-grabbing hook like, "$name, let's set up a quick 5 minute call so we can discuss a few ways your website can be improved to increase appointments/sales/etc by 20% like I've done for my other clients."
I suggest you read Pitch Anything and CA$HVERTISING.
Python is a good choice primarily because of the culture around it of focusing on teaching new folks and documenting things for new folks. It is an excellent first language both because:
The first key skill when you first start programming is that you are able to write a buggy program, run into an error that makes no fucking sense, and confidently break down that problem, figure out what went wrong, and fix it. Python provides better tools for doing that than many other languages. ^(look up pdb and py.test) once you are able to write and debug short programs, you can call yourself a programmer and then build on top of that foundation.
A good starting point is this free book followed by this free book by the end of which you will be able to build a dynamic website in python.
There are disadvantages to python. They mostly don’t matter as much when first starting out, but as you gain experience, you should expect to be annoyed by these trade-offs.
After the Pragmatic Programmer, Debugging.
As a starting out programmer, so much of your time is spent debugging, and this very short (can easily be read in day) book will probably cut that time in half if not more. I mean you can read it in 6 hours, and it could easily save a new programmer 100's of hours in a year.
the art of deception by kevin mitnik
http://www.amazon.ca/The-Art-Deception-Controlling-Security/dp/0471237124
Maybe someone just pretended to be an AT&T tech and got his info by calling the support switchboard and talking to a naive service rep. Gee, it's almost like they could have learned about that technique by reading a book or something.
Interesting article by the author of The Inevitable who posits that only narrow AI is the more likely candidate for AI in the future and not AGI. I would disagree with many of his premises e.g. his 'strawmanish' argument of exponential intelligence growth, that human intelligence must be substrate-dependent, and he doesn't quite seem to engage in the argument of thinking of intelligence as a focused optimisation-process that can more likely achieve the outcomes its values are set to.
But point 5 did make me think: how much can a superintelligence infer from existing data alone? "Can you know the universe from a single pebble?" And if it requires more data, then the scientific method for accumulating data takes time. What does that mean for thoughts on intelligence explosions and "singularity"-type events? Or is there an assumption I have made in that train of thought, that isn't correct?
My introduction to Social Engineering was in "The Art of Deception: Controlling the Human Element of Security" by the famous hacker Kevin Mitnick.
From the wiki:
All, or nearly all, of the examples are fictional, but quite plausible. They expose the ease with which a skilled social engineer can subvert many rules most people take for granted. A few examples:
Honestly, it was a better introduction to and explaination of social engineering than pretty much anything I've caught on this subreddit. Most things on here are more "pick-up artist" tricks than what I would personally consider true social engineering.
I made a list based on where you can purchase them if you want to edit it onto your post:
This Month's Book
January:
by Iain Banks]
(https://www.amazon.com/Consider-Phlebas-Culture-Iain-Banks/dp/031600538X)
by Aldous Huxley]
(https://www.amazon.com/Brave-New-World-Aldous-Huxley/dp/0060850523)
by Ray Bradbury
by Oscar Wilde
by Adrian Tchaikovsky
by Jordan B. Peterson]
(https://www.amazon.com/12-Rules-Life-Antidote-Chaos/dp/B0797Y87JC)
February:
by Richard Matheson
by Frank Herbert
by Haruki Murakami
by Bret Easton Ellis
by Max Tegmark
by Friedrich Nietzsche
March:
by Ernest Hemingway
by Herman Melville
April:
(https://www.amazon.com/Dice-Man-Luke-Rhinehart/dp/0879518642)
https://www.amazon.com/Stoner-York-Review-Books-Classics/dp/1590171993)
(https://www.amazon.com/Crime-Punishment-Fyodor-Dostoyevsky/dp/0486415872)
https://www.amazon.com/No-Longer-Human-Osamu-Dazai/dp/0811204812)
May:
https://www.amazon.com/Spring-Snow-Sea-Fertility-1/dp/0679722416)
(https://www.amazon.com/Runaway-Horses-Sea-Fertility-2/dp/0679722408)
November
Books Pewds suggested but hasn't talked about in any of the episodes yet:
linking pewds to see this u/pewpewpewPEWdie
I fully agree regarding the news. To follow on to this- Hans and Ola Rosling's TED Talk from 2014, How not to be ignorant about the world, genuinely helped me. Their later 2018 book, Factfulness, further helped focus my understanding of things. Things are better than it seems for the vast majority of humanity.
"My" data on Fukushima is from the National Police Agency of Japan and Ichiseki (2013). According to police records, the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami caused 15,894 confirmed deaths, and 2,546 people are still missing (as of December 2017).
Tanigawa et al. (2012) concluded that 61 very old people in critical health conditions died during the hasty evacuation.
About 1,600 further deaths were indirectly caused by other kinds of problems for mainly elderly evacuees, reports Ichiseki:
>The reconstruction agency reports that more than 95% (1206) of victims were aged 60 years or older. About 64% (814) had chronic diseases. About 48% (608) of deaths were confirmed within 1 month, and 78% (986) within 3 months after the earthquake. The most common cause of death was “physical or mental fatigue from life at evacuation shelters” (n=638 [33%]), followed by “fatigue from moving to evacuation shelters” (401 [21%]), “aggravation of illnesses due to halted hospital operations” (283 [15%]), and “excessive mental and physical stress caused by the earthquake and tsunami” (150 [8%]).
Nobody was reported dying from the nuclear leak, and WHO concludes that it might be possible to detect a small increase of mortality, but that it is expected to occur in a very limited group of people.
According to Pew in 2012, 76 percent of people in Japan believed that food from Fukushima was dangerous. The contamination of the very word Fukushima is discussed in the book “Hazards, Risks, and Disasters in Society” by John Shroder (2014).
It's really cool that a lot of elderly people found a new purpose in life by being united after living so far apart for so long. But moving is not easy for sick and old people and it causes a lot of health problems as well.
Anyway, the main point I guess is that our fears are disproportionate to the reality of what causes harm.
Your comments on the insiders not wanting to cut an existing source of revenue is the entire subject of a book by Clayton Christensen called the Innovator's Dilemma. Christensen chronicles the hard drive industry and shows how firms continuously refined their products in incremental ways and did everything right according to management and shareholders, only to be crushed by new disruptive technologies.
That's one item that I got from my worthless (50k) MBA.
Would love to add anyone on Goodreads if you use it too :) [Add me](https://www.goodreads.com/thedoerco
)
Second Influence. Getting Everything You Can is good if you are basic in marketing, I would not recommend it for people who are more advanced.
If you don't know what a "business goal" is, you need to read this:
Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind by Al Ries and Jack Trout is as important today as it ever has been. It's a great book and IMHO a must read for every marketer and business owner.
Say no more, fam.
You don't need a degree to run a business. Having your own business allows you to experiment with these books first hand instead of taking some professor's word for it. Professor's usually just read what the book says. If they were actually good at running a business they'd probably be doing that.
Rationalizing why a version is better never works, people don't like to be told that they're wrong. This is why graphic design is 50% salesmanship. Selling clients on a concept is half the battle. There are tried and tested ways to present ideas that don't come across as "I know better than you so do it this way...". Even body language can play an important role. I recommend getting some good books on sales psychology and pitches. Pitch Anything and The Challenger Sale are good starts.
I read an interesting book that discusses and answers all of your questions called The Inevitable. Highly recommend. https://www.amazon.com/Inevitable-Understanding-Technological-Forces-Future/dp/0525428089
An Essential Reading List For Designers
Source: www.tomfaulkner.co.uk
All books have been linked to Amazon for review and possible purchase. Remember to support the authors by purchasing their books. If there are any issues with this listing let me know via comments or pm.
Architecture
Communication Design
Fashion Design
Angela ButtolphEditors of Phaidon ?Furniture Design
Game Design
Graphic Design
Information Design
Industrial Design
(cont'd)
Here's an "Intro to Tableau" Evernote link that has the detail below, but this is what I've put together for our teams when new folks join and want to know more about it.
http://www.evernote.com/l/AKBV30_85-ZEFbF0lNaDxgSMuG9Mq0xpmUM/
What is Tableau?
Where do I get it?
Now that I have it, how do I use it?
How do I become involved?
I want to know more
Scrum doesn't have failed stories, anything that doesn't get accepted by the PO is not counted against velocity, especially if it's been abandoned entirely. I've used TFS for scrum, but based on your type of work, the fact that you are running 1-week sprints (rarely recommended) and that you are tracking velocity/capacity per person rather than your team (also very rarely recommended) I would make the switch to Kanban, specifically operational Kanban detailed in David Anderson's Kanban bluebook:
​
https://www.amazon.com/Kanban-Successful-Evolutionary-Technology-Business/dp/0984521402/ref=sr_1_3?crid=3R9PO4NATTFZT
​
You will then change what you are tracking to concentrate on flow control (with cycle times per class of service, etc.) rather than worrying about velocity.
> don't have the financial need to innovate
The Innovator's Dilemma book covered this. They do need to innovate and they know that. The problem is that any innovation will look like a rounding error compared to current financials and so on those terms it is hard to make any progress.
I'm reading a book called the Innovator's Dilemma that explains how a company (and Sears is a perfect example) can do all the right things, and still lose its position as the dominant player in the market.
It's a very insightful read -- I recommend it. Very interesting if you're ever thinking of starting your own business.
http://www.amazon.com/Innovators-Dilemma-Revolutionary-Business-Essentials/dp/0060521996
And, I shit you not. I started reading this last night and then you post this.
so far pretty interesting book, You should also look up the Baader Meinhoff effect
I had seen "The Art of Strategy" by Dixit and Nalebuff recommended here before, and thought it was a great place to start.
He wrote a book a few years ago (2002) thats a fun read although not particularly informative. It largely focusses on social ngineering.
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Deception-Controlling-Element-Security/dp/0471237124
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Intrusion-Exploits-Intruders-Deceivers/dp/0471782661/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b/105-3743895-7466022 also in 2005.
ad hominem comment - directed against a person rather than the position they are maintaining.
I never said that I am more versed than Musk (though we don't know if I am or not - it isn't relevant).
I'm just not going to agree with Musk because he is Musk. UBI is a favorite term of futurology. . .
I find someone like Kevin Kelley as a better resource/explanation of what will happen in the future (https://www.amazon.com/Inevitable-Understanding-Technological-Forces-Future/dp/0525428089).
Did you also know he believes in 'The Secret' ? Read the last chapter of this book.
The best advice I can give you is to start with this book by Steven Few: http://www.amazon.com/Show-Me-Numbers-Designing-Enlighten/dp/0970601972/ref=la_B001H6IQ5M_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1369652567&sr=1-1. Excel CAN make professional looking charts and graphs. It just doesn't always by default. Steven Few is the authority on this.
Kanban is just a way to visualize your work, and by doing so to limit your work in progress (WIP). I've worked on Agile teams that used Kanban boards to track all their deliverables and to make the work visible so that there was absolute clarity on what was in the backlog, what was in progress, and what was done.
Tools like Trello are good, and a lot of project management/issue tracking systems aimed at Agile organization have a way to do Kanban. Jira, for example, has a way to use it. To me, however, Kanban works best with an actual physical board that you move cards or sticky notes across. It's easy to close and ignore a browser tab or an application window, it's a bit harder to do that when you've got a whiteboard mounted to the wall with brightly colored sticky notes on it.
This is a good book that explains the theory and methodology behind Kanban: Kanban: Successful Evolutionary Change for Your Technology Business
If you are going for a internet business or any product-oriented business here a are the best books
BEST ONES
"The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses" (Eric Reis) - 2011
https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation/dp/0307887898/
"Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works" (Ash Maurya) - 2010
https://www.amazon.com/Running-Lean-Iterate-Plan-Works/dp/1449305172
"Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days" (Jake Knapp - Google Ventures) - 2016
https://www.amazon.com/Sprint-Solve-Problems-Test-Ideas/dp/150112174X/ref=sr_1_1?qid=1550802301&s=gateway&sr=8-1
​
ALSO GO FOR (these are the ones that started organizing the Startup world)
"The Four Steps to the Epiphany" (Steve Blank) - 2005
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0989200507/
"Business Model Generation" (Alexander Osterwalder) - 2008
https://www.amazon.com/Business-Model-Generation-Visionaries-Challengers/dp/0470876417/
It's a tad geared towards software and B2B SaaS, but it can apply to anyone: Four Steps to the Epiphany
It focuses on finding your customers and developing products for them. Reads like a textbook from college somewhat, but my #1 go-to business book by far.
Hi skunk,
Since everyone is remaining quiet I might as well give this a shot. I'm from a technical background but currently studying PM in my spare time in the hope that I can progress in this direction within my industry.
PMP
It seems like the global standard is the PMP with PMI which requires:
> A secondary degree (high school diploma, associate’s degree, or the global equivalent) with at least five years of project management experience, with 7,500 hours leading and directing projects and 35 hours of project management education.
> OR
> A four-year degree (bachelor’s degree or the global equivalent) and at least three years of project management experience, with 4,500 hours leading and directing projects and 35 hours of project management education.
I'm currently studying towards this. I've taken recommendations from this subreddit (and /r/pmp) and bought:
and
In order to obtain the required 35 contact hours, I bought one of several cheap Groupons for $99. I'm not going to link the course because I don't necessarily recommend it - it should be easy enough to find and people have linked to these in previous posts. It doesn't really matter anyway because it's just so I can "tick that box", as I've learnt everything I need to know from the books.
The exam however will have to be sat in person. I have yet to do this so can't give you any pointers.
CAPM
If you don't match the above criteria, you can always opt for the lower qualification of CAPM (also with PMI) and work your way up.
For this I reccommend CAPM/PMP Project Management Certification, Third Edition and the previously mentioned online course.
Please note that you can potentially pitch anything as a project in the right light, even washing the dishes. Aim high and try to get the hours for PMP if possible.
PRINCE2 & SIX SIGMA
What else? Well, if I'm successful with the PMP and still enjoy PM after the blood, sweat and tears, I'm looking at these two qualifications.
I've already added a few books to my Amazon wishlist but have yet to seriously look into these with enough detail to commit.
I know that the exam for the PRINCE2 foundation level (and possibly practitioner level?) can be sat online with a webcam.
Six Sigma I know very little about except that several colleagues have mentioned it and my industry takes it seriously. However, I don't believe you can do these Six Sigma "belts" online.
Sorry for the serious wall of text but I just thought I'd share everything I know about PM accreditation. This isn't a comprehensive list but I'm planning on doing 90% online so I'm in a similar situation to yourself.
I would be grateful for any feedback myself from experienced PMs on my plans going forward.
I am in the same situation and I am going to take the new test in Feb. I am using the Rita Book and they released this update for the book. http://shop.rmcls.com/multisite_includes/pdfs/misc/PMP_8th_Ed_8th_printing_Updates_English.pdf
If you read around it is not that big of a change as the new test is still based off the 5th edition of the PMBOK
Good Luck and if you need the updated Rita book here is the link on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1932735658/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_dp_ss_1?pf_rd_p=1944687582&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=1935589679&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=0W27D2FBPX0M5XDQHZHW
the marketing bible called 'Positioning' explains a lot about how this works. other things being equal, people will keep voting for senator smith the way they buy kleenex and zerox.
smith dies, they will gravitate to the closest substitute, in this case smith junior. there are other factors, but name recognition is the biggest one.
http://www.amazon.com/Positioning-The-Battle-Your-Mind/dp/0071373586
I would suggest the book "the millionaire Real Estate investor" here:
https://www.amazon.ca/Millionaire-Real-Estate-Investor/dp/0071446370
Property management is my biggest side hustle, and the most profitable. I fell into it when I paid off my mortgage, and realized a year later, 50% of my net worth was earning less than zero, and creating a huge drag on my plans for early retirement. I now own a condo, and a duplex. (EDIT - sadly, still not retired. Kids are expensive!)
Can it be a full time job? Sure, but I suspect it's a great side hustle instead. Like DSJustice mentions, it's a long process, and not possible to profitably start in Vancouver or Toronto, based on the prices versus rent. Depends on where you are.
I would suggest staying away from the condos though. Yes, the condo fees eat up your profit, but it's the fact that so much is out of your control that is the real risk.
If I could have a do-over, I'd buy duplexes, and triplexes instead. (EDIT two - Ok, I see your from AB. It really depends on the conditions out there... Are you guys close to recession? Maybe wait a while?)
Investing in real estate really requires that you know a little about a lot of things. These are the books I used when starting up:
General Overview:
Multi-Family Introduction:
Flipping Introduction:
Real Estate Formula Primer:
Landlord Tax Basics:
That is a good intro for books...BiggerPockets is always good too. However, most investors will tell you that there is only so much you can read about real estate. Read some books, get a feel and then go for it. It's the only way you can really learn.
On What to Read
Here are some suggestions on books and websites:
The Millionaire Next Door by Stanley and Danko - https://www.amazon.com/Millionaire-Next-Door-Surprising-Americas/dp/1589795474
If You Can by William Bernstein - http://efficientfrontier.com/ef/0adhoc/2books.htm
Free version is here - https://www.dropbox.com/s/5tj8480ji58j00f/If%20You%20Can.pdf?dl=0
The Investor's Manifesto. Preparing for Prosperity, Armageddon, and Everything in Between by William Bernstein - https://www.amazon.com/Investors-Manifesto-Prosperity-Armageddon-Everything/dp/1118073762
The Bogleheads Guide to Investing - https://www.amazon.com/Bogleheads-Guide-Investing-Taylor-Larimore/dp/1118921283
The Coffeehouse Investor - https://www.amazon.com/Coffeehouse-Investor-Wealth-Ignore-Street/dp/0976585707
The Bogleheads' Guide to Retirement Planning - https://www.amazon.com/Bogleheads-Guide-Retirement-Planning/dp/0470455578
The Four Pillars of Investing: Lessons for Building a Winning Portfolio by William Bernstein - https://www.amazon.com/Four-Pillars-Investing-Building-Portfolio/dp/0071747052/
Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey - https://www.amazon.com/Total-Money-Makeover-Classic-Financial/dp/1595555277
Personal Finance for Dummies by Eric Tyson - https://www.amazon.com/Personal-Finance-Dummies-Eric-Tyson/dp/1118117859
Investing for Dummies by Eric Tyson - https://www.amazon.com/Investing-Dummies-Eric-Tyson/dp/1119320690/
The Millionaire Real Estate Investor per red-sfplus’s post (can confirm this is excellent) - https://www.amazon.com/Millionaire-Real-Estate-Investor/dp/0071446370/
For all the M.Ds on here and HNW individuals, you might want to check out https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/ and his blog – found it to be very useful.
https://www.irs.gov/ or your government’s tax page. If you’ve been reading, you know that millionaires know more than your average bear about the tax code.
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheRedPill/comments/7vohb3/money/
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheRedPill/comments/3hzcvn/financial_advice_from_a_financier/
https://www.artofmanliness.com/2017/09/22/4-money-tips-4-personal-finance-legends/
Personal Finance Flowchart from their wiki - https://i.imgur.com/lSoUQr2.png
Additional Lists of Books:
https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Books:_recommendations_and_reviews
https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/books-4/
Subreddits
https://www.reddit.com/r/investing/
https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/ - I would highly encourage you to spend a half hour browsing their wiki - https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/wiki/index and investing advice - https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/wiki/investing
https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/
https://www.reddit.com/r/SecurityAnalysis/
https://www.reddit.com/r/finance/
https://www.reddit.com/r/portfolios/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bogleheads/
MRP References
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/40whjy/finally_talked_to_my_wife_about_our_finances_it/
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/67nxdu/finances_with_a_sahm/
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/488pa0/60_dod_week_6_finances/ (original)
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/6a6712/60_dod_week_6_finances/ (year 2)
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/3xw015/how_to_prepare_for_a_talk_about_finances/
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/30z704/taking_back_the_finances/
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/2uzukg/married_redpill_finances_and_money/
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/3637q5/some_thoughts_on_mrp_and_finances/
https://www.reddit.com/r/askMRP/comments/8dwaqt/best_practices_for_finances_within_marriage/
https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/588e5o/gain_control_of_the_treasury/
Final Thoughts
There are already a lot of high net worth individuals on these subs (if you don’t believe me, look at the OYS for the past few months). This should be a review for most folks. The key points stay the same – have a plan, get out of the hole you are in, have a budget, do the right moves for wealth accumulation. Lead your family in your finances. Own it.
What are YOU doing to own your finances? Give some examples below.
I read it in this book. Obviously it was historical conjecture but the author's arguments were very well supported and I was convinced. It's a good read too, I highly recommend it for people who like history and/or psychology.
On Amazon, A First Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness.
> This New York Times bestseller is a myth-shattering exploration of the powerful connections between mental illness and leadership. Historians have long puzzled over the apparent mental instability of great and terrible leaders alike: Napoleon, Lincoln, Churchill, Hitler, and others. In A First-Rate Madness, Nassir Ghaemi, director of the Mood Disorders Programme at Tufts Medical Center, offers and sets forth a controversial, compelling thesis: the very qualities that mark those with mood disorders also make for the best leaders in times of crisis. From the importance of Lincoln's "depressive realism" to the lacklustre leadership of exceedingly sane men as Neville Chamberlain, A First-Rate Madness overturns many of our most cherished perceptions about greatness and the mind.
I read this a few years back and thought it was good.
Great list! I have read all the above and totally agree that their value is worthwhile to anyone seeking to improve their life -- regardless of financial status, relationships, profession, etc. A couple others that I've found useful along the road:
6. The Six Pillars of Self Esteem by N. Branden. During the reawakening stage and after a particularly painful breakup, I found this book helpful. Learning the concept of "alone-ness" versus "loneliness" continues to drive many motivations.
7. Games People Play by Eric Berne. Want to understand why your plate/gf/wife went batshit insane over the stupidest thing, and how to counteract it in the future? Read this book. Want to understand why your coworker was making those strange comments to your boss? Read this book - a must for anyone wanting to learn more about game theory and its application to everyday life. (Next on my list is The Art of Strategy ).
8. Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. In many ways this is an antithesis to Freudian thought -- whereas Freud argued man is happy when seeking and obtaining pleasure, Frankl postulates that finding meaning and understanding is what makes us happy. In the context of TRP theory, meditating on, if not fully understanding, these concepts is absolutely necessary.
9. Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini. The seminal work on the concept and application of persuasion. From negotiations to dating/relationships to job performance, I would rank this book at the top of many lists.
A few other authors/books I've seen mentioned elsewhere that are worth checking out: anything by Kurt Vonnegut, The Art of War by Sun Tzu (which goes hand in hand with The Prince for a great East/West study), and Rollo Tomassi. I've also found some of Oscar Wilde's writing to be both amusing and insightful.
[edit: formatting.]
The retro is the key, IMO. I recommend reading “Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great” by Esther Derby & Diana Larsen. Lots of good stuff there! https://www.amazon.com/Agile-Retrospectives-Making-Teams-Great/dp/0977616649/ref=nodl_
I'm sorry if the reply turned out a bit too general, but the individual steps depend a lot on the specifics :)
As I said before, it's crucial that you understand the problem domain as good, or better than your customers. I like to think of it as the Fog of War in strategy game maps. I can only effectively perform once I have explored enough territory to see the big picture. Here's roughly how I would try to wrap my head around such a challenge, if the company hired me to help:
Customer
Who are the customers? It's actually possible to think of the customers just in terms of their needs and desires. But it's useful to know their demographic attributes, so you can choose whether your solution is going to be a lateral or a niche one. For instance.. Trello is a lateral solution, because the kan-ban methodology can be applied to many different types of problems. On the other hand, It could be argued that 500px is a niche solution, because it caters to photographers more than meme authors. It's very easy for 500px to figure out where photographers hang out online and in the real world, should they choose to reach out to them in any way.
The job (Problems / Desires)
The customers usually have some sort of job to be done. That job is driven by their desire for a benefit, or a lingering problem that needs solving. Those benefits can range from monetary to peace of mind or social status. And problems can range in severity. Furthermore, different customer segments can rate some problems and benefits as more important than others. This is the combinatorial explosion of stakeholders and their points of view, that informs a strategy of a good product designer, and causes an uninformed designer to arrive at an optimal solution only through brute force or sheer luck.
Solution
Sometimes the solution has to be drawn up from scratch, optimized or entirely re-imagined. So what is the existing solution? What would an utopian solution look like? A complex problem might require a solution in the form of a toolkit of multiple core activities (Like Google, HubSpot or Moz). A focused solution though, can be embodied in a single product (Caffeine.app keeps your mac from going to sleep). If a solution is complex behind the curtains, but you make it simple and gratifying from the user's point of view, it may seem like magic to them.
Business
The things that you do behind the curtains are some core activities, that might require some key resources. That's how the business makes sure it spends less than it earns on a customer (unit economics). It's easy to paint a picture where the world is split between sociopathic capitalists with a greedy agenda & empathic designers, who champion the user's priorities. But a similar solution with a sound business foundation will always be better for the customer, because it stands a better chance of outperforming the economically inferiour solution in the long run. It's the job of a designer to balance between the two aspects. So much so, that the Elements of User Experience places big emphasis on both Business Objectives & User Needs.
Communication
Once you love your people, and you have a way to show it to them, you'll have to start and maintain some sort of relationship. You can identify Touch Points or Channels. If, for instance, your customers are tourists looking for a place to grab a meal before boarding the next train, you can administer your solution right then and there, at the train station. But most of the time you'll be reaching out to your potential users somewhere between you and them, probably through a third party (online publication, app or ad network). It may take multiple exposures in different contexts, before somebody decides to give your solution a try. So a customer might bump into your message at certain touch points, open a communication channel like a newsletter or notification subscription, and only then decide to commit. There's often talk about a multiple stage funnel, through which we try to shove as much of our target market. But you can also look at customer lifetime stages as vertebrae in the cohort spine. For instance.. Slicing out customer segments by lifetime lets SoundCloud identify differences between a newcoming podcaster & a long-time podcaster, and communicate with each of them appropriately, even though most of the people that care about SoundCloud are producers and record labels. Staying on top of communication also helps you avoid conversion attribution mistakes, so you can communicate more effectively.
Here are some resources related to those subjects:
A bit more business related:
Once I have a good understanding, I would focus on Information Architecture, Experience Design, Production & Iteration. I can't spare the time to write about those now, but here are some related resources:
I might write more about the specific subjects of IA and UX later, when I find the time. In the meanwhile, check any of the three books with italicized titles, if you haven't already.
Peace o/
I used the following approach to pass the PMP exam--
http://www.amazon.com/PMP-Exam-Prep-Eighth-Edition/dp/1932735658/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1393947324&sr=8-1&keywords=PMP
http://www.amazon.com/Head-First-PMP-Jennifer-Greene-ebook/dp/B00HETLZIQ/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1393947324&sr=8-5&keywords=PMP
I passed with all "Proficient". The exam wasn't nearly as hard as the practice tests I took.
Edit: This is also very helpful in your preparation. A consolidated list of 100 "Lessons Learned" for the PMP exam http://www.testprepsupport.com/blog/100-pmp-exam-lessons-learned-posts-all-in-one/
You don't necessarily need to study from the PMBOK. I think you really need an exam prep book.
https://www.amazon.com/PMP-Exam-Prep-Eighth-Edition/dp/1932735658
Formulas are important to memorize but I had less than 10 questions that required formula calculation. In order to pass, you really need to understand the knowledge and process areas. You need to be able to put yourself in a project manager's shoes from PMI's perspective. Most of the questions are situational, e.g. "What should the project manager do?"
Title/Company: Rita Mulcahy's PMP Exam Prep, Eighth Edition
Type of Material: Book
Cost: $64.95 - $87.21
Learning Style:
Review: I've seen this mentioned several times in conversation, but I've not read it - can someone provide a review? It is rated 4.5 stars out of 5 on Amazon.
A great book on the topic of improvement in the world is Factfulness by Hans Rosling. He gave a several talks which inspired the book, which was his last contribution before passing away from cancer. The book is entertaining, thought-provoking, and optimistic. One of the main points he makes is that not acknowledging world progress is more than a mistake; it has real, negative repercussions--because when we don't acknowledge progress, we are in danger of stopping the actions that made the progress possible. He argues acknowledging the good is paramount if we are to eradicate the bad. I like that argument. It is a rationale reason to be optimistic.
If you get down about the state of the world, and I agree it is easy to do, read that book.
Links:
If you're serious about a PM career, you'll probably want to pursue the PMP credential, which requires (from the PMI site):
Some of you need to read Factfulness by Hans Rosling. It is a great book talking about how this exact moment in human history is the safest, most transformative, most peaceful, time period we have ever had. The news profits off of negative articles by appealing to the natural fears that we all have inside of us. No one wants to watch a news segment about how child mortality has fallen from 18.2% in 1960 to 4.3% in 2015 because it’s a slow decline over decades of diligent work by governments and health organizations, and it simply does not get as many views as say a Hurricane. Instead the news organizations post murder stories, hate crimes, premeditated violence to ignite that biological fear and to get a reaction, despite violent violent crime rate falling 49% between 1993 and 2017
Tl/dr - the world is a lot better than the news shows. Take 5 minutes to do some research, and you will feel much more comfortable and optimistic about the world you live in.
Assuming you're starting from scratch, and without repeating what /u/Laser45 already said, definitely read up on whatever books you can get your hands on, and avoid Gurus. (Very, VERY few classes are worth their cost) This is one of my all time favorites, which you should be able to get as a freebie on an Audible trial:
The Millionaire Real Estate Investor
by Gary Keller
https://www.amazon.com/Millionaire-Real-Estate-Investor/dp/0071446370
If you have $30k in savings, I would recommend looking into putting that into a high-yield checking account - such as: Kasasa Cash (4% APY, 7.5k cap [1]), LMCU (3% APY, $15k cap [2]), Option1 CU (4% APY, 10k cap [3]). Links below.
Biggerpockets is good... but beware ALOT of it is fluff, and not all of it is accurate. Worse - much of what is presented is shown and appears alot easier to execute and implement than it actually is. Many people lose sight of the fact that - when they wholesale, do subject-tos, drive-for-dollars, etc. - they are essentially building a new business from scratch and applying ALOT of time and elbow grease... with very little protective "moat" that prevents the competition doing the same. Even if you're complete / have done your first deal - does the profit on a $/hr basis make sense, or did it make more sense to better educate yourself at your main line of work (or even get a second job)?
Ultimately, you have to decide if you want to be an "investor" - or - if you want to "buy another job." Always quantify your options, make sure the $/hr figure makes sense - and of course, make sure you feel 100% comfortable with it.
---
[1] https://www.pelicanstatecu.com/accounts/personal-checking/index.html
[2] https://www.lmcu.org/banking/checking/checking_max.aspx
[3] https://www.option1cu.org/personal/Checking/edge-checking
https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between-Leadership/dp/0143121332
When I took Game Theory the professor used Evolutionary Games and Population Dynamics, which I really liked.
Evolutionary Dynamics is just amazing, but a bit on the biological side.
If you are studying on your own I would suggest Game Theory Evolving, which has a lot of exercises and examples to keep you going.
And for added bursts of motivation read The Art of Strategy, which is not really technical but explains the concepts incredibly well.
There's a post like this every few weeks. Here's a link that links to a lot of other good links.
From personal experience, I recommend:
The Basics to Hacking and Penetration Testing
and since a lot of hacking these days has to do with social engineering, this book:
The Art of Deception
There is a management principle based on this. There's even a book about it.
I'm going through this book now...highly recommended:
https://www.amazon.com/Agile-Retrospectives-Making-Teams-Great/dp/0977616649
Also, try using some liberating structures which you can learn about here: http://www.liberatingstructures.com/ls/
Hello! Have you read Esther Derby's "Agile retrospectives"?
https://www.amazon.com/Agile-Retrospectives-Making-Teams-Great/dp/0977616649
It provides a good explanation of all the retrospective stages, as well as activities to do for each stage (in your case, the "gather data" stage). Or you could try some activities like those described in funretrospectives.com
Having said that, sometimes it is just better to talk than write. I do many of my retros on a cafeteria outside where we all sit in a table (12 people). The format is simple, no writing, we just talk one after the other (or just begin a conversation) to collect our memories and problems form the previous sprint. It is amazing how powerful that is.
Nah people said this about every technology sector ever.
BUT! OP, you'll have to talk with hundreds (read again, 100s) of potential pilot customers before you even start to have a clue about what might be useful. Read this: https://www.amazon.com/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Steve-Blank/dp/0989200507?ie=UTF8&ref_=asap_bc
As mentioned about Carnegie is a must. Otherwise I'd recommend King, Warrior, Magician, Lover, Staying Healthy with the Seasons (some of the nutrition info is out dated but the core of the book is still great), The Book of Five Rings.
This topic is well covered in the book "The Innovator's Dilemma" by Clayton Christensen
http://www.amazon.com/Innovators-Dilemma-Revolutionary-Business-Essentials/dp/0060521996
Chapter One...
http://www.businessweek.com/chapter/christensen.htm
It's not really about that one waver, it's about brand exposure. They are trying to make 'doing my taxes' and 'liberty taxes' connected in peoples minds. Your one part of reinforcing that message. The more reinforcement you have, the stronger the connection. A lot of advertising is like dealing with a child, you have to establish a premise and then reinforce it constantly.
If you wish to know more read this book:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Positioning-The-Battle-Your-Mind/dp/0071373586
You'll probably find "The Millionaire Real Estate Investor" to be a very good read. It talks about a lot of different real estate concepts that are still very applicable today. I particularly enjoyed his thought process on how to identify a good real estate opportunity and how leverage in real estate can make you wildly successful in real estate investing.
There's also a very good answer that I found on Quora relating to real estate investing that you might find interesting.
Read or listen to this book https://www.amazon.com/Pitch-Anything-Innovative-Presenting-Persuading/dp/0071752854 As I was reading your post, my mind kept going toward the lessons in the book. I have listened to the audio book several times (although I have never been involved in an open vendor day.)
​
You need to sell them that you are a premium product, and while your base price is higher, you include a lot more in the base. The whole book uses simple tactics to completely flip the tables, rather than you begging to work with them, they will be dying to work with you.
Read the book Pitch Anything by Oren Klaff
Not totally in line with what you're asking, but I'm currently reading Pitch Anything by Oren Klaff. Its a very insightful book where he goes into detail about basically being persuasive enough to sell anyone anything. Be it yourself in the form of an interview or your product. Great read so far.
If you want to hear a more anecdotal story about a life of a successful bipolar person with her fair share of psychosis and depression, I read this super quickly and I had been having a hard time reading: An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness
This book is about a journey through anxiety. The author is young and she was actually inspired by the author of the book above. First, We Make the Beast Beautiful: A New Journey Through Anxiety
If you want to read stories about great leaders who suffered through mental illness, including bipolar, along with the argument that those experiences made them the dynamic people they were with special abilities to be empathetic and reach people in ways others couldn’t, A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness.
I bought this Bipolar Workbook but haven’t had the discipline to do it yet.
>Anti-authoritarians question whether an authority is a legitimate one before taking that authority seriously. Evaluating the legitimacy of authorities includes assessing whether or not authorities actually know what they are talking about, are honest, and care about those people who are respecting their authority. And when anti-authoritarians assess an authority to be illegitimate, they challenge and resist that authority—sometimes aggressively and sometimes passive-aggressively, sometimes wisely and sometimes not.
>...
>Many people with severe anxiety and/or depression are also anti-authoritarians. Often a major pain of their lives that fuels their anxiety and/or depression is fear that their contempt for illegitimate authorities will cause them to be financially and socially marginalized; but they fear that compliance with such illegitimate authorities will cause them existential death.
>...
>Americans have been increasingly socialized to equate inattention, anger, anxiety, and immobilizing despair with a medical condition, and to seek medical treatment rather than political remedies. What better way to maintain the status quo than to view inattention, anger, anxiety, and depression as biochemical problems of those who are mentally ill rather than normal reactions to an increasingly authoritarian society.
These sections of text all rang very true for me, personally.
I've been un-medicated as someone who was diagnosed with Bi-polar Type 2. I also have ADHD, which I choose to take medicine for. I've since learned to cope, and a lot of it had to deal with learning how to respect and follow my own judgements about the authorities who's control I was under, even if it meant resisting aggressively. I eventually learned to find my own solution within the boundaries of my authorities, which meant everyone won; I got to bypass incompetence, and they got someone who could be obedient within bounds. It's been a valuable resource in my successes, and has been the cause of many issues in my life.
This article provided a lot more context as to how I interpret myself and my place in life. Reading the portion about Einstein reminded me a lot of A First-Rate Madness by Nassir Ghaemi (which talks about people with bi-polar depression being the best type of leader during times of crisis). Knowing the root causes of what makes you "you" helps provide new understanding, and with it, coping mechanisms to move beyond your shortcomings.
But "extraordinarily" rare events are commonplace according to anything but. In fact, they're commonplace according to statistician David J. Hand. So I think your definition is off.
But the bigger question is why you'd want to have to different standards for historical things.
>Please clarify: are you stating that I stated a claim has to be absolutely true?
How else would one interpret this statement of yours: This lesser claim of a murder can not be found absolutely true, then the greater claim of jesus's resurrection is not absolutely true and therefore possibly not true.?
>Because this post is to Christians who believe the claim that the resurrection occurred, is absolutely (incontrovertible) true, without a possibility that is possibly not true.
Oh, you are asking this question to people who think that there are things that can be proven to be "absolutely, incontrovertible true without a possibility that is possibly not true", which is a logical impossibility. I don't defend the logically impossible.
Thanks. I will check that out. This is another great book on the subject http://www.amazon.es/The-Improbability-Principle-Coincidences-Miracles/dp/0374175349
Another book by the same authors that's worth considering is The Art of Strategy. I can't recommend it personally, since I haven't read it yet, but it's the one I purchased when I decided I wanted to get a popular account of game theory. It's supposed to be good.
I highly recommend The Art of Strategy: A Game Theorist's Guide to Success in Business and Life.
The Art of Deception by Kevin Mitnick. My personal favorite book on the topic, as its both highly informative and entertaining.
The Inevitable is mostly about technology but has plenty economic and financial implications described for the coming decade.
I don't know if this has been posted yet or not but this book is a good read for anyone, but especially someone feeling the way you are feeling.
Book recommendation: Debugging: The 9 Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems
Swift anecdote: I had a crash that only affected 32bit devices, because the code used Int, but ran out of bits in rare cases. The original code assumed that it was a int64. Changing the type from Int to Int64 fixed the problem. It was difficult to debug since the original bug report mentioned no device type, nor specific numbers that was causing problems. Gathering much more data helped identifying the problem.
Tell us more about your setup.
if they would get rid of the Oracle cert and the second SQL class(r u srs with literally writing out select and insert statements), not focus on teaching JavaFX for Software I and II(and add some heavier programming), add an assembly class( I do like how they cover AArch64 in the computer arch class though), add a "non OO language" class I would say WGU's CS program would match most other online CS programs from regionally accredited, non profit unis
adding a compiler class would make it exceptional among online CS degrees but would make the degree even harder
another class I took at my B&M is a debugging class (they assigned this book and I still quote it to this day), I think that would be really interesting to offer as well
​
as it stands I don't think it's as good as most decent B&Ms or most online CS degrees
​
source: 7 years of experience, was on last year of CS degree at good B&M
I'd say there are at least two sides to debugging: technical knowledge and mindset/approach. In many situations, technical knowledge is less important than your approach. This is a great book on how to debug anything, because it focuses on the approach:https://www.amazon.com/Debugging-Indispensable-Software-Hardware-Problems/dp/0814474578/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&qid=1473264988&sr=8-1&keywords=debugging&linkCode=sl1&tag=makithecompsi-20&linkId=fff719e6c1338a3b9f9d763d7f5830a2
A really brief summary: Understand the system, reproduce the error, and think of ways to methodically test your hypotheses of what's wrong.
For your situation, "understand the system" doesn't have to mean "understand the schematic". You can start with the basic blocks: physical construction, power supply, audio output, controls. The other posters have broken down what to look for in some of these cases.
For example, if you physically inspect the board and see a big blob of solder going across three different components, it's probably a waste of time to check whether the controls affect the output sound, because that blob of solder shouldn't be there. Next step, nothing works properly without proper power, so check the points where power is supposed to be supplied on the board and make sure the voltages are correct. Then, find the earliest point on the schematic where you should get an audio output (probably an oscillator out) and check that. And on and on.
To test audio outputs, an oscilloscope is super handy, but honestly I've done a ton of debugging with a small battery-powered speaker with a mono cable connected to it, probing test points in a circuit to see whether audio is present. However note that it IS possible to fry circuits with this approach by accidentally bridging traces, so be careful.
What I'm talking about is pretty basic knowledge. I'd suggest googling for it first and reading through that.
If you're using an IDE (seriously, use an IDE), look for debugging in <your IDE>. It should give you what you need. You should be able to stop execution at a given breakpoint, step into and over method calls, and inspect the values of object and expressions. Bonus points for learning how to "Run to the cursor position" instead of dropping breakpoints everywhere and for figuring out conditional breakpoints. It's more complicated, but being able to debug a remote application is also really useful for most web applications.
After that, if you want to get into more systematic debugging, I recommend looking at Debugging: The 9 Indispensable Rules for Finding Even the Most Elusive Software and Hardware Problems
For SQL, again, read the basics and then play around with it in an SQL application. Honestly, for learning purposes, if you have it, MS Access is pretty good. MySQL is probably the most accessible free tool.
Learn how to get data, filter it, order it from a single table. Then how to use grouping and group level filtering with GROUP BY and HAVING. Then learn inner and outer joins.
That's going to put you way in front of most young devs.
If you want to really get into it, I recommend Joe Celko's SQL for Smarties, but that's kind of overkill.
For me, it depends on two things mainly: my current level of focus, and my understanding of the problem I'm trying to solve (actually, it would be better to state that as: my understanding of the solution to the problem).
On focus, sometimes I have a spec'd out system (so I know exactly what I am going to code, often I have good pseudo-code), and I can write 500 lines of code in a couple hours. Other times, I might have the same spec, and it would take me 5 days to write the same 500 lines. I find there are a lot of variables that contribute to my level of focus. I find that I focus much better after vacations, which is why vacations actually make me more productive. I focus much better when my body and mind are in a good state - physically fit, which is why exercising is so valuable, well-rested, sufficient nutrition, how happy I am. Spending a decent amount of time outside each day, even 15 minutes, makes a huge difference for me (could be vitamin-D production). Personally, I focus much better when I listen to music than when I don't (if it's non-vocal music, it drowns out external stimuli). I have two monitors at work, and if I want to get into serious coding, I never have a web browser open in my second monitor. I usually try to keep my IDE occupying both screens, and if I need textual information, I copy it into a blank document in my IDE. If I need to reference a paper, I print it out. Caffeine can give me a temporary boost in focus, but usually results in a longer period of poor-focus.
Sometimes I work on an open-ended problem, where the problem is simple, but the solution is completely unclear. Not "bugs" per-se, but research, often involving somewhat fuzzy math. I might spend 10 days manipulating 50 lines of code. Other times, when a bug crops up, I know exactly what the issue is and I can fix it immediately.
I've heard as a rule of thumb, a good programmer will generate 50 lines of completely correct code in a day. Not sure how true that is, and obviously "lines of code" is a varying metric, depending on language, coding style, and so on.
Others mention debugging as a major factor. This diminishes with experience and learning, although of course it never goes away completely. As you specialize in some domain, you learn techniques for debugging problems in that domain. One of the things I've gotten a lot better at over time is building test data inputs to illustrate bugs.
For debugging, I recommend reading this book. It may not be useful for exceptional, highly experienced programmers, but I've found that it has probably made me 2-4x more efficient at debugging, and it's a super-short read (took me maybe 6 hours, and I'm a really slow reader). The other thing that makes a huge difference is learning clean coding style. As my code has gotten cleaner, I've introduced considerably fewer bugs, and spent less time tracking down the bugs I have introduced. If you haven't already, I recommend learning functional programming and spending some time with literate programming (which is less well-known). Literate programming isn't really that fundamentally different, but it teaches you to think about your program as an expression (explanation, even) of ideas or concepts, and that causes you to write your programs as an expression of the underlying ideas, making them much more clear.
I see the same problem on StackOverflow on a daily basis - someone posts a chunk of code and says "Help - my code is not working!". I keep a standard response to this on hand, as it's such a regular occurrence:
> Welcome to Stack Overflow! It sounds like you may need to learn how to use a debugger to step through your code. With a good debugger, you can execute your program line by line and see where it is deviating from what you expect. This is an essential tool if you are going to do any programming. Further reading: How to debug small programs.
But the broader problem of course is that colleges simply do not seem to teach students how to use a debugger, or debugging techniques (arguably more important), or even development tools in general. I think the excellent Agans book, Debugging should be required reading for every undergraduate programming course.
Another pet peeve is that students seem to be completely oblivious to the need to (a) enable compiler warnings and (b) take heed of such warnings.
Also, read his Dilbert Principle book. Read the last chapter. It's all about the The Secret theory. It was the first place I heard of it.
He's a cook.
I think that for this general question, I'm good with not seeing your data or dashboards. I guess the first question is: have you gone through the online visualization training from tableau? If not, check out these:
http://www.tableausoftware.com/learn/webinars/making-flow-happen-dashboards-persuade-inform-and-engage
http://www.tableausoftware.com/videos/zen
http://www.tableausoftware.com/learn/whitepapers/tableau-visual-guidebook
After you've gone through these, go read Stephen Few's books...based on your question, you're going to get the most out of these:
http://www.amazon.com/Information-Dashboard-Design-At---Glance/dp/1938377001/ref=la_B001H6IQ5M_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1409978547&amp;sr=1-1
http://www.amazon.com/Show-Me-Numbers-Designing-Enlighten/dp/0970601972/ref=la_B001H6IQ5M_1_2?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1409978547&amp;sr=1-2
I personally like Learning Tableau as a great primer and refresher on understanding how Tableau works: http://www.amazon.com/Learning-Tableau-Visualization-Business-Intelligence/dp/1784391166 -- follow along with the book where you can.
If you haven't already walk through the videos here: http://www.tableau.com/learn/training -- and by walk-through I mean use Tableau and follow along.
Visualisation in general I need to do more reading but I like:
Stephen Few : Show me the Numbers http://www.amazon.com/Show-Me-Numbers-Designing-Enlighten/dp/0970601972
Accidental Analyst: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1477432264/
There's a few more books recommended here: http://www.tableau.com/about/blog/2013/7/list-books-about-data-visualisation-24182
edit: and for blogs I currently like http://flowingdata.com/
there are a few really great resources that were mentioned already.
I found Tufte books a little bit abstract and more geared toward data visualization philosophy and not as practical as some of the other resources out there in terms of creating interactive, business-focused data visualizations. While I really like them, it may not be the first ones you grab.
I highly recommend books and blogs by these people---all but Stephen Few are active on Twitter (bolding the highest 3 recommendations):
Stephen Few:
Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic:
Stephanie Evergreen:
Alberto Cairo:
If you go the Agile approach, I'd recommend you start with retrospectives. This is a great tool to identify problems and needs of the team and start addressing them in following iterations. Even if you don't go full Scrum or whatever, I'd insist you try retrospectives. If you want some good reading try this: http://www.amazon.com/Agile-Retrospectives-Making-Teams-Great/dp/0977616649
The Phoenix Project is probably the best book out there - I also recommend: https://smile.amazon.com/Agile-Retrospectives-Making-Teams-Great/dp/0977616649/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1520447802&amp;sr=1-3&amp;keywords=Agile+Retrospectives
Because retros are hard to do right and awful when done wrong.
To gather insight, help teams find their own places they want to improve, and generate self-realized learning... try Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great.
Consensus driving change or driving work is all about figuring out what is the next best thing to try and improve.
If you aren't already, try capturing the outputs of your retros and have the team commit to one thing you want to make better or make great. Make this an actual backlog item and track it as you would work coming in. It should be owned by everyone, and it should be a driving force to try some actions to improve it. If you can get 1 thing agreed to by the team to improve, and then a proposed action to try as a team; you will rapidly find your pain points and make them better.
Read these books to get to grips with the latest techniques and ways of working. As an employer I'd be extremely impressed if you'd read these books. They will give you a big head start when trying to move into the professional work environment. Most of them will apply to any programming language but they mainly use Java as the example language but it's very similar to C#. It's books like these that are the difference between a beginner and an expert, but don't forget when you start coding 9-5 with good developers you will very quickly pick things up. We were all in your position at one point, if you get these read it'll all be worth it in the end!
Coding
C# in depth - I've not read this one since I do Java but I've just had a quick glance. This should be pretty useful and it's a respected publisher. I think you should start with this one.
Clean Code - Great book which explains how to write clean concise code, this 1,000,000x. It doesn't matter what language you are using it should apply where ever you write code.
Cleaner Coder - Another Robert Martin book, this one is easy to read and quite short, it's all about conducting yourself in a professional manner when you are coding. Estimating time, working with co-workers, etc.. Another good read.
Growing Object-Oriented Software - This book is about writing code using test driven development. It explains the ideas and methodologies and then has a large example of a project that you build with TDD. I just read this recently and it is really good.
Head first design patterns - This book goes through essential design patterns when coding with an object orientated language. Another essential read. Very easy to read, lots of diagrams so no excuses to not read it!
Work Methodologys
Kanban
Succeeding with Agile
p.s
Start building stuff, get an account on linked in and state the languages you are working with. This will help as well because having something to show an employer is priceless.
I don't think I'd start with a certification class. I'd start with two books:
I'd also look at some other online resources (like this agile roadmap to get a sense of what you actually want to implement and change.
From there, that will guide you to what classes, or as /u/mlucero14 pointed out, if you'd prefer to bring in a coach or trainer.
Given that it looks like you all are in Costa Rica, you might want to talk to the team from Pernix Solutions. I've worked with them before, and they understand the agile and craftsmanship side of things.
Hope that helps!
We used Kanban to sort out publishing production. It was not “agile” really it was “lean”.
Map your process and tasks flow through the process.
Read David Anderson’s book
https://www.amazon.ca/dp/0984521402/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_t1_IaJ-Bb394Y1FH
Some additional information can help a lot in recommendations. I'd like to know the following:
What is your team size?
Is your team co-located (all in one place)?
Can you describe the type and flow of your work?
Do you have open channels of communication with your customer, and if not, do you have people who can stand in and more or less speak for the customer?
Do you think the leadership would be on board for a drastic change?
It is unlikely that the visibility and continuous improvement of an agile framework will not bring about significant improvements within your company. Also, if you are the type that thrives on facilitating a team and helping them grow to excellence, then this will be a great career change. Personally, I love my job and enjoy every day. With the above simple questions answered, it would be a lot easier to spark a conversation.
Jeff Southerland's book (already mentioned) is a great intro for Scrum, and not a boring read. I also like David Anderson's Kanban, if you have a more steady continuous workflow like a compliance or support team, this can fit better. Also, a good read. The Scrum Guide is rather short and is the definitive guide for the Scrum framework. Exactly how you execute under that framework is largely up to the team, but everything is based on the idea of iterative continuous improvement. Once you get this idea down in practice, you'll be hooked.
If you're interested in Scrum (it's not an acronym) then an easy way to get started is to take training as a CSM (Certified Scrum Master). It's a 2-day course with a fairly easy multiple-choice exam.
If you're already a Product Manager, you could also look at the CSPO (Certified Scrum Product Owner) which will help you understand the differences in the way requirements are treated.
Scrum isn't the be-all and end-all of Agile methods, so do keep your mind open after the training! But it will help you to get your foot in the door.
After that, try looking for local Agile or Scrum groups; most big cities have them. Look out for Agile conferences too; even if you can't make it, a lot of them post the talks online.
If you do end up as a PM and you're struggling to understand something, don't be afraid to hire an Agile Coach for a few days. They'll help to mentor you, explain how Agile works, and fine-tune your processes.
The most important thing to remember about Agile methods is that they're there to help handle uncertainty. For anything you do that's new, and you've never done before, it's useful to make discoveries early rather than later and to get feedback quickly on those discoveries. In Waterfall we made sure we we're getting it right. In Agile, we assume we can't know everything up front and will inevitably get some of it wrong.
I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention Kanban, which is related to Agile and originally derived from the Lean techniques used at Toyota, and Cynefin (my blog, the Wikipedia page is also good). Mike Cohn's books are a pretty good first stop for basic Scrum, but Kanban and Cynefin will help you to see beyond that.
Finally, if you get stuck, http://pm.stackexchange.com is your friend. You can also shout out on Twitter; there's always people willing to help and pass you links and ideas.
(Oh, and don't worry too much about the formality. I work as a Lean / Kanban and Agile consultant, have no formal qualifications in it, and am internationally recognized. Doing it and having the metrics and stories to show that you've done it is more important than a qualification.)
I really enjoyed "Kanban" by David J Anderson. https://www.amazon.com/Kanban-Successful-Evolutionary-Technology-Business/dp/0984521402
Read this book. Four Steps to the Epiphany. It focuses on customer development and making sure you build what customers want.
https://www.amazon.com/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Steve-Blank/dp/0989200507
Forget the LeanStartUp stuff to begin with, this book is the perfect blueprint for creating and/or growing a business. I've used the ideas in the book to build my business. (https://bubblecow.com/)
The only ones I can think of is Hagakure and Go Rin No Sho. Obviously, you'd have to track down the japanese version of the books (I assume via amazon.jp), but I neither speak nor read japanese, so I would defer to you.
Like say the US Marine Corps' Professional Reading List? I think all branches have reading lists.
One's I've actually read::
I'm particularly fond of The Village by Bing West.
There's Power To The Edge which is more modern
Also yes, Sun Tzu's The Art of War, also Nicolo Machiavelli's Art of War, On War by Clausewitz, On Combat by Grossman even though I have some issues with it.
Hope this helps.
EDIT: I can't believe I forgot The Book of Five Rings by Musashi
God, this is something I've thought about a lot...
I lived in Japan when I was in college, and one of the biggest things I noticed was the huge difference the two cultures have on learning, what I ended up calling The Cult of Originality and The Cult of Mastery.
In The Cult of Mastery, the Japanese method, originality isn't valued as highly as the complete mastery of the fundamentals, followed by the mastery of an already existing style. After multiple styles are mastered, that's when the learner can start melding them together, to create something unique, and perhaps his own style, but this is an afterthought, not the goal.
The other side of the coin is the American Cult of Originality, in which the goal is to create new material from day one, and the fundamentals are only a stepping stone to that creation of your own new material.
To put this in return top terms, in Japan, a flawless execution of a routine in Jensen Kimmet's style will score higher in a competition than a flawed original execution. In America, the reverse is true, originality will always win.
My biggest takeaway from all of this, as an American, is to not give a shit if people think my style is derivative. I've only been taking throwing seriously for about nine months, which ain't a long time. I will keep drilling the fundamentals, and mimicking styles I like, all with the faith that originality will come at when those fundamentals are not enough.
If you like this line of thinking, I would really recommend the books The Art of Learning (by the guy who Searching for Bobby Fisher was based on, who became a world champion in martial arts later on in life), The Road to Excellence (which is expensive, but you can find pdfs of on the internet), Malcom Gladwell's Outliers, and The Book of Five Rings
Oh with 11 years experience I don't think you would get much out of CAPM. It is very much a 'get-you-in-the-door' type certificate.
Rita's is a text book, https://www.amazon.com/PMP-Exam-Prep-Eighth-Updated/dp/1932735658/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1509553496&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=rita which I found very helpful. The end of chapter tests are quite good, the only downside is they do relate to the material you just learned which is quite leading. I am not sure if there is going to be an updated version coming out soon with the updates to the test format and the PMBOK.
Another paid resource I found useful was PMTraining. It was a pretty reasonable cost for a 3 month subscription and I found the questions similar in format to the actual test exam.
For free resources, I found that the Oliver Lehmann questions were pretty solid. The HeadFirst mock exam was maybe a bit on the easy side, but was a good exercise in taking a 200 question multiple choice test.
The Rita Process game found @ http://pmp.aamirafridi.com/_rpg/index-3.html was really helpful to me as well. Being able to map out the processes, and figure out exactly what process group you are is very valuable IMO.
So... it depends. I've been a PM for 13 years, and PMP for 9.
I took a Project management course in my undergrad during my Bcomm at u of c so I didn't need the education contact hours, but being the keener I am took the PMP prep course at MRC.
That was a waste of time. It was taught by volunteers from PMISAC, and they don't have education as their background...
What was of benefit though was the course forced me to sit and read the PMBOK chapters to be prepped for the lectures.
Alongside the course, I picked up Rita's Guide to the PMP. Link This book is one of the two best resources for passing the PMP. It teaches you to think in the language of the exam.
The next best resource was pmstudy.com. I bought the four pack of exams. I scheduled the cert exam for a Friday, and did one test per night Monday-Thursday. On Friday, when I sat the exam, I finished in 1.5 hours as I had seen over 100 of the questions before. It was a breeze and I passed with only a few wrong.
So... if you need education contact hours, go somewhere that's cheap. Check out places like Global Knowledge or Cheetah as well. If you want to pass the exam, get Rita's book and the 4 pack of exams from pmstudy.com.
And don't forget, you don't need to maintain your PMI membership to maintain you PMP credential.
I would say the BEST book is this one, A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide)–Fifth Edition.
The reason why, is the PMP/CAMP/Project+ are all based on this book. So not only will it get you Project+, but it will also prepare you for the other two certs from PMI. It's not short, I mean it's 600 pages, but it really is the best for these certs.
Otherwise, I think the Sybex book is your best bet. It's half the size and will only focus on the topics covered in Project+
Yes! Everyone should read this book! Very important message!
https://www.amazon.com/Factfulness-Reasons-World-Things-Better-ebook/dp/B0756J1LLV
Obviously people's changing perspective affects their behavior along with cultural and social norms, from views on slavery to civil rights or from war to types of government over the ages, but all of that and our reactions to it are based on human nature. We all have biases, complex motivations, and evolved tendencies which can make us get jealous, angry, and so on resulting in horrible mistakes, while also causing us to fall in love, express gratitude, and feel empathy with others, along with the unintended consequences and unexpected results which can always haunt us.
That doesn't mean we can't temper unwanted behavior through laws criminalizing violence, shunning bigotry in media, or removing incentives to cheat, while supporting desirable behavior by promoting education, rewarding cooperation, and building helpful institutions, which people have been attempting to do for millennia. Sometimes these attempts succeed in addressing one problem yet cause other issues we didn't expect, such as the rise of globalism. Other times they fail miserably and hurt even more people than they were meant to help, like the war on drugs.
Our perspectives on the world motivate or discourage us from implementing the changes we think it needs, yet through it all we are still bound by human nature and the consequences of trying to apply our lofty ideals onto the slippery nature of reality. Meaning that no matter what perfectly moral laws we create, people will still react with violence in times of stress. That however much we condemn racism, people are prone to categorizing others as different. And while we can educate people better than anyone else in the past, ignorance will always cause problems.
This doesn't mean the world hasn't been getting better than the past, it truly has in many ways, but that unless we start changing our DNA, some humans will continue to make the same old mistakes we've made for millennia, only with fewer and fewer people making those mistakes as progress marches on.
(I realize this was less an answer to your question and more of a concept I wanted to express to anyone willing to read it. And for anyone wanting to know more on how things are actually getting better, The Better Angels of Our Nature by Steven Pinker, and Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World--and Why Things Are Better Than You Think by Hans Rosling explain things much better than I could.)
You should really read Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World--and Why Things Are Better Than You Think!
Basically, population growth is one thing we're all instinctually terrible at getting right. He explains it very well in the book (Page 76 begins the section "The Mega Misconception that 'The World Population is just increasing and increasing'") but here's a short overview:
We are currently in a population boom because more babies are surviving into adulthood.
As more babies in a culture survive, the mean number of births per family decreases.
Right now, we have 7 billion people. 2b are children. 4b are adults. and 1b are elderly.
By the end of the century, we will have 11b people. However, still only 2b of them will be children. 6b now will be adults (these are today's children and their children). And 3b will be elderly.
The key concept is that the number of children in 50 or 75 years will be the same number as today. The population boom will have stabilized.
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https://imgur.com/UWei3b1
https://imgur.com/bwHXfN9
https://imgur.com/P6ZIs5S
https://imgur.com/qIL5RBd
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Ugh, been there. Not going to get better until the owner gets better.
Do yourself a favor. Buy this book, and anonymously leave it in his office. Highlight Chapter 2: Letting Go of the Vine.
https://www.amazon.com/Traction-Get-Grip-Your-Business/dp/1936661837/
I'm in the same boat. Product Hunt surge, now need to work on marketing. I just read a book called "Traction" that is interesting. It lists out 19 different channels and provides recent examples and case studies. I'm not going to follow the book verbatim, but there are definitely some good takeaways.
http://www.amazon.com/Traction-Get-Grip-Your-Business/dp/1936661837
How are you marketing your business currently?
Here's some good books to read although they're geared more towards managing and motivating a workforce. Others may have better recommendations for books on growing as a startup or small business. Ultimately, you need to focus on marketing your company and targeting your ideal customer.
Turn the Ship Around by David Marquet
https://www.amazon.com/Turn-Ship-Around-Turning-Followers/dp/1591846404
How to Become a Great Boss by Jeffrey Fox
https://www.amazon.com/How-Become-Great-Boss-Employees/dp/0786868236/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1484506909&amp;sr=1-2&amp;keywords=how+to+a+great+boss
How to Be a Great Boss by Gino Wickman
https://www.amazon.com/How-Great-Boss-Gino-Wickman/dp/1942952848/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1484506909&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=how+to+a+great+boss
Good to Great by Jim Collins (I just started this)
https://www.amazon.com/Good-Great-Some-Companies-Others/dp/0066620996/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1484507074&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=good+to+great
EDIT: Here's another one.
Traction. Get a Grip on Your Business by Gino Wickman. I haven't read this but the CEO did and we use the structure and methods from this book to run our company. https://www.amazon.com/Traction-Get-Grip-Your-Business/dp/1936661837/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
The Hard Thing About Hard Things -- Ben Horowitz. GREAT as an audiobook.
Traction: Get a grip on your business -- Gino Wickman. Good for unknotting the reasons for constantly stalling out on progress. It's meant for large offices, apparently, but even my little office benefited since the habits are universal.
The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph -- Ryan Holiday
Hi I'm a graphic designer, UX engineer, and I have worked for a lot with a bunch of different PMs. Some have been great and some treat people really badly. I can share what was most effective for me and the other graphic designers I have worked with.
When it comes to the long hours I would like to ask who is making the estimates for the projects? I really recommend including the designers when you are making your estimates and scoping out the work. This not only will help you get better estimates but it creates buy in from the designers so that they feel more committed to meeting those estimates. I have seen PMs throw work over the wall to people to complete in unrealistic time frames or unrealistic prices. The person doing the estimate didnt know rendering an animation would take 4 days and 100% use of someone's computer etc. All parties end up blaming each other for not having the right talents and in the end its just the project that is put at risk.
As far them asking other resources to be involved. Somewhere they got the notion they could do that, they feel they have no choice, or they are doing some skill swapping and team building between departments. I really recommend looking into why this is happening before bringing down the hammer on anyone, a lot of times there is some other resource issue occurring that needs to be resolved. If you can approach it as a way to help solve their underlying problem people are more likely to be open to change.
Liability:
Reference:
This may seem lame but I totally recommend reading the PMBOK for reference. Don't feel like you have to take the test but I think it covers a lot of the responsibilities of PMs well. PMBOK
Sorry if this is very pro designer but I have seen way way too many PMs just pretend we aren't people. If you can gain peoples respect you have have an awesome job. Hope this helps. Good luck.
Not all of these are in our core training/ required knowledge, or related to our day to day functions as a university A/V department, but They are all available to my team for knowledge building and professional development. Additionally , and our job ladder includes Infocomm certifications, so the library is a little biased towards infocomm resources at the moment.
Books I use are
http://www.amazon.com/Master-Handbook-Acoustics-Alton-Everest/dp/0071603328)
just ordered digital video and hd
based on a recommendation in r/videoengineering
infocomm's audio and visual systems design, essentials of the av industry, av best practices, AV installation hand book
white papers/ online training from extron, JBL, Dalite, surgeX, bluejeanscable, and others. (out of the office and do not have the exact list and links with me
In your scenario, I feel like simplicity is going to be key because this your first time doing it.
I discuss your question in my video: https://youtu.be/tvK0BYO-9R0?t=529
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A lot can get lost in extravagant business plans. The important thing is that you can PROVE what you have done and that it works. Basically, will putting more money into this engine = a return?
Read:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influence_People
https://www.amazon.com/Factfulness-Reasons-World-Things-Better-ebook/dp/B0756J1LLV
https://www.amazon.com/How-Think-Like-Leonardo-Vinci-ebook/dp/B000SEFNF0/
https://hbr.org/2014/09/how-philosophy-makes-you-a-better-leader
https://www.amazon.com/Microserfs-Novel-Douglas-Coupland-ebook/dp/B004W2YZ0I
Write: Your 1, 3 and 5-year plans. Write plans for achieving them
Watch:
The Big Short
The Smartest Guys in the Room
Go to: Industry events, user groups, technical meetups. But also museums, great restaurants, national parks and crowded cities
Connect with: Peers, leaders, teachers, innovators - not just people in your business niche.
Travel: As far & wide as you can. Nationally & internationally. Don't forget the local things around you that you've never seen
Exercise: You're taking care of your brain - take care of your body, too
Gino Wickman.
https://www.amazon.com/Traction-Get-Grip-Your-Business/dp/1936661837
Yes, I've read Verne's second book, Scaling Up. I would recommend skipping that one though and going straight to "Traction" which is like "Scaling Up" but for smaller companies. "Traction" has become very popular in the entrepreneurial community the past few years and it's a great system to run a business in.
In any normal time, I would say "What does Google have to say about your sources?"
Unfortunately, our present culture is such that everything is regarded as a completely untrustworthy source by a very vocal minority on one side or the other. So there is not necessarily a simple answer to that question.
One important thing to remember: No source is 100% right. All sources have a bias. The first thing you can do is try to be aware of what biases your preferred sources have. If you are aware that your preferred sources lean [direction], you can try to be aware of any spin they are applying.
There is a great new book called Factfulness that helps you learn how to read the news and spot the facts underlying reporting. Things that the articles might state, but -- intentionally or not-- they might obfuscate for one reason or another. Bill Gates reviewed it here, and in fact he liked it so much that he gave a free copy away to any person graduating from college this year. It's well worth reading if you can find the time. It's a short and quite interesting book, so I recommend it highly.
Entrepreneur Reading List
Computer Science Grad School Reading List
Video Game Development Reading List
Correct for some companies. Especially, now that the internet has really helped us define affinity groups or tribes. Check out Seth Godin if you like discussing that.
The economy has scared a lot of companies into consolidating their products to target the acceptance of the mass bell-curve. This is the safe route; they don't want to wait for the adoption curve to pick up.
Here's the other kick: Some companies are too big to take small wins. A company has to show good returns on their stock every quarter. A small company can turn a profit from niche; however, a larger company has too much infrastructure to support for anything other than large wins and huge margins (to turn the same percent growth).
Suggest reading the Innovator's Dilemma if this is interesting to you.
The Innovator's Dilemma
People are probably going to recommend the usuals but I'm going to try and add some spicy flavor to this topic.
Designers call it using a concept.
Also can anyone recommend a good book on art philosophy/aesthetics?
Since you're in the Bay Area, go to an SF Made event or schedule a meeting with Janet. SFMade is an organization that gets stuff made in SF. Mostly cut and sew apparel work.
Go in with a plan, not just an idea.
Don't worry about your niche (or niche within a niche) being too small. Smaller is better to start. Tailor your product to a small group and blow their minds. Get a base of raving fans then expand from there or, better yet, figure out what else they will buy and make it.
Don't worry about competition like Outlier. Read Positioning and "own" a phrase in your customers' minds. Maybe it's "dress shirts for Crossfitters."
My company, Tortuga Backpacks makes travel backpacks. Note how our story and target market are reflected in our 'About Us' page, product copy, and every other page on the site. We aren't the only company making backpacks, but we portray a very clear image: 25-39 year old urban travelers who see the value of packing light. I'm a marketer by trade, so I think about this stuff a lot.
If you like reading btw, here's my top list for teaching yourself marketing:
My favorite marketing book: https://www.amazon.com/Being-Direct-Making-Advertising-Pay/dp/0394540638
Best for creative ad strategy: https://www.amazon.com/Made-Stick-Ideas-Survive-Others/dp/1400064287
Two really good ones on branding: https://www.amazon.com/22-Immutable-Laws-Branding/dp/0060007737, https://www.amazon.com/Positioning-Battle-Your-Al-Ries/dp/0071373586/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_img_1?_encoding=UTF8&amp;psc=1&amp;refRID=SAK252T4836CY0G4XYGD
A classic on inbound marketing (not paid media): https://www.amazon.com/Inbound-Marketing-Found-Google-Social/dp/0470499311
Good guide to Facebook advertising: https://adespresso.com/academy/guides/facebook-ads-beginner/
Suggested read for everyone in this thread: Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind
it's all about branding and reasons for success vs. failure of a brand name
Very interesting even if you only have a passing interest in marketing and it is well written by some of the best in the industry.
I found the The Brand Gap to be very elementary. If you've been in marketing for a while you should already have a solid foundation on branding that that book covers. It's definitely an easy read and a great source for an introduction to branding.
With that said, I'd recommend:
Given that social security is constantly threatened, and given that most Americans have less than $500 in savings and are not saving nearly enough for retirement, creating passive income is a great way to both hedge against uncertainties and build actual wealth.
You've really got something to think about here. If you rent your house out, someone else is paying your mortgage for you. And if you're renting it out for twice to three times the note (hell of an investment), that one property can pay for your next property as well. Keep going and in a decade you could have several properties that have paid for themselves. When you are ready to retire, which could be a lot sooner than you currently believe is possible, you could be sitting on ten to twenty properties or more that you own, that you owe nothing for, that are making you thousands of dollars each month. And if you get tired of dealing with it all, you can always sell.
I recommend starting by looking into sources such as bigger pockets and start reading books like [The Millionaire Real Estate Investor] (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0071446370/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_EPN-zbTQ6ZCNS) by Gary Keller. Those sources will lead to learning about your current options and your future as an investor. And you need to learn about it, because whether you realize it or not, you're already a real estate investor.
In short, yes it is. Theres many ways I could explain it but I don't think i'd do this book justice - http://www.amazon.com/The-Millionaire-Real-Estate-Investor/dp/0071446370 The Millionaire Real Estate Investorby Gary Kellar
This book is to real estate what Rich Dad Poor Dad is to Personal Finance.
Millionaire Real Estate Investor, Gary Keller.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Millionaire-Real-Estate-Investor/dp/0071446370
There might be better "beginner books", but I think this does start at the basics and does an even better job at the more thorough and practical levels. By far the best overall book on RE investing that I have read. No nonsense approach, which is hard to come by in a world where every slick haired dude ever bought anything is trying to sell a book on "how to be a billionaire overnight with no money or assets at all!".
Beyond that there are a list of other books that hit on more specific or detailed topics, and when you need those just let me know. I could think of a few.
Two of the best introductory books:
Wow, that's a really broad topic and there is so much written on this.
When you say presentations, do you mean specifically like PowerPoint slides or pitching like getting funding for a business idea?
One of the best places to hear great presentations is Ted.com. You may want to check out [Garr Reynolds] (https://www.ted.com/search?q=garr+reynolds) and his books. Another great resource for presentations is [Nancy Duarte] (http://www.ted.com/search?q=nancy+duarte). Also [Seth Godin] (http://www.ted.com/search?q=seth+godin).
For pitching (selling your ideas or getting funding) I would read Oren Klaff's book called [Pitch Anything] (https://www.amazon.com/Pitch-Anything-Innovative-Presenting-Persuading/dp/0071752854/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1469128594&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=pitch+anything).
Let me know if that was what you were looking for. Hopefully others will have more ideas!
This is a business where you have to do things the hard way, typically. If you decide to become a retail broker, there are a few things I would do:
I would suspect that a broker, in his first five years, probably hates his life. But once you get beyond that initial phase, it can obviously become very lucrative, as lucrative as a more institutional role. Remember that brokers eventually establish relationships with investment bankers and start doing fun little private placements. Some brokers specialize in this stuff (e.g. finding capital for small tech firms). These guys get warrants, the piece of the compensation picture that the retail client often doesn't know about. Warrants are good.
Remember too that we may be entering a long-term bear market. Some good friends of mine got started at one of the world's largest brokerages back in the mid 90s. So they had timing on their side. You may not.
This book might interest you: http://www.amazon.com/Pitch-Anything-Innovative-Presenting-Persuading/dp/0071752854/ref=reg_hu-rd_add_1_dp
It's written by a guy who raises VC capital.
I am looking to hire a long term writer, offer to pay and incentives based on CTR. [LeadArk] (http://leadark.com) partners with the top 1% of Real Estate Agents to do marketing for their clients, people like you and me who are buying homes. Very captive audience, who will be making a decision in the next 60 days. 13,000 people a day buy homes.
I opened [LeadArk] (http://leadark.com) 6 months ago, signed up 250 users in the last 3 months and already have a 6 figure contract. Working with Oren Klaff the author of [Pitch Anything] (http://www.amazon.com/Pitch-Anything-Innovative-Presenting-Persuading/dp/0071752854) to make it sizzle. Are you looking for a long term partnership, or just portfolio work? What's in it for you and how do we get our goals in line?
Maybe you should become an amazing marketer then?
I've heard Pitch Anything reccomended. Also your tone seems to be the biggest problem with your proposals. If you only phrased things differently, you might see clients/companies becoming much more willing to play along.
While not specifically sociopathy, the a book A First Rate Madness addresses the link between leadership and mental illness. I found it fascinating.
http://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between-Leadership/dp/0143121332
is "a first-rate madness" (amazon link) considered a credible book?
written by psychiatrist nassir ghaemi with due diligence on primary historical sources (will edit to add details, but currently on mobile) hitler discussion in the book is a digression from "first-rate" leaders who had neurodiverse leadership styles in times of crisis: resilience, originality and high empathy.
hitler never displayed high empathy... not surprisingly.
> The person Adolf Hitler is not very interesting.
I don't think he was neurotypical. examples from the book include grandiose discussions of destiny with his childhood friend.
> Let me expand: The private thoughts of Adolf Hitler do not hold the key for understanding Nazism and the Holocaust. Adolf Hitler, like any of us, is in his political convictions, in his role of the "Führer", in his programmatics, and in his success, a creation of his time.
agree that he was interacting with a weak political system and a culture ripe for revenge ideology. World War II being the revenge war for World War I.
edit: ghaemi used august kubizek's memoir "the young hitler I knew" for his commentary "beginning with symptoms, hitler had clear manic and depressive episodes throughout his life." kubizek's memoir was written 10 years after hitler's death and "most historians accept the general veracity of kubizek's account." that's what ghaemi wrote about the source.
edit 2: to clarify, "hitler never displayed high empathy"... I meant "us vs them" mentality which was violent even in the beginning.
https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between-Leadership/dp/0143121332
This book looks at Lincoln, Hitler, GWB, a couple of civil war generals, homoclites (which was really interesting), and others.
https://www.amazon.com/First-Rate-Madness-Uncovering-Between-Leadership/dp/0143121332/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1506404345&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=a+madness+ghaemi
Hey friend,
Try to meditate. It really helps. But be careful, that you don't sit with your eyes closed, and start to think about how you are anxious about everything. No. Just sit there for 20 minutes (set the timmer) and count your breath. Try focusing on it being long enough, and not abrupt as in panic attacks.
You have to accept one thing. Nothing will make you happy in the outside world. You need to be happy with yourself. Our time on this planet is limited, if you want to be friends with one person, let it be yourself.
I don't want to force any religion upon you, and I am atheist myself, but living on this planet with nothing to put faith in can be really hard. If you believe in something, trust it with your whole heart. Say 'Jesus, I believe in you' or even better, 'I believe in myself'. And really do. Act as you know best for yourself. Never do anything for others. Have the courage to do as you want.
And remember. You are not worst than anyone. The greatest leaders were all depressed in some time of their lives. In order to be happy,
one has to feel down sometimes. I haven't read this book yet, but if you feel like it's interesting give it a try A first-Rate Madness
The book A First Rate Madness talks at length about great leaders in times of crisis who went through depression. Having to endure enabled, or rather forced, them to develop a deeper level of empathy or resolve. It's a great read about the positives of mental illness that not many people are discussing.
Here's a link to the book on Amazon if it piqued your interest:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0143121332/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1459228791&amp;sr=8-1&amp;pi=SY200_QL40&amp;keywords=a+first+rate+madness&amp;dpPl=1&amp;dpID=518LWMl9xBL&amp;ref=plSrch
There's actually a book I saw recently about miracles where the author makes the claim that, statistically, miracles are very common. I haven't read the book sop I can't give a personal anecdote, but here's the link.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0374175349/ref=cm_sw_r_udp_awd_uS-rtb1VVP49N
Now supernatural miracles still haven't been proven to ever happen, but this is something you can show to someone who says God works miracles in their life.
Here are some links for the product in the above comment for different countries:
Link: [http://www.amazon.com/dp/0374175349/ref=cm_sw_r_udp_awd_uS-rtb1VVP49N
Now](http://www.amazon.com/dp/0374175349/ref=cm_sw_r_udp_awd_uS-rtb1VVP49N
Now)
This bot is currently in testing so let me know what you think by voting (or commenting).
The improbable isn't that rare. That's the core concept to grasp. I'm pretty confident there's a pop-science book about this exact concept if you want some light reading.
Found it. It's The Improbability Principle. I haven't read the book, but plenty of buyers seem happy with it.
It's almost definitely just a coincidence. I bought this book recently and it explains the math behind coincidences and why they're actually very very common.
>I often question whether nonphysical things can exist...
I phrase it differently--what reason do I have to think nonphysical things do exist? I can't know that something invisible, magical, undetectable can't exist, since I'm not omniscient. That doesn't mean "hmm maybe there are invisible genies." We have to remember that not knowing that something can't exist isn't an argument for it existing. Me not having a reason to think a given thing exists doesn't mean I'm declaring that it doesn't exist, nor am I "dismissing" the idea for all time. I just want to know what reason I have, at present, to think it actually exists.
>Darth Vader, for example, is something that does not exist.
Well, he's known to be a fictional character. But how about the chupacabra? Unicorns? Both were (or are, by some) thought to be real. We have reported sightings. I can't know for sure they aren't real, but I can ask if we have ample reasons to consider them real.
> One of the most common arguments for gods I see is that of experience.
Experiences are interpreted. So though we may say "People experienced God," what that means is that people had an experience that they interpreted as being God. The basis for that interpretation, the tenability of their inference, should be critically examined.
>Someone has an idea or is inspired out of nowhere, against any meaningful material connection (such as Jung's synchronicity).
There are different ways to frame that, though. Jung saw deep meaning in coincidences. But when we see meaning in coincidences, the meaning is provided by our own interpretation. The meaning is in us, not in the coincidence. And much of that meaning is, in my experience, due to us underestimating how probable coincidences really are.
>Could this not be evidence of nonphysical effects on nonphysical aspects of ourselves
What reason is there to think it is? Coincidences happen. They are shocking and eerie only to the extent that we are ignorant of statistical thinking. When we learn about statistical thinking or skepticism in general we learn that coincidences should be expected.
"The Art of Strategy" by Dixit and Nalebuff presents a very accessible approach to game theory. (http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-Strategy-Theorists-Business/dp/0393337170)
"Economic Fables" by Rubinstein is a combined memoir and text on game theory methodology that's a fun read. (http://www.amazon.com/Economic-Fables-Ariel-Rubinstein/dp/1906924775/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1412805443&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=economic+fables)
https://www.amazon.com/Art-Strategy-Theorists-Success-Business/dp/0393337170
I read this. Haven't read much into Game Theory besides this book, but it's probably a more general overview of Game Theory with real life examples.
I actually read this book a while back, so I understood the concept of a Nash Equilibrium in general, just not the example you gave. I'll admit that most of it didn't stick since I skimmed over much of the math. I think it was just the way you worded it. I thought you meant steal wasn't a dominant strategy at all, but you meant it was weakly dominant.
The Art of Deception Great book i learned about on "The Broken"
Meet my friend.
His book has a handful of insights into social engineering, but nothing you wouldn't be able to get elsewhere.
from information security, Kevin Mitnick The Art of Deception
great stories of early hackers and employees giving away the keys to the kingdom.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-Deception-Controlling-Security/dp/0471237124
I suggest 3 books, all for different reasons.
The easiest I can explain it is Logic is math with words. You will learn how to form arguments and spot fallacy's. By the end of that textbook you will know how to put together a bulletproof argument and tear someone else's argument to shreds. Its practical philosophy for your ever day life. (And great for arguing on the internet)
I'm a firm believer that logic classes should be taught starting in middle school.
Read this AFTER learning the Logic textbook, it will make much more sense. After logic you will be able to put together logically sound arguments. After The Art of Deception, you will become good at putting together fallacious arguments. Because...well, sometimes you need to win even when you are wrong. Also, you will be able to spot people trying to do this too you.
I think these 3 books will give you a good overview of philosophy and logic and you will be able to implement them in a practical way in your life.
Hi, I would like to suggest two books as following. I'm interested in some business field, so theses are my recommendations, enjoy~
1)the inevitable- kevin kelly
http://www.amazon.com/Inevitable-Understanding-Technological-Forces-Future/dp/0525428089
2)Why Nudge?- Cass R. Sunstein
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Nudge-Politics-Libertarian-Paternalism/dp/0300212690
Holly Mother of God. :-)
"Dancing with the Stars and The Voice" ? Yipes!
How about Silicon Valley, Dark Mirror, and a dash of Dark Matter?
I bounce between Greenpoint and Manhattan. There is not a soul here that has "Network" TV anywhere in their world. Not a soul. It's gone. We use cable for only one thing. Just internet. Google is putting up 1gb/s access points all over the city. Totally free. Like to ditch my cable when they get one closer to my apt.
But what is back, BIG TIME? Books and paper. Everywhere. :-) And Voice (Alexa on Echo) is the craze.
You might really enjoy this book. We're all devouring it now (well 2 here for u).
Rushkoff
https://www.amazon.com/Throwing-Rocks-Google-Bus-Prosperity/dp/1617230170
Kelly
https://www.amazon.com/Inevitable-Understanding-Technological-Forces-Future/dp/0525428089
> That's nothing new. If you knew the industry you know that almost everyone is freelance and they moved on to new gigs the moment they wrapped the season finale of Vinyl.
Yes, but a few years back for sure, it would have been "you're stealing my show!", now it's "totally cool dude." Big change there.
Currently reading a book about this subject (https://www.amazon.com/Inevitable-Understanding-Technological-Forces-Future/dp/0525428089) and apparently instant-access is going to replace ownership in the long term. It's happening now with entertainment media (Spotify, Netflix, EA Access), cars (Uber, Lyft) and may happen with much bigger things like shelter, food etc.
Debugging.
Debugging by Agans is great on debugging; my last company liked it so much they bought all the devs a copy, and I think that in turn was inspired by a course at the local university requiring the book.
Buy her some type of Scott Adam's book.
Help her look for other job opportunities and keep reminding her that she won't have to spend her entire life there. People can tolerate things better when they know it won't be forever.
The Dilbert Principle.
Gronk
Si ça se trouve y'a des versions pdf qui circulent...
Its really not hard. honestly, read scott adams books. yes he write the dilbert stripes, but his actual books this one and this one will change your cube life. trust me.
I like these books:
I do a set of activities as discussed in Agile Retrospectives by Esther Derby.
Mad, Sad, Glad is a really great activity to focus the team's thoughts and Gather data. However, if you can define a full set of activities to draw insights and then add Spikes/Enabler to your Backlog, it will really help the team. From the time I started doing these activities, the team performance improved dramatically and I have stuck with the template. If you are interested do read about it in an article about the template that I have written.
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Pens and post its work.
This book gives you hundreds of actionable opportunities based on the audience: https://www.amazon.com/Agile-Retrospectives-Making-Teams-Great/dp/0977616649
Kanban: Successful Evolutionary Change for Your Technology Business
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0984521402
The Phoenix Project is a great book and has some really interesting (though a bit idealistic in my opinion) theories about organization and execution. That book really jump-started my Kanban efforts. I don't think I could recommend a single book to cover everything because my current efforts have grown organically over years of trial and error and I pulled from a lot of different places to accomplish it all.
As I mentioned, I use Kanban to manage workflow and a bit of Agile/Scrum concepts for meetings. Some good resources along those lines are...
http://www.agilesysadmin.net/kanban_sysadmin
http://blog.digite.com/kanban-in-it-operations/
http://www.amazon.com/Kanban-Successful-Evolutionary-Technology-Business/dp/0984521402
You may also want to look more into retrospectives, where you look back on what happened and discuss what worked, what didn't, what you could do better, how the process can be improved, etc. But also pulling in Agile concepts of iterations so your retrospectives don't wait until the end of a 6 month project, instead you'd hold them more frequently so you can derive more value throughout the process and make frequent changes/adjustments.
There is product development, and there is customer development. You get the second one. Read Four Steps to the Epiphany.
Pick up a copy of The Book of Five Rings or The Dhammapada and add them to your study. You can still read the Bible and Mormon "scriptures" but approach them as literary works: character, dialogue, plot, theme, metaphor, philosophy, etc.
Thank you, I'm flattered
that you could be impressed by five book that I hold dear to my heart. I have strong feelings about adding books to my collection, as it's far more important to me to know a book, that to simply be able to purchase it. I have far too many books that I confess I'm only acquainted with, and do not know deeply :( A good book owns me as much as I own it. I carry it with me in my thoughts.
>I would love to read more about that but I have this fear of not understanding their way of life, of respect, of loyalty to the monarch/ shogun.
Instead, please take my offering of a small library of five books on samurai aesthetics.
I hope you are much more impress by the quality of the words written in these books, and what they might evoke in you, rather than their habitation in my life. I am but the humble reader.
> That's last in the book so either I've read the book or I had read the wikipedia page before you mentioned it
You already said you didn't read the book, so yeah, the table of contents in the wikipedia article mentioned it, or you pulled it from a quote site. We already know you didn't read it.
> h, and it also happens to be very near the bottom of the wikipedia page, suggesting that I did in fact not only read the first paragraph.
Or one of those other options. Good job, though. I'm sure you totally grocked the book of the void in all its context by skipping to the end of the wiki article (assuming that's what you did).
> You still don't get it do you. The downvotes are there because you aren't even making arguments for your cause.
I don't need to argue. You haven't read the book, you don't know enough about it to make any suggestions about its material. It's a book about martial prowess and the mindset with which you approach combat. Trying to pull anything else out of it is a fool's errand- which you've proven by trying to do without so much as an initial reading.
You aren't equipped to talk about it. I tried to be nice, but you just aren't. Let me know when you've given it a nice, respectful reading, and then we can talk.
https://smile.amazon.com/Book-Five-Rings-Miyamoto-Musashi/dp/1590309847/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1481739643&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=book+of+five+rings
Here you go. It's cheap and if you use that link something will go to charity. Buy it, read it over a month or so (it's short, but not meant to be taken in a single brief reading), and come back when you have an opinion worth taking into account.
Well if you are looking for study material here are some links to books I suggest.
http://www.amazon.com/Guide-Project-Management-Body-Knowledge/dp/1935589679/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1405382005&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=pmbok
http://www.amazon.com/PMP-Exam-Prep-Eighth-Edition/dp/1932735658/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_y
http://pmhigherlearning.com/project-management-exam-guide/
I believe there is an audio version. But this hardcopy is what you want.
PMP Exam Prep, Eighth Edition - Updated https://www.amazon.com/dp/1932735658/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_.cbyzbC83DVFN
Any other pointers?
Books on project management, software development lifecycle, history of computing/programming, and other books on management/theory. It's hard to read about actual programming if you can't practice it.
Some of my favorites:
You can't exactly learn to program without doing, but hopefully these books will give you good ideas on the theories and management to give you the best understanding when you get out. They should give you an approach many here don't have to realize that programming is just a tool to get to the end, and you can really know before you even touch any code how to best organize things.
IF you have access to a computer and the internet, look into taking courses on Udacity, Coursera, and EDX. Don't go to or pay for any for-profit technical school no matter how enticing their marketing may tell you you'll be a CEO out of their program.