It’s always a good idea to keep current on industry trends. Best practices for small businesses come, go and occasionally come back. Marketing strategies shift and are turned upside down (think TV commercials vs. YouTube ads). Sometimes a refresher can come in the form of a conference, a seminar or networking with a wise colleague. And sometimes, it’s as easy as downloading a book on your Kindle app. Here are three books to put on your list right now plus the recommended method of “reading.”
A Classic
How to Win Friends and Influence People
This book was originally released in 1937, reformatted and republished a few times and it is surprisingly applicable today. It has sold over 15 million copies and with a new edition is back on best-seller lists. If you’ve read this one already, read it again and if you’re a newbie, enjoy. It’s broken into four parts:
- Fundamental Techniques in Handling People
- Six Ways to Make People Like You
- How to Win People to Your Way of Thinking
- Be a Leader: How to Change People Without Giving Offense or Arousing Resentmen
Get this as a Kindle download for easy access to inspiration.
It changed my life. The most successful self-help book of all time.
Warren Buffett
An Instant Best-Seller
Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges
By Amy Cuddy
This book has climbed to the top of many reviewers’ lists and was an Amazon Best Book of 2015. A researcher and professor at Harvard Business School, the author translates her TED talk about power posing/body language into a compelling case for using this method to overcome adversity, all researched and documented.
Try the audio version of this one and be enlightened on your commute or workout.
Cuddy brings an abundance of humility and charm to the page. Her presence itself–her openhearted desire to help the insecure and the uneasy in this age of anxiety–shines through. PRESENCE feels at once concrete and inspiring, simple but ambitious–above all, truly powerful.
Heather Havrilesky, New York Times Book Review
An Interactive Experience
Secret Garden: An Inky Treasure and Coloring Book
In a childhood-throwback moment, coloring books for adults are all the rage right now and the excitement doesn’t seem to be slowing down. It has spawned specialty coloring instruments from Crayola (crayons won’t do for the intricate details) and instructions on how to blend for the perfect shade of greenish-bluish teal. Secret Garden has actually climbed to an Amazon top 15 list! While the value of coloring from a business viewpoint may be subtle and sound very Google-ish, experts have weighed in about numerous benefits: health and memory, stress reduction, creative release, relaxation – not too shabby.
Order the new version with extra-thick pages for bleed-through control.
There are few art forms as meditative, nostalgic and all-around blissful as the coloring book. Consider trading in your yoga mat for a set of markers and peruse the gorgeous gardens of Basford’s imagination.
Huffington Post
Happy reading (and coloring)!
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