Offices and Professionals Books

Finally! A book that gives the real truth about how to thrive careerwise after college. Where most books fall short, this one keeps going, offering loads of practical advice. Brutally honest about the reality of the corporate world, this book lays it out in fun to read, plain English. I don't know why my college career office doesn't give this book out!

For the record, this is my very first Amazon review because I finally found a book that is worthy of a 5 star review. After reading several post-college graduate books, @ the Entry Level finally stops beating around the bush and tells you how it really is and how to succeed after college in the jungle known as 'the real world.' Anyone in my position (fresh out of college, has a job, has no idea how the real world works) should pick up this book immediately. Michael Ball relates to our position and generation very accurately and convincingly as well. Teaches you the politics of business and how to sell yourself for future promotions and growth. Much more than a post-college book, I recommend it for anyone trying to get a competitive edge and understanding for themselves in the workplace.

Anyone who's in (or just about to enter) Corporate America and hasn't read this book is at a serious disadvantage! Not only does it show you how to work more effectively with managers and seniors, but it even talks about promotions and career paths, early decision-making, work - life balance, and how to build a personal "brand."

Plus it really gets you to think about the deeper meaning of your career: where it's all leading, how money fits into the equation, and what you're going to want to look back on your life and see. The author obviously cares about his readers, and that makes it even more worthwhile. Truly an informative, provoking (and controversial) book!

I was actually a bit disappointed in this book because I expected more advice on how to deal with the survival and achieve success rather than how to find a true calling. I do think I have found that true calling already thus this part was not interesting for me. I was fresh out of grad school when I got this book and despite having some work experience I did not think I had come even close to starting to figure out office politics etc. This book has not offered me many new insights and I still feel I am at the starting point re: survival and success. If anyone has good tips on books that might be more helpful, please let me know.

I've been in the workforce for almost twenty years, and am only now going back to college, but I felt like this book was written just for me. It talks about direction, and uses words we don't see enough of - like Passion, and Value. After working in customer service for so long, every word he said rang true. It is obvious he has studied many succesful people (from the quotes and anecdotes he sprinkles throughout the book) and is trying to pass on what he has learned from them while emphasizing that most important third dimension of work - satisfaction. (The first and second being Money and a Benefit Package *wink*)

While the theme is a serious one, the book is a great read. Michael's style makes you feel like he's right there in the room telling his jokes in person. The intimacy really worked for me. I'm glad I picked this up - I might even change my major!

This book was SO funny - had me laughing out loud from page one! A GREAT gift idea for co-workers and colleagues. Definitely worth the read. Can't wait to get my hands on the next Stooples book!

When you set three wise guys loose in the office, you're going to get something unpredictable, funny and smart. "Wise" is the operative word here--all the things you were told not to be in high school. Or most anywhere else. Nothing is exempt! I wouldn't be exempt, or you, or the authors--everything goes. Go with it, you'll like it!

First there was Dilbert...funny, yet so close to the truth! Now comes Stooples: Office Tools for Hopeless Fools. I got hold of a copy, and I haven't let go or stopped laughing since!

It's essentially a table top book, although if you leave it on your corporate reception area table, it WILL disappear. Same for the washrooms.

At only $12.95, cheaper at Amazon, for this 128 page full color parody of an office supply catalog, it's well worth thinking about it as a Christmas stocking stuffer, your office gift exchange, or as a give-away at your office holiday bash. The authors will be on tour throughout the US in October and November just to make sure you got their message. You were warned!

This book was hilarious! For anyone who has ever worked in an office setting, it's a must-read when you need a good laugh. This would make a good gift for co-workers and bosses with a sense of humor!

This is one of the funniest office-related books I've read. These guys are cynical, sarcastic and have more insights in modern workplaces than most business consultants. If only we could buy these products--coffee mugs with your six-figure salary emblazoned on it and other ego-pumping products. It reminds me of the Alex Baldwin character in Glengarry Glen Ross, who plunks his Rolex on the desk in front of some loser colleague and says "Who am I? This watch cost more than you earned last year, that's who I am."
This book reminds me of when I got my first job in the early 90s. My predecessor cleared out the bookshelf and left only Dilbert's "How to Build a Better Life By Stealing Office Supplies," which turned out to be the best sources of career advice I had. Now, as I'm preparing to clear out of an office, I think I'll leave the Stooples book to my successor...

August Aquila and Bruce Marcus reward readers of Client at the Core with an imaginative map for the perilous journey through the twists and turns of marketing and managing today's professional services firm. It is creative and thorough.

August Aquila and Bruce Marcus have written a clear and comprehensive view of what every accounting or law marketer needs to know about this new, unprecedented professional services environment. Their book not only explains the new environment, but it's also a rich primer of practical "how-to" advice on all the marketing tools available to the professional services marketer. Strategy is fine, but I find that few books get down to the step-by-step implementation tactics involved in winning new business like this book does - that's one of its best points of differentiation. After reading it, I bought copies for every one of my regional, industry, service line and national marketing leaders.

"Meaty and rich with texture. The authors understand the application of marketing concepts to the CPA profession at a very deep level, and communicate clearly and concisely."

"Every page was another 'Yes!' when reading about the application of marketing principles to the CPA world. The authors nailed it."

This book should burnish the authors' already high reputations for having cogent, jargon-free, and street-smart things to say about what it's really like to try to market professional services. An unusual blend of (clear and lucidly stated) theory about marketing, and real-world insights into obstacles clients can throw up--not to mention the high barrier of internal resistance that "professionals" instinctively erect when asked to be marketers--this should be your starting point if you're facing the complexities of marketing in this environment.

Think that "marketing is just common sense?" Think again; it's both a discipline and an art. Aquila and Marcus will guide your hand at both.

In "Client at the Core: Marketing and Managing Today's Professional Services Firm," (Wiley, 2004) August J. Aquila, based in Minnetonka, Minn., and Bruce W. Marcus, in Easton, Conn., a pair of veteran consultants, combine their considerable experience, skill and insight into a veritable strategic planning operator's manual for today's consulting firm.

From the outset, they acknowledge "the professional world doesn't need another book on how to write a press release or write a brochure or run a seminar."

Instead, they provide a new perspective on the crucial subject of how to keep firms relevant to the needs of the marketplace -- mainly, creating clients and building a marketing culture.

They don't get tied up in ideas like "vision," or "mission."

Instead they talk about the new realities of the 21st Century and professions in turmoil: dot-coms gone bust, a stock market meltdown, and a rash of frauds, defalcations, misuse of corporate funds; and then a reformist reaction, still unfolding, that the authors term "a helter-skelter regulatory rush that was at least as punitive as it was appropriate. It would seem that the regulatory garment was cut to fit all, when all don't wear the same size."

"The time is past when just the presence of the professional was its own comfort factor. It's long been believed that the concept of the professional was so exalted, and so trusting, that people accepted advice unquestioningly. No more. The scandals of 2002 and 2003 seem to have bred a diminished - if unwarranted -- respect for professionals," they say.

"Traditionally, professional services have been a seller's market," according to Aquila and Marcus. But now the tables are turned. "It is now a buyer's market."

For today's professionals, here are six lessons you can take to the bank according to the authors:

1. Clients are more sophisticated. They no longer accept advice without questioning, challenging, demanding more reasoning and detail.

2. Because of the complexity of business today, clients demand that their professionals know more about the client's business and industry than ever before.

3. Professional services always function best when trust is at the heart of the relationship, but the corporate scandals of recent years have eroded that trust. That trust must now be regenerated. And the workings of trust are more important in the new economy than in the old.

4. Once the narrow structures of a profession were sufficient to serve clients. But clients now demand a broader spectrum of capabilities. The more broadly educated and well-rounded professional is the one with the greater advantage in meeting the needs of today's client. Clients demand that accountants know more than the basic skills of accounting.

5. Competition is now a fact of life. Clients know they have a choice.

Clients know the difference between marketing promises and professional services delivery. Today's client demands more real service and solutions -- not just a warm personal relationship.
To Aquila and Marcus, the new paradigm of professional services requires a new demand for partnership with the client and new participatory skills.

As they say: It's a buyers' market. Get used to it.

(...)

Don't we all need more humor at work? I do. And this book gave it to me. Great stuff. I'd recommend it to everyone.

Thejendra!! Can you come and join our technical team?? We are desperate for someone with your sense of the absurd to lighten up our day!! With your tongue firmly lodged in your cheek, your delightful "Corporate Wildlife" pokes fun at the IT industry and all its 'quirky' idiosyncrasies that plague us mere 'end-users' daily - nay hourly!! Just the book to have by your PC while waiting for the machine to reboot, the application to be downloaded or the Help Desk to get back to you!!

A copy of BS Thejendra's book "Corporate Wildlife" is a touch of whimsy that should be on the desk of every office employee as an antidote to combat the stress created in the wild and wacky world of business and industry.

Through his marvelous sense of humor, Thejendra details the pitfalls of the workplace that can bring a smile to the face of a frustrated hireling because, as a voice of experience, the "Tej" has obviously "been there and done that" himself. Otherwise, how could he fashion a literary piece with such biting satire?

An excellent book on office humor. A must for every corporate library

This book made me laugh out loud, and that's saying a lot. I especially liked the Resume of a Terrorist. The author sheds some very humorous light on corporate life, or, actually, corporate wildlife.

Quite an entertaining and informative read.I have become a SME(subject matter expert)in the world of corporate buzzwords. Now I understand a lot of what is being said around me. Highly recommended if you are new to the corporate environment, or, if you are just too proud to ask a fellow colleague.

I read the book cover to cover in one sitting. It is a great read for those in Corporate America - insightful and funny at the same time. Lots of terms presented in alphbetical order. The definitions in the book can be useful to know when the need arises to understand/speak coroporate jargon.

A great book that is amusing and educational simultaneously. This book serves as a great reference for creative office literature or even just office chit-chat. It's the perfect gift for that "special" somebody that is really hard to buy for. Highly recommend it for yourself and for others!

this book is insightful, humorous and actually informative which is rare. it's a fun book which pokes a good jab at today's corporate world. highly recommend!

A playful and fascinating insight of office terms. Not only helpful, but pokes fun at the sometimes too serious side of corporate production. The book is well organized, amusing and a quick read. I found it useful for the the day to day operation of American corporate communication. Informative and useful this slightly cynical book is a good reference. Share it with your office!

This is perhaps Tracy's best audio program. It contains 9 hours on 8 CD's. Listen to it as you commute. Listen often--repeat listening anchors the messages in the mind.
I've been reading, listening, and watching Tracy for 10+ years. He's simply the best in his field. You may find that some of the CD's in the set are more applicable to your situation than others--listen to them, find your niche. If you were to purchase a set of audio CD's through Nightingale Conant, you would spend $70+. This is a fantastic deal! If there is a drawback to this program, it would be that Tracy pushes more expensive programs on track 24 of each CD. If that bothers you, just skip that track.
Over all, Awesome!

The audio of this book is the way to go: For some reason it's not a book that is nearly as interesting to read as to hear. It's valuable material, although much of it you may already know. Still, his good reminders, plus his interesting twists on how to live life each day make this is good purchase.

I've been listening to Brian Tracy for a number of years. I've purchased many of his audio programs and read several of his books. In my opinion, Brian gives you the most information for your money over any other business / motivation speaker out there. There are other good speakers, of course. I also like Tony Robbins, Zig Ziglar, Harvey Mackay, Stephen Covey, and Mark Victor Hansen, as well as classics like Dale Carnegie and Napoleon Hill. But all-in-all, I keep going back and listening to Brian's stuff over-and-over again and find it to be the most practical.

This particular set of "21 Secrets to Success" is kind of a compilation of a number of programs he previously released that you had to buy separately for $20 each. Now you can get them all for pretty much the price of previously buying one. It's a good deal. In fact, I've recommended this program to almost all of the people I work with. The most useful programs in this set are the ones on Productivity, Personal Success and Becoming a Good Manager. Many people might think this is a program just for business people. But really I think this is a great program for helping you get the most out of your life in general. There are some excellent life management skills to be learned here.

The other program of Brian's that I recommend is called "Master Strategies for Higher Achievement". It's available on Amazon also. This program is similar to the "21 Secrets of Success" series but has some different and very useful information. I think they are both worth owning and listening to frequently. I have loaded both programs into my iPod so I can listen to them while jogging. Good stuff. And if you're used to buying Brain's material in other audio formats you know this is a good deal for the amount of information you get.

I recommend this program for anyone who wants to improve their personal and work habits.

The information in this series is well founded and easy to understand. For the money, you cannot beat having this available for listening while driving to work, or at home during workouts, etc. As far as I'm concerned, these 8 CD's are worth twice as much (or more) and still worth the price. Just keep listening to them over and over and let the message continually be beaten into your head... especially if your skull is as thick as mine. I've read dozens of positive thinking books in my life, and this is one of the better ones to have around.

The production is excellant, the sound is very clear, and Brian Tracy's voice, while a little "Mr. Rogersish", is smooth and articulate, but not distracting, or annoying. Well done.

I consider this a "must have" for anyone with a car and a CD player that's interested in improving their life, or performance at work.

This book was required for a business communications class and continues to be an excellent source of information. I pull it out whenever any questions come up pertaining to written communication of any sort.

This book should be on the desk of any professional in any business. It is the best reference for any written communications.

This is an excellent handbook to go along with the business English course I'm taking and it will be great to have it to fall back on after the course is completed.

Thank you for re-mailing this book back to me. :) The book is what I expected it to be and it's in good condition.

I am a business consultant that works with Microsoft, HP, Oracle, HP, Xerox etc. and teaches how to conduct sales presentations to CXOs for a living. I can say that this book has taken the look, feel and ease of creating a first class executive level business case to a level I could have not imagined. At first it is quite daunting and overwhelming. But I had to get some business cases together for 50 marketing professionals in Sydney on a special workshop and I crashed into it. The MODD system once you "get it" is easy, fast and addictive. I ripped through Excel, PowerPoint and Word integrated data and information in no time flat with the MODD tools. It scared me it worked so well. This stuff is like awesome and it is refreshing to actually see a program work without a hitch. ( I wonder how they did that?)Krieger has made me look really, really good. Go for it!

I have trained over 3,000 people in Microsoft Word. None of them had ever heard of or used styles. Styles are necessary if you're going to use Word correctly. So, I bought this book for two reasons. First, I find that a woman writes a better book about learning software. I think women authors seem to explain software in better detail, especially for beginners. Second, the back cover describes a CD that has "Dozens of professional designs and layouts." I like examples for learning.

So, I opened the book. It looked very good. Good topics, easy reading, nice coverage of Word, Excel,and PowerPoint. But, not a single reference to Word styles. Did I waste my time? No. I then looked at the CD and guess what? There is more information for Word users on the CD than in the book. Don't get me wrong - the book is good. But the CD has articles that explain more about how Word works than most people know. And as for styles, I found them when I loaded the samples, they were filled with styles. And, the CD tells much about their use.

How about Excel and PowerPoint? They are also covered very well on the CD, along with great examples in the book.

So, this book is about integration of three programs, yet each is covered very well. In today's world of business, if you know how, you can always find a job. You will learn the "how" with "Document Designer." You'll also learn the "why", and, if you know why, you can always be the boss.

This book is like having an assistant to help with my documents. I create a lot of my own documents at work, and they have to look good. The book is a true help with that, not to mention the tools that come with the book. And, I can't believe how many how-to articles and tip sheets come along with the tools on the CD. Those articles are so great for quick and practical answers to the whatever I need to get done - I use them all the time.

This is the first book on Office that's not a theoretical reference or a laundry list of all the stuff you can do but will probably never use. The book and the tools actually help me get my work done. The tools save a lot of time, and they help me do things I didn't think I could do (like complex page layouts in Word or formatting Excel charts). I think Office 2003 is great, but I can do a lot more with it since I started using this book.

After purchasing this book over a month ago, I have attained the necessary tools and techniques to be able to create complex looking documents that weren't hard to create at all. The book was easy to read and the CD that was supplied had really great layouts that helped me put together some of the documents I needed for my job. Also the various toolbars were really helpful, so I didn't need to go searching; it was right there! After using Office 2003 / XP for quite some time I felt that something was missing...and this was it.

I have a new reverence of the supply cabinet. I had no idea what the supplies were used for and I now notice a communication style all around me that I thought were just idiosyncrasies. This book has changed my whole outlook. There are over one hundred pages of how to obtain a good position in the office. And for those that are challenged by the written word there are many colorful diagrams.
By its self this book is amusing, but combine it with the knowledge of the traditional Kama Sutra and it takes on a greater dimension.

Required reading for any would-be office Shiva. You will never look at your mouse the same way again.

This little treasure of a book is a delectable play of the two concerns (aside from food) that dominate all of our conscious and even much of our unconscious time: work and love. The writing is entertaining, smart, and down-right hilarious. The illustrations are witty and delicate--the perfect treatment to the awkward subject of office love. This is a book that I had to read outloud to others, as well as give to anyone who thought they were getting away with illicit practice of the "40 Ways." Who would have known that delivery people, office stickies, and packing popcorn held so much potential. Work has never felt so much like play.

My dad was a writer who actually made living doing it. I always thought that writing was the most boring job ever created for mankind. Was I ever wrong! Reading this book by Ms. Balmain I was laughing out loud, and that doesn't happen too often with me. It's funny and for some odd reason it holds a lot of truth as well, it's almost like she actually worked at the office at some point and most likely she has at least been a witness for some of the action described in the book. I truly recommend this to anyone who needs good laugh or a hell of a gift item. I just wished I was a writer and could do research on something like this, but with my luck I would be working on lock spring mecanism on Buick Riviera's gas pedal. I wonder if Ms. Balmain needs an assistant?

Finally a book that explains the objective and not just what the software is capable of doing!

I would highly recommend this book to any person using Office 2003 in a business environment. Gini Courter and Annette Marquis had anticipated my questions and not only provided highly informative answers but extremely useful tips and advice. Additionally, the examples will assist readers from an entry level to expert.

My bookshelf is crammed with reference guides for application software. Recently I have purchased a number of titles written by Courter and Marquis as I find their writing style so easy to read and interpret. Once again I have not been disappointed with this title.

I've only just begun reading this book, but have learned something on each and every page. I bought it at the suggestion of a colleague who attends seminars given by the authors. She raves about their knowledge and ability to easily give instructions on using software applications as they "write the manuals", and I can confirm that they "know their stuff."

This book is a great resource for both people who have used other Office versions and for those who are beginners. The explanations are great and the pictures really help you understand what is going on. My copy of this book has been borrowed numerous times by others in my office. They love the book just as much as I do.