#131 The Case of the Two-Cent CandyYears ago, I wrote about a retail store in the Palo Alto environs a good one, which had a box of two-cent candies at the checkout. I subsequently remember that "little" parting gesture of the two-cent candy as a symbol of all that is Excellent at that store. Dozens of people who have attended seminars of mine from retailers to bankers to plumbing-supply-house owners have come up to remind me, sometimes 15 or 20 years later, of "the two-cent candy story," and to tell me how it had a sizable impact on how they did business, metaphorically and in fact.Well, the Two-Cent Candy Phenomenon has struck again with oomph and in the most unlikely of places.For years Singapore's "brand" has more or less been Southeast Asia's "place that works." Its legendary operational efficiency in all it does has attracted businesses of all sorts to set up shop there. But as "the rest" in the geographic neighborhood closed the efficiency gap, and China continued to rise-race-soar, Singapore decided a couple of years ago to "rebrand" itself as not only a place that works but also as an exciting, "with it" city. (I was a participant in an early rebranding conference that also featured the likes of the late Anita Roddick, Deepak Chopra, and Infosys founder and superman N. R. Narayana Murthy.)Singapore's fabled operating efficiency starts, as indeed it should, at ports of entry the airport being a prime example. From immigration to baggage claim to transportation downtown, the services are unmatched anywhere in the world for speed and efficiency.Saga . . . Immigration services in Thailand, three days before a trip to Singapore, were a pain. ("Memorable.") And entering Russia some months ago was hardly a walk in the park, either. To be sure, and especially after 9/11, entry to the United States has not been a process you'd mistake for arriving at Disneyland, nor marked by an attitude that shouted "Welcome, honored guest."Singapore immigration services, on the other hand:The entry form was a marvel of simplicity. The lines were short, very short, with more than adequate staffing.The process was simple and unobtrusive.And:The immigration officer could have easily gotten work at Starbucks; she was all smiles and courtesy.And:Yes!Yes!And . . . yes!There was a little candy jar at each Immigration portal!The "candy jar message" in a dozen ways:"Welcome to Singapore, Tom!! We are absolutely beside ourselves with delight that you have decided to come here!"Wow!Wow!Wow!Ask yourself . . . now:What is my (personal, department, project, restaurant, law firm) "Two-Cent Candy"?Does every part of the process of working with us/me include two-cent candies?Do we, as a group, "think two-cent candies"?Operationalizing: Make "two-centing it" part and parcel of "the way we do business around here." Don't go light on the so-called substance but do remember that . . . perception is reality . . . and perception is shaped by two-cent candies as much as by that so-called hard substance.Start: Have your staff collect "two-cent candy stories" for the next two weeks in their routine "life" transactions. Share those stories. Translate into "our world." And implement.Repeat regularly.Forever.(Recession or no recession you can afford two cents.)(In fact, it is a particularly Brilliant Idea for a recession you doubtless don't maximize Two-Cent Opportunities. And what opportunities they are.)

An original collection of incandescent cultural criticism, both experimental and personal, full of pragmatic advice for how to live a considered, joyful existence in our era of screen living and hipster irony, by a Gen-X Princeton professor and contributor to the New York TimesThe essays in The Other Serious examine the signature pheno?mena of our moment: the way our lives contradict themselves, how exaggeration and excess seep into our collective subconscious, why gender is becoming more rather than less complicated, and how we interact with the material things that surround us. It is a book about the delicacy and bluntness of American life, about how pop culture sticks its finger deeply into the ethical dilemmas of our time, and how to negotiate between the old and the new, the high and the low, the global and the local, the sacred and the profane. At the heart of these reflections lies a central question: What should you do when you don't know what to do?Taken together, these essays comprise a guide for the overhaul of "the administrativersity" of contemporary American life, a bureaucratic prison where the brain needn't work anymore. These pieces investigate the writer's own way of thinking putting forth new ideas, questioning them, and urging the reader to adopt the same spirit of critical reexamination.

They say kids don't come with a set of instructions the AstroTwins beg to differ!Are you a Cancer mom trying to understand your Sagittarius daughterAre you a Virgo mother with a Pisces son who seems to be your polar oppositeWondering why your little Taurus was such an easy baby, but your Aquarius was anything butEven if you've only ever read your horoscope in the back of a magazine for fun or never given astrology a second thought, you'll be amazed at the insights you'll get from Momstrology, a guide to parenting by the stars.From choosing a preschool, to picking hobbies and activities, to understanding what it means when your toddler gets clingy, or your big kid wants to quit soccer, or your tween talks back, Momstrology is a unique guide through all of the phases of your child's life. Offering charts for every astrological sign to decipher your child's good days and bad days, likes and dislikes, and how your child deals with authority, limits, separation, and siblings, the AstroTwins offer real-world advice, from a cosmic perspective, that is always supportive and never overwhelming. With a section devoted to understanding your strengths and challenges as a mom based on your sign and another section that matches you with your children to see how you all mesh together, Momstrology is a parenting guide like no other.Let Momstrology be your go-to guide in the trenches of parenthood...through tears and triumphs and meltdowns and milestones, for every age and stage.

When journalist and fatherhood columnist Josh Levs was denied fair parental leave by his employer after his child was born, he fought back -- and corporate America responded. He became a leading advocate for modern families. In All In, he shows how fatherhood today is far different from previous generations and what it means for our individual lives, families, workplaces, and society. An investigative journalist, expert on modern fatherhood and dad of three, Levs spent years reporting for CNN on air and online and serving as the network's "dad columnist". Prior to CNN, he was a reporter for NPR. His many prizes include six Peabody awards, two Edward R. Murrow awards, and a designation as a Journalist of the Year from the Atlanta Press Club. Levs is also a motivational and keynote speaker. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia, with his wife and children. Visit his website: www.joshlevs.com

The media coach and Emmy Award-winning correspondent Bill McGowan shares his secrets of pitch-perfect communications, showing readers how to communicate with confidence.During the pivotal moments of our lives, results are often determined not only by our actions but by our words as well. Saying the right thing the right way can make the difference between sealing the deal or losing the account, advancing your career or suffering a demotion. During these moments, it's important to be pitch perfect to use precisely the right tone to convey the right message to the right person at the right time. Such pitch-perfect moments are crucial in our personal and professional journeys. In Pitch Perfect, the renowned media coach Bill McGowan shows you how to craft just the right message. Along the way, McGowan lays out his Seven Principles of Persuasion, including: The Scorsese Principle: Hold your audience's attention with visual images. Direct the film that plays in your listener's mind. The No-Tailgating Principle: Avoid verbal fender-benders and career-wrecking moments by maintaining a safe talking distance. When in doubt, stop talking and listen. The Pasta-Sauce Principle: Cure boredom by boiling down your message, making it as rich and brief as possible. In Pitch Perfect, you'll learn how to overcome all these communication pitfalls. The Seven Principles of Persuasion are as easy to learn, implement, and master as they are effective. The right language both verbal and nonverbal can make you more confident, persuasive, and certain. It can stir people to listen closely to your every word and to remember you long after you've left the room.

In 1907, Irish immigrant William Mulholland designed and began to build one of the greatest civil engineering feats in history: the aqueduct that carried water 233 miles from the Sierra Nevada Mountains to Los Angeles allowing this small, resource-challenged desert city to grow into a modern global metropolis. Drawing on new research, Les Standiford vividly captures the larger-than-life engineer and the breathtaking scope of his six-year, $23 million project that would transform a region, a state, and a nation at the dawn of its greatest century.Mulholland, a penniless Dublin immigrant who made his way west as a stowaway on a passenger ship, personifies the American rags-to-riches tale, working from a position as a ditchdigger to become chief engineer of the Los Angeles Water Company. Confronted with a decade-long drought that threatened his adopted city's future, the self taught Mulholland found the answer in the rushing snow melt from the Eastern Sierra Nevada Mountains, nearly 250 miles away. He proposed to build an aqueduct that would outdo any such ever conceived, one that would carry an entire river from its source to Los Angeles, through mountains, over chasms, and across an alternately freezing and blistering terra incognita, because he believed it was the city's only hope.The project brought a simmering-to-this-day firestorm of protest from residents of California's Owens Valley where the waters would be taken, as well as an all-out onslaught from political opponents and vested interests in Los Angeles, who were fearful of losing their stranglehold on the city's yield. But after nine years of struggle, including the efforts of thousands of workmen many of whom lost their lives and the use of engineering techniques and strategies never previously employed, Mulholland turned the gates and loosed the waters that brought an unprecedented wave of development and prosperity to his city and the region.Though the landmark film Chinatown touched on the subject, Mulholland was characterized there as Hollis Mulwray, a colorless pipsqueak easily dispatched by archvillain and developer Noah Cross (John Houston). In real life, however, Mulholland was every bit the equal of any of his foes, a colorful, brook-no-nonsense man of the people who accomplished a feat like no other and became a hero in the process. Water to the Angels is not only a book that provides insight into the seeds of significant ecological concerns of this day, it is also a stirring story of accomplishment against all odds, all the more captivating for being true.As Robert Towne, author of the screenplay for Chinatown suggests, the subject is timeless. "I found the ubiquity of water in everyone's lives to be compelling. Everybody needs water."At a time when the importance of water is being recognized as never before considered by many experts to be the essential resource of the twenty-first century Water to the Angels brings into focus the vigor of a fabled era, the might of a larger-than-life individual, and the scale of a priceless construction project, and sheds critical light on a past that offers insights for our future.

Too many leadership failures. Too many career derailments. Too many toxic workplaces filled with disengaged, distrustful employees. Jeffrey Pfeffer, a professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the author of Power, offers an incisive dissection of the multibillion-dollar leadership industry and presents ways to fix its many problems.In Leadership BS, Jeffrey Pfeffer pulls back the curtain, showing how leadership really works and why so many leadership development efforts fail. In this forthright and persuasive critique, Pfeffer argues that much of the oft-repeated wisdom about leadership is based more on hope than reality, on wishes rather than data, on beliefs instead of science. In an age when transparency is considered a virtue, Pfeffer makes the case that strategic misrepresentation isn't as harmful as you think, that breached agreements are a part of business, that immodesty is frequently a path to success, and that relying on the magnanimity of your boss is a bad bet.Using research findings from social psychology, sociology, and sociobiology, and filled with practical, actionable advice, Leadership BS encourages readers to finally stop accepting sugar-laced but toxic potions as cures and to understand the realities of organizations and human behavior.To make real change, Pfeffer argues, we need to get beyond the half-truths and self-serving stories that are so prominent in the mythology of leadership. In calling BS on so much conventional wisdom, Leadership BS offers both a provocative, scientific examination of how leadership actually works and how it doesn't and a pre*ion for leaders future and present.

On the morning of April 2, 1865, Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy, received a telegram from General Robert E. Lee. There is no more time the Yankees are coming, it warned. Shortly before midnight, Davis boarded a train from Richmond and fled the capital, setting off an intense and thrilling chase in which Union cavalry hunted the Confederate president. Two weeks later, President Lincoln was assassinated, and the nation was convinced that Davis was involved in the conspiracy that led to the crime. Lincoln's murder, autopsy, and White House funeral transfixed the nation. His final journey began when soldiers placed his corpse aboard a special train that would carry him home on the 1,600-mile trip to Springfield. Along the way, more than a million Americans looked upon their martyr's face, and several million watched the funeral train roll by. It was the largest and most magnificent funeral pageant in American history.To the Union, Davis was no longer merely a traitor. He became a murderer, a wanted man with a $100,000 bounty on his head. Davis was hunted down and placed in captivity, the beginning of an intense and dramatic odyssey that would transform him into a martyr of the South's Lost Cause. The saga that began with Manhunt continues with the suspenseful and electrifying Bloody Crimes. James Swanson masterfully weaves together the stories of two fallen leaders as they made their last expeditions through the bloody landscape of a wounded nation.

From Roger Rosenblatt, author of the acclaimed memoirs Making Toast, Kayak Morning, and The Boy Detective, comes another lyrical meditation on and celebration of a universal and elusive subjectIn The Book of Love, Roger Rosenblatt looks at love in all its themes and variations romantic love, courtship, marriage, battle, heartbreak, fury, confusion, melancholy, beauty, delirium, ecstasy; love of lovers, family, friends, of country, of work, writing, solitude, of art; love of nature; love of life itself. Using lines from love songs to create a kind of verbal jazz riff, as infectious as it is engaging, Rosenblatt intersperses thoughts about love with fictional vignettes that capture a variety of lovers in different situations with notes addressed to "you," his wife of fifty years. "The story I have to tell is of you. Of others, too. Other people, other things. But mainly of you. It begins and ends with you. It always comes back to you." Pieces follow upon one another in a continuous progression, as if composing one long song that flows through the entire mystery and magic of what it means to love and be in love. What is this thing called loveLively yet profound, poignant yet joyous, The Book of Love is a triumph of intellect and imagination.

Arch and unrepentant, Will Leitch, founding editor of Deadspin.com, is the mouthpiece for all the frustrated fans who just want their games back from big money, bloated egos, and blathering sportscasters. Always a fan first and a sportswriter second, Leitch considers the perfection of fantasy leagues and the meaninglessness of the steroids debate as he exposes Olympic fetishes, parses Shaq's rap attack on Kobe, shares a brew with John Rocker and his surprising girlfriend, and reveals what ESPN and the beer companies really think about you. If you or a fan you love is suffering from a sense of listless dissatisfaction brought on by the leagues and networks, God Save the Fan is your new manifesto.

There's nothing better than a book you can't put down or better yet, a book you'll never forget. This book puts the power of transformational reading into your hands. Jack Canfield, cocreator of the bestselling Chicken Soup for the Soul series, and self-actualization pioneer Gay Hendricks have invited notable people to share personal stories of books that changed their lives. What book shaped their outlook and habitsHelped them navigate rough seasSpurred them to satisfaction and successThe contributors include Dave Barry, Stephen Covey, Malachy McCourt, Jacquelyn Mitchard, Mark Victor Hansen, John Gray, Christiane Northrup, Bernie Siegel, Craig Newmark, Michael E. Gerber, Lou Holtz, and Pat Williams, to name just a few. Their richly varied stories are poignant, energizing, and entertaining.Author and actor Malachy McCourt tells how a tattered biography of Gandhi, stumbled on in his youth, offered a shining example of true humility and planted the seeds that would help support his sobriety decades later. Bestselling author and physician Bernie Siegel, M.D., tells how William Saroyan's The Human Comedy helped him realize that, in order to successfully treat his patients with life-threatening illnesses, "I had to help them live not just prevent them from dying."Actress Catherine Oxenberg reveals how, at a life crossroads and struggling with bulimia, a book taught her the transforming difference one person could make in the life of another and why that person for her was Richard Burton.Rafe Esquith, the award-winning teacher whose inner-city students have performed Shakespeare all over the world, recounts his deep self-doubt in the midst of his success and how reading To Kill a Mockingbird strengthened him to continue teaching.Beloved librarian and bestselling author Nancy Pearl writes how, at age ten, Robert Heinlein's science fiction book Space Cadet impressed on her the meaning of personal integrity and gave her a vision of world peace she'd never imagined possible. Two years later, she marched in her first civil rights demonstration and learned that there's always a way to make "a small contribution to intergalactic harmony."If you're looking for insight and illumination or simply for that next great book to read You've Got to Read This Book! has treasures in store for you.

In 2010 the U.S. Army Special Operations Command created Cultural Support Teams, a pilot program to put women on the battle field alongside Army Rangers, Green Berets, Navy SEALs, and other special operations teams on sensitive missions in Afghanistan. The idea was that women could access places and people that had remained out of reach and could build relationships woman to woman in ways that male soldiers in a conservative, traditional country could not. Though officially banned from combat, female soldiers could be "attached" to different teams, and for the first time women throughout the Army, the National Guard, and the Reserves heard the call to join male soldiers on special ops missions. Each had her own reason for wanting to serve alongside America's finest fighters for wanting, as the recruiting poster advertised, "to be part of history."In Ashley's War, Gayle Tzemach Lemmon uses exhaustive firsthand reporting and a finely tuned understanding of the complexities of war to tell the story of CST-2, a unit of women handpicked from across the Army, and of the remarkable hero at its heart: First Lieutenant Ashley White. Lemmon reveals how First Lieutenant White and the pioneers of CST-2 worked to earn the respect of combat-tested special operations warriors and illuminates the very human stakes of their battlefield successes. Transporting readers into the little-known world of the CSTs, a community of fierce women bound together by valor, danger, and the desire to serve, Ashley's War is a gripping combat narrative and a testament to the unbreakable bond of friendship born of war.

After an eleven-year-old Kimberly Guilfoyle lost her mother to leukemia, her dad wanted her to become as resilient and self-empowered as she could be. He wisely taught her to build a solid case for the things she wanted. Creating a strong logical argument was the best way to ensure she could always meet her needs. That childhood lesson led her to become the fearless advocate and quick-thinking spitfire she is today. In Making the Case, Guilfoyle interweaves stories and anecdotes from her life and career with practical advice that can help you win arguments, get what you want, help others along the way, and come out ahead in any situation.Learning how to state your case effectively is not just important for lawyers it's something every person should know how to do, no matter what stage of life they are in. From landing her dream job right out of school, switching careers seamlessly midstream, and managing personal finances for greater growth and stability to divorcing amicably and teaching her young child to advocate for himself, Guilfoyle has been there and done it. Now she shares those stories, showing you how to organize your thoughts and plans, have meaningful discussions with the people around you, and achieve your goals in all aspects of your life. You'll also learn the tips and strategies that make the best advocates so successful, some of which come directly from courtroom scenarios where the stakes are highest.Told in her winning and humorous voice, Guilfoyle's experiences and the wisdom drawn from them are a ready guide to help you reach your potential and live a fulfilling and happy life at work and at home.

Last Will & Testament of Adam CarollaI, Adam Carolla, being of beaten-down mind, declare this to be my Last Will and Testament. I revoke all wills and addendums previously made by me. (You guys never did listen, anyway.) Article II appoint the rest of the world's unappreciated dads as Personal Representatives to administer this Will. I bequeath to them the right to crack a couple cold ones in the garage after working their asses off all week and ask that they be permitted to watch all the porn they like and not have to change diapers and get dragged to every preschool "graduation" and PTA meeting. Article IITo my wife, I leave a safe-deposit box, the sole content of which is a note reading "Get a job. I'm dead," and my best wishes on trying to keep up with the unending demands of our houses, cars, dog, and kids.Article IIII devise, bequeath, and give my kids this book, Daddy, Stop Talking. Since you guys were the death of me, I leave you these pages of wisdom. But no cash, cars, or property. You've got to earn those. On that note, I further demand that the following message be placed on the marker of my grave: "You're All on Your Own Now. Enjoy."

In 2008, Bonner Paddock summited 19,341-foot-high mount kilimanjaro, the world's tallest freestanding mountain. Four years later, he earned the elite triathlete title kona Ironman. Thousands have done each individually. Bonner is the first person with cerebral palsy to do both.Bonner Paddock grew up just wanting to be ordinary. Despite his skinny legs and habit of tripping over nothing, he fought to keep up with his athletic older brothers, learned to battle riptides with his grandfather on close watch, and did everything he could to feel like a regular kid, even when it became clear he wasn't. After being diagnosed with cerebral palsy at age eleven, Bonner didn't let it limit him instead he simply ignored its existence. For the next eighteen years, he guarded the truth about his health, building a normal life and keeping his secret from everyone most of all himself.But the sudden death of a friend's young son named Jake, a boy who also suffered from cerebral palsy, forced Bonner to reevaluate who he was. No longer content striving for normal, he began to pursue one breathtaking experience after another in Jake's memory, never hiding from his physical limitations and, in the process, raising international awareness about cerebral palsy. T is appetite for challenges led him to the foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro where, pushing his fragile body to the brink and barely surviving, he braved one mountain only to discover that he still had farther to climb.Embracing his weaknesses to understand his strengths, he then pursued the ultimate adventure: testing his mind, body, and will at the Ironman in Kona, Hawaii, a race regarded by many as the hardest on earth. Along the way he forged a renewed bond with his family and launched a foundation to help disabled children in Africa and at home.In the end, his remarkable journey took him across the globe and introduced him to a compelling cast of characters from Tanzanian mountain guides to top-class surgeons, to disabled children, to champion athletes all of whom inspired his quest. Infused with his irresistible charisma, courage, and heart, and illustrated with sixteen pages of color photos, One More Step is a gripping story of human perseverance that demonstrates how our lives are not defined by limits, but by the moments and lessons that push us past them.

In this gripping narrative history, Al Roker from NBC’s Today and the Weather Channel vividly examines the deadliest natural disaster in American history—a haunting and inspiring tale of tragedy, heroism, and resilience that is full of lessons for today’s new age of extreme weather. On the afternoon of September 8, 1900, two-hundred-mile-per-hour winds and fifteen-foot waves slammed into Galveston, the booming port city on Texas’s Gulf Coast. By dawn the next day, the city that hours earlier had stood as a symbol of America’s growth and expansion was now gone. Shattered, grief-stricken survivors emerged to witness a level of destruction never before seen: Eight thousand corpses littered the streets and were buried under the massive wreckage. Rushing water had lifted buildings from their foundations, smashing them into pieces, while wind gusts had upended steel girders and trestles, driving them through house walls and into sidewalks. No race or class was spared its wrath. In less than twenty-four hours, a single storm had destroyed a major American metropolis—and awakened a nation to the terrifying power of nature. Blending an unforgettable cast of characters, accessible weather science, and deep historical research into a sweeping and dramatic narrative, The Storm of the Century brings this legendary hurricane and its aftermath into fresh focus. No other natural disaster has ever matched the havoc caused by the awesome mix of winds, rain, and flooding that devastated Galveston and shocked a young, optimistic nation on the cusp of modernity. Exploring the impact of the tragedy on a rising country’s confidence—the trauma of the loss and the determination of the response—Al Roker illuminates the United States’s character at the dawn of the “American Century,” while also underlining the fact that no matter how mighty they may become, all nations must respect the ferocious potential of our natural environment.

Short of spending every waking hour engaged in antiaging treatments, is there anything the average woman can do to shave even a few months from her appearanceDo any of the miracle creams, procedures, or magic potions actually make a person look more youthfulDoes a woman have to worry about her nasolabial folds if she doesn't even know where they're located on her bodyVeteran journalist Beth Teitell aims to find the answers to these questions and many more in her hilarious travels looking for the elusive elixir of youth. If you feel bad about your neck (or any other body part), if the idea of Botox-filled syringes fills you with horror, if you don't want to empty your wallet to pay for $475 serums that promise to cheer up aging skin or the hourly cost of a facial-fitness coach, or if you don't believe the claims of antiaging gummy bears or age-defying bottled water, then Drinking Problems at the Fountain of Youth is the book for you. There's not a woman in America who won't see herself in Teitell's struggles or come away feeling that the enormous amount of energy, time, and money we spend trying to restore our bodies to the way they were when we were twenty could be better spent elsewhere. With honesty, outrage, and wit, Teitell goes deep into the youth-at-any-cost culture and takes it apart from the inside out. And then she reassures us that there is hope there are things we can do to look and feel younger, and ways we can learn to stop worrying about looking older.Drinking Problems at the Fountain of Youth is for every woman who isn't as young as she used to be a book of wisdom and advice, and a laugh-out-loud look at our age-obsessed culture.

For nearly three decades political observers have sought to understand the complex relationship between Hillary Clinton's faith and her politics. Now, in this first spiritual biography of the former first lady, acclaimed historian Paul Kengor sets out to answer the elusive question: What does Hillary Clinton believeBased on exhaustive research, God and Hillary Clinton tells the surprising story of Hillary's spiritual evolution, detailing the interaction between her lifelong religious beliefs and her personal history that has made her the politician she is today. Offering an in-depth spiritual chronology of Clinton's life, author Paul Kengor also analyzes the fraught relationship between her faith and her secular policies most notably how she reconciles her pro-choice stance on abortion with her Christian beliefs and scrutinizes how these policies have changed over the course of her political career. What emerges is an unexpected portrait of a political figure whose ideals have been shaped by both the power of her politics and the depth of her religious devotion.

This is an anthology designed to help you get through the stresses of modern life. For rapid and effective relief around the clock, 24-7, without side effects, try a poem -- whatever the time of the day (or night), you can be sure that some poet, past or present, has been there too.To help you find the right poem at the right time, the organization of the book is like that of a book of hours. Starting with Getting Up, it then moves on to those other morning traumas: Stepping on the Scale and Looking into the Mirror.As the day moves on there are sections to cover everything, from Office Politics to Off to School. And if by five p.m. your head is throbbing, dig into the poems in the Take 5 section and let the world recede. By the end of the day you may want to look for inspiration among the poems in Going Home, but if you are intent on veering from the straight and narrow, then turn to the Behaving Badly poems and you'll find you're in good company. Anyone who feels vaguely guilty about settling down in front of the TV instead of taking café society by storm should turn to the poems in the Not Tonight section.

The Collins College Outline for Introduction to Business provides students with a detailed overview of the basic business studies curriculum. This guide covers business foundations, the global economy, company structure and formation, personnel and production management, labor-management relations, marketing concepts and logistics, statistical analysis, financial strategies, careers in business, and much more. Completely revised and updated by Dr. H. James Williams, Introduction to Business includes practical "test yourself" sections with answers and complete explanations at the end of each chapter. Also included are bibliographies for further reading, as well as charts, graphs, and illustrations.The Collins College Outlines are a completely revised, in-depth series of study guides for all areas of study, including the Humanities, Social Sciences, Mathematics, Science, Language, History, and Business. Featuring the most up-to-date information, each book is written by a seasoned professor in the field and focuses on a simplified and general overview of the subject for college students and, where appropriate, Advanced Placement students. Each Collins College Outline is fully integrated with the major curriculum for its subject and is a perfect supplement for any standard textbook.

What Is Your Life's Workcaptures a most extraordinary moment in each of our lives the time when we sit down with loved ones and attempt to answer the big question about what really matters. Bill Jensen has created a wonderfully practical space for you to explore who you are, what you stand for, what you believe in, what's risky, what's not, what's worth it, what you're struggling with, and what you've accomplished.He has captured the intimate exchanges between mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, and caring teammates all talking about what really matters at work, and in life. Their conversations are as real as yours would be: "Don't kiss tush, beware carnivorous sheep." "Honey, there are no shortcuts." "My daughter was limp with pain ... and I'm worried about deadlines. What was I thinking?!?!" "Speak up if you don't agree." "Be a respectful rebel." In What Is Your Life's Workyou will discover a new way to see and know who you are in today's more-better-faster world. Exposed is what usually stays private; the raw truths we've all experienced, the personal frailties and mistakes we'd like to hide, and the proudest achievements we'd like to celebrate.In the letters and work diaries of others, we see ourselves. In their struggles, we see our own.Bill Jensen has made it his life's work to battle corporate stupidity and help us all simplify our workdays, take more control, and rediscover our passions. As your trail guide and partner, he will take you through five distinct discoveries that thousands have encountered in finding their voices: Finding Yourself Finding the Lessons to Be Learned,the Questions to Be Asked Finding the Choices That Really Matter Finding the Courage to Choose Finding Joy, Serenity, and FulfillmentWhile it touches your heart and lifts your soul, What Is Your Life's Workdoes not shy away from difficult introspection. You are an active participant in this book. Yes, you will find value here stories of people like you, new ways of looking at what really matters, or simple confirmation that others have chosen the same path as you.But the ultimate takeaway asks something of you in return: Take something from this book and pay it forward. Start a new conversation with a loved one about what really matters about your own life's work.You will get back even more than you give. You will have brought these pages to life.