Art Business

The Art of Conversation will show you step by step how to converse skillfully and enjoyably with other people, at home, at work, on the phone, and in the street. Even if you're daunted now, discover the difference good conversation can make in every aspect of your life.

The Disneyland Story: The Unofficial Guide to the Evolution of Walt Disney's Dream is the story of how Walt Disney's greatest creation was conceived, nurtured, and how it grew into a source of joy and inspiration for generations of visitors. Despite his successors' battles with the whims of history and their own doubts and egos, Walt's vision maintained momentum, thrived, and taught future generations how to do it Walt Disney's way.

1:1s are arguably one of the most critical meeting types for the success of team members, managers, coaches, teams, and organizations. The best managers recognize that 1:1s are not an add-on to their role as a manager. Conducting 1:1s successfully are foundational to being a manager. At the same time, these meetings are the core of a direct report's experience and development at work, including how well they engage and attach to their role, perceive the effectiveness of their manager, and envision their future at the organization.

In Mind Management, Not Time Management, best-selling author David Kadavy shares the fruits of his decade-long deep dive into how to truly be productive in a constantly changing world. Quit your daily routine. Use the hidden patterns all around you as launchpads to skyrocket your productivity. Do in only five minutes what used to take all day. Let your “passive genius” do your best thinking when you’re not even thinking.

While other books give you tips on how to “write funny,” this book offers a paradigm shift in understanding the mechanics and art of comedy and the proven, practical tools that help writers translate that understanding into successful commercial scripts. The Hidden Tools of Comedy unlocks the unique secrets and techniques of writing comedy. Kaplan deconstructs sequences in popular films and TV that work and don’t work and explains what tools were used (or should have been used).

Think your “great voice” is enough to make it in VO? Spoiler alert: It’s not. In today’s competitive voice-over industry, it takes grit, gear, and relentless grind. This book delivers the real deal from someone who's lived it for over 30 years—radio veteran and full-time VO pro Keith Kramer. This is not your average fluffy “follow your dreams” pep talk. This is a tactical, no-B.S. roadmap to help beginners, part-timers, and even radio folks transition into a profitable, sustainable VO career.

Startup money is moving online, and this guide shows you how it works. The Art of Startup Fundraising takes a fresh look at raising money for startups, with a focus on the changing face of startup finance. New regulations are making the old go-to advice less relevant, as startup money is increasingly moving online. These new waters are all but uncharted—and founders need an accessible guide. This book helps you navigate the online world of startup fundraising with easy-to-follow explanations and expert perspective on the new digital world of finance.

From New York Times best seller author Mark Manson comes an irreverent, interactive journal based on the internationally best-selling phenomenon The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck and the New York Times best seller Everything Is F*cked, providing questions and sharp insights in his inimitable voice.

The contemporary art market is an international juggernaut, throwing off multimillion-dollar deals as wealthy buyers move from fair to fair, auction to auction, party to glittering party. But none of it would happen without the dealers - the tastemakers who back emerging artists and steer them to success, often to see them picked off by a rival. Dealers operate within a private world of handshake agreements, negotiating for the highest commissions. Michael Shnayerson, a longtime contributing editor to Vanity Fair, writes the first-ever definitive history of their activities.

Aimed at emerging as well as established social entrepreneurs, for-profit leaders who want to introduce an element of social responsibility into their companies, and nonprofit organizations who want to increase their stability by generating income, The Art of Social Enterprise is the definitive guide to doing well while doing good.

Status signaling isn’t just the province of the immature or insecure but a fundamental human need to secure social standing. It drives our behavior, forms our tastes, determines what we buy, and ultimately shapes who we are. It’s what’s behind “cool” and what drives fashion, music, food, sports, slang, travel, hairstyles, and dog breeds—and even the outsize influence of unpopular things with the “right” audience.

After Steve Jobs was unceremoniously dismissed from Apple, he turned his attention to a little-known graphics art company that he owned called Pixar. One day, out of the blue, Jobs called Lawrence Levy, a Harvard-trained lawyer and Silicon Valley executive to whom he had never spoken before, in the hope of persuading Levy to help him get Pixar on the right track. What Levy found in Pixar was a company on the verge of failure. To Pixar and Beyond is the extraordinary story of what happened next.

Some people think that in today’s hyper-competitive world, it’s the tough, take-no-prisoners type who comes out on top. But in reality, argues New York Times bestselling author Dave Kerpen, it’s actually those with the best people skills who win the day. Those who build the right relationships. Those who truly understand and connect with their colleagues, their customers, their partners. Those who can teach, lead, and inspire.

Told through the frame of a cross-country motorcycle journey, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance explores its characters' search for spiritual meaning and peace in a technological, automated age. This audio study guide presents the same expert content - written by experienced teachers, professors, and literary scholars - in an easy-to-access audio format. SuperSummary study guides demonstrate an authoritative voice, present expert analysis, offer big picture ideas, and help listeners understand a work’s underlying meanings and conclusions.

It sounds so simple: Tell stories from your life, and people will remember your message. But when you get down to crafting one, there's nothing easy about it. Material for stories surrounds us. Yet few people are skilled at sharing personal anecdotes and even fewer know how to link them to professional goals. Whether you want to stand out in the interview process, add punch to a presentation, or make a compelling case for a new initiative, Let the Story Do the Work shows you how to mine your experience for simple narratives that convey who you are.

Everyone, regardless of their background and training, can improve their storytelling abilities. But what is a story? How can you tell it in a way that delights and informs your listeners? Take a journey into the keys to great storytelling with two of the country’s top experts on story presentation and speech writing.

In this star-studded autobiography, Clive Davis shares a personal, candid look into his remarkable life and the last 50 years of popular music as only a true insider can. In the history of popular music, no one looms as large as Clive Davis. His career has spanned more than 40 years, and he has discovered, signed, or worked with a staggering array of artists: Whitney Houston, Janis Joplin, Simon and Garfunkel, Barry Manilow, Patti Smith, Lou Reed, Dionne Warwick, Carlos Santana, The Grateful Dead, Alicia Keyes, Kelly Clarkson, Jennifer Hudson, and Aretha Franklin, to name a few.

Using stories from his time at Netscape, Apple, and Slack, Michael Lopp presents a series of small but compelling practices to help you build leadership skills. You’ll learn how to create teams that are highly productive, highly respected, and highly trusted. The essays in this book examine the practical skills Lopp learned from exceptional leaders - as a manager at Netscape, a senior manager and director at Apple, and an executive at Slack. You’ll learn how to apply these lessons to your own experience.

The majority of leadership strategies taught today are outdated by at least a decade. In a world where business evolves at the speed of light, yesterday's strategies are tomorrow's relics. I'm Joel R. Klemmer, and I've spent over 20 years in the trenches of leadership, learning, failing, and succeeding. Along the way, I discovered something crucial – the need for a leadership approach that evolves as rapidly as the business landscape itself.

Your projects, programs, and career turn on the difference between "no" and "yes". Yet selling ideas, especially the kinds of ideas that make organizations work, is a skill shrouded in mystery. Part emotional intelligence, part politics, part rhetoric, and part psychology, selling ideas is not like tricking someone out of his money. It's about helping others to see things your way: engaging their minds and imaginations.