Category Archives: Kits Book Review Archive

Guerrilla Marketing for Job Hunters 2.0: 1,001 Unconventional Tips, Tricks, and Tactics for Landing Your Dream Job, by Jay Conrad Levinson & David E. Perry, 2009.
Wow, this brand new book takes job searching to a whole new level! Once you know what you want to do and how (and those are big questions), Levinson & Perry march you right into the fire of today’s job market. Guerrilla Marketing is a no-holds manual on how to design and maximize a multi-media campaign to market and sell your skills and talents. The authors teach you how to stand out from the crowd and get in front of those decision-makers who can hire you now.

5 Steps to Professional Presence: How to Project Confidence, Competence, and Credibility at Work, by Susan Bixler & Lisa Scherrer Dugan, 2001.

This is one of my favorite books. I have used it consistently in my career development trainings.

Bixler & Dugan provide a wealth of very practical tips and strategies to make sure that you are presenting yourself in the best light you can in today’s competitive workplace.

Their ideas range from making that first impression, business etiquette, developing social savvy and creating a powerful virtual presence. These are areas that can’t be neglected. You may have superior technical skills, but if you look like you just fell off the turnip truck, your career will be in trouble!

Generations, INC: From Boomers to Linksters – Managing the Friction Between Generations at Work, by Meagan Johnson & Larry Johnson, 2010.

AND How Not to Act Old: 185 Ways to Pass for Phat, Sick, Hot, Dope, Awesome, or at Least Not Totally Lame, by Pamela Redmond Satran, 2009.

I was reading both of these books at the same time and rolling on the floor with laughter.

The first, Generations, INC, is brand new and written by a father-daughter team who are right on. In a lively conversational style, they address what is happening right now in 2010 at our workplaces. The value and uniqueness of their book is that they go beyond just describing the generational differences to really teaching us how to lead and manage the five generations (yes, five!) that now are working together.

Why We Make Mistakes: How We Look Without Seeing, Forget Things in Seconds, and Are All Pretty Sure We Are Way Above Average, by Joseph T. Hallinan, 2009.

This is an absolutely intriguing book. I’ve never seen a book that really explores why we all seem to make decisions that in retrospect were clearly wrong – and then we go and do it again!

Hallinan shares the research into how we can “walk and chew gum but not much else”; why the “grass does look greener” every  time and why people insist that San Diego is west of Reno. Hallinan has a wealth of real life stories and you will see yourself in many of them.

Keep this book by your bed and treat yourself to a good laugh just before you turn off the light. And maybe you’ll find yourself making some mental shifts and avoiding a mistake or two.