Ask a Manager


Book Description

From the creator of the popular website Ask a Manager and New York’s work-advice columnist comes a witty, practical guide to 200 difficult professional conversations—featuring all-new advice! There’s a reason Alison Green has been called “the Dear Abby of the work world.” Ten years as a workplace-advice columnist have taught her that people avoid awkward conversations in the office because they simply don’t know what to say. Thankfully, Green does—and in this incredibly helpful book, she tackles the tough discussions you may need to have during your career. You’ll learn what to say when • coworkers push their work on you—then take credit for it • you accidentally trash-talk someone in an email then hit “reply all” • you’re being micromanaged—or not being managed at all • you catch a colleague in a lie • your boss seems unhappy with your work • your cubemate’s loud speakerphone is making you homicidal • you got drunk at the holiday party Praise for Ask a Manager “A must-read for anyone who works . . . [Alison Green’s] advice boils down to the idea that you should be professional (even when others are not) and that communicating in a straightforward manner with candor and kindness will get you far, no matter where you work.”—Booklist (starred review) “The author’s friendly, warm, no-nonsense writing is a pleasure to read, and her advice can be widely applied to relationships in all areas of readers’ lives. Ideal for anyone new to the job market or new to management, or anyone hoping to improve their work experience.”—Library Journal (starred review) “I am a huge fan of Alison Green’s Ask a Manager column. This book is even better. It teaches us how to deal with many of the most vexing big and little problems in our workplaces—and to do so with grace, confidence, and a sense of humor.”—Robert Sutton, Stanford professor and author of The No Asshole Rule and The Asshole Survival Guide “Ask a Manager is the ultimate playbook for navigating the traditional workforce in a diplomatic but firm way.”—Erin Lowry, author of Broke Millennial: Stop Scraping By and Get Your Financial Life Together




DevOps For Dummies


Book Description

Develop faster with DevOps DevOps embraces a culture of unifying the creation and distribution of technology in a way that allows for faster release cycles and more resource-efficient product updating. DevOps For Dummies provides a guidebook for those on the development or operations side in need of a primer on this way of working. Inside, DevOps evangelist Emily Freeman provides a roadmap for adopting the management and technology tools, as well as the culture changes, needed to dive head-first into DevOps. Identify your organization’s needs Create a DevOps framework Change your organizational structure Manage projects in the DevOps world DevOps For Dummies is essential reading for developers and operations professionals in the early stages of DevOps adoption.




Confessions of an IT Manager


Book Description

Phil Factor is a legend in his own runtime. Scurrilous, absurd, confessional and scathing by turns, Confessions of an IT Manager targets the idiocy, incompetence and overreach of the IT management industry from vantage point all the way up and down the greasy pole. Phil Factor (real name witheld to protest the guilty) has over 20 years experience in the IT industry, specializing in database-intensive applications. For withering insight into the human weaknesses and farcical levels of ineptitude that bring IT projects to their knees, plus occasional escapes into burnished pastiche and cock-a-leg doggerel there is no funnier, more illuminating commentary on the IT crowd.




The Everyday Project Manager


Book Description

The best organizations, and even the best departments within organizations, have a roadmap: a clear vision of where they would like to be and the means by which they will get there. This roadmap drives the everyday activity of the company as well as any change it makes both internally and externally. And it is what drives projects. In fact, it is arguable that success in business is almost wholly reliant on an ability to implement change effectively – whether it is a computer system that gives you the edge on your competitor, bringing a new product to market, adopting new ways of working, or completely redefining the approach your company takes. Success and survival in business relies on change and the way that business implements change is through projects. Therefore, if you work in the world of business, sooner or later the chances are that you will be involved in a project, as a stakeholder, advisor, sponsor or possibly running it - as the project manager. In The Everyday Project Manager, author and project management expert Jeremy Nicholls shares the key attributes and skills of successful project management and describes the practical skills that will enhance project delivery regardless of your level of experience. The skills and concepts detailed in this book can be easily understood and implemented. They are "everyday" (that is, commonplace) skills, but they are skills and the concepts that the best project managers use every day. Each chapter details the concepts, practices, and tools that readers will use to build their proficiency in every phase of delivering a project efficiently and effectively.




The Circle


Book Description

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • A bestselling dystopian novel that tackles surveillance, privacy and the frightening intrusions of technology in our lives—a “compulsively readable parable for the 21st century” (Vanity Fair). When Mae Holland is hired to work for the Circle, the world’s most powerful internet company, she feels she’s been given the opportunity of a lifetime. The Circle, run out of a sprawling California campus, links users’ personal emails, social media, banking, and purchasing with their universal operating system, resulting in one online identity and a new age of civility and transparency. As Mae tours the open-plan office spaces, the towering glass dining facilities, the cozy dorms for those who spend nights at work, she is thrilled with the company’s modernity and activity. There are parties that last through the night, there are famous musicians playing on the lawn, there are athletic activities and clubs and brunches, and even an aquarium of rare fish retrieved from the Marianas Trench by the CEO. Mae can’t believe her luck, her great fortune to work for the most influential company in the world—even as life beyond the campus grows distant, even as a strange encounter with a colleague leaves her shaken, even as her role at the Circle becomes increasingly public. What begins as the captivating story of one woman’s ambition and idealism soon becomes a heart-racing novel of suspense, raising questions about memory, history, privacy, democracy, and the limits of human knowledge.




The 10 Laws of Career Reinvention


Book Description

Reinvention is the key to success in these volatile times—and Pamela Mitchell holds the key to reinvention! In The 10 Laws of Career Reinvention, America's Reinvention Coach® Pamela Mitchell offers every tool readers need to navigate the full arc of career change. Part I introduces the Reinvention Mindset, with what you need to know to be prepared mentally to get started. In Part II, you read the real-life stories of ten individuals who successfully made the leap to new and unexpected careers, using the 10 laws: The 1st Law: It Starts With a Vision for Your Life The 2nd Law: Your Body Is Your Best Guide The 3rd Law: Progress Begins When You Stop Making Excuses The 4th Law: What You Seek is on the Road Less Traveled The 5th Law: You’ve Got the Tools in Your Toolbox The 6th Law: Your Reinvention Board is Your Lifeline The 7th Law: Only a Native Can Give You the Inside Scoop The 8th Law: They Won't "Get" You Until You Speak Their Language The 9th Law: It Takes the Time That it Takes The 10th Law: The World Buys Into an Aura of Success Each story is followed by an in-depth lesson that explains how to adapt these laws to your own career goals, and what actions and precautions to take. The lessons answer all your tactical concerns about navigating the roadblocks, getting traction and managing your fears. The final section provides workbook exercises for fine-tuning your reinvention strategies for maximum results. Clear-headed, calming, practical, and thorough, this is the ideal action plan for getting through any career crisis and ending up securely in the lifestyle you've always dreamed of having.




The Project Manager's Guide to Mastering Agile


Book Description

Streamline project workflow with expert agile implementation The Project Management Profession is beginning to go through rapid and profound transformation due to the widespread adoption of agile methodologies. Those changes are likely to dramatically change the role of project managers in many environments as we have known them and raise the bar for the entire project management profession; however, we are in the early stages of that transformation and there is a lot of confusion about the impact it has on project managers: There are many stereotypes and misconceptions that exist about both Agile and traditional plan-driven project management, Agile and traditional project management principles and practices are treated as separate and independent domains of knowledge with little or no integration between the two and sometimes seen as in conflict with each other Agile and "Waterfall" are thought of as two binary, mutually-exclusive choices and companies sometimes try to force-fit their business and projects to one of those extremes when the right solution is to fit the approach to the project It’s no wonder that many Project Managers might be confused by all of this! This book will help project managers unravel a lot of the confusion that exists; develop a totally new perspective to see Agile and traditional plan-driven project management principles and practices in a new light as complementary to each other rather than competitive; and learn to develop an adaptive approach to blend those principles and practices together in the right proportions to fit any situation. There are many books on Agile and many books on traditional project management but what’s very unique about this book is that it takes an objective approach to help you understand the strengths and weaknesses of both of those areas to see how they can work synergistically to improve project outcomes in any project. The book includes discussion topics, real world case studies, and sample enterprise-level agile frameworks that facilitate hands-on learning as well as an in-depth discussion of the principles behind both Agile and traditional plan-driven project management practices to provide a more thorough level of understanding.




The Best Business Schools' Admissions Secrets


Book Description

The top secrets to getting into the best MBA programs, from a leading industry expert Top MBA programs reject more than 80 percent of their applicants, but author Chioma Isiadinso's admissions consulting firm has successfully guided 90 percent of her students into the best business schools around the world. As a former Admissions Board Member, Isiadinso offers insider tips and strategies to help applicants get into the school of their choice by building and promoting their personal brand. This revised and updated edition now offers: the do's and don'ts of social media networking sample admissions essays that worked an international perspective for global admissions appeal




The New Software Engineering


Book Description

This text is written with a business school orientation, stressing the how to and heavily employing CASE technology throughout. The courses for which this text is appropriate include software engineering, advanced systems analysis, advanced topics in information systems, and IS project development. Software engineer should be familiar with alternatives, trade-offs and pitfalls of methodologies, technologies, domains, project life cycles, techniques, tools CASE environments, methods for user involvement in application development, software, design, trade-offs for the public domain and project personnel skills. This book discusses much of what should be the ideal software engineer's project related knowledge in order to facilitate and speed the process of novices becoming experts. The goal of this book is to discuss project planning, project life cycles, methodologies, technologies, techniques, tools, languages, testing, ancillary technologies (e.g. database) and CASE. For each topic, alternatives, benefits and disadvantages are discussed.




Out Of Control


Book Description

Out of Control chronicles the dawn of a new era in which the machines and systems that drive our economy are so complex and autonomous as to be indistinguishable from living things.