2014 Was Another Great Year for Reading

If you have not figured out by now, I am a huge fan of reading. Its importance cannot be stressed enough.

“If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.” ― Stephen King

If you are trying to generate ideas to help improve your lot in life, then you need to read. I recommend that you read widely. Here is what I have read and blogged about in 2014:

Business

The Referral Engine – Teaching Your Business to Market Itself – What if you created a business that automatically referred business to itself? What if we could get current customers to send new clients to our business? John Jantsch believes that this is not only possible but very much doable. In his book, The Referral Engine: Teaching Your Business to Market Itself*, he provided guidance for creating a referral process within the business process. Read more

Education

The Digital Scholar – How Technology is Transforming Scholarly Practice – The world is changing rapidly; is higher education adapting as fast? Martin Weller explores this topic in his book The Digital Scholar: How Technology is Transforming Academic Practice*.  I found this book to be prophetic as I watch what is happening around me in both higher education (HE) and Extension. Read more

Game Changers: Education and Information Technologies – For the spring term of 2014, I used Game Changers: Education and Information Technologies, edited by Diana G. Oblinger, as a textbook for the course.  I believe it helped the learners appreciate developing trends in education. Read more

Leadership

Digital leadership: Changing technology for change-savvy school leaders – This is one of the best books I have read. I believe every educator, education administrator, and simply all leaders should read. Digital Leadership: Changing Paradigms for Changing Times* written by Eric Sheninger thoroughly explains why educators and leaders should be directly involved in using and promoting the use of technology as a work, learning, and communication tool. Read more

Learning

Professional Learning In the Digital Age: The Educator’s Guide to User-Generated Learning – As I traveled from conference to conference this spring, I had a opportunity to catch up on some reading. One book I finished was fromKristen Swanson called Professional Learning in the Digital Age: The Educator’s Guide to User-Generated Learning*. Swanson’s message focused on the curation, reflection, and contribution of user-generated content in support of learning. This is a very similar message of Seek – Sense – Share outlined by Harold Jarche. Read more

Organizations

How Google Works – I have always been curious about what was behind the Google curtain. When I learned that Google Executive Chairman and ex-CEO Eric Schmidt and former Senior Vice President of Products Jonathan Rosenberg wrote How Google Works*, I knew I had to read it. I was not disappointed. Read more

Choosing Change: How Leaders and Organizations Drive Results One Person at a Time – Change is scary! We are not very good at change. According to Walter McFarland and Susan Goldsworthy, authors of Choosing Change: How Leaders and Organizations Drive Results One Person at a Time*, 75% of organizations fail when instituting a change initiative.  Choosing Change focuses on how to be part of the 25% and implement a successful change initiative. Read more

Productivity

Lifehacker – The Guide to Working Smarter, Faster, and Better – I picked up a copy of Lifehacker: The Guide to Working Smarter, Faster, and Better* written by Adam Pash and Gina Trapani. I am not sure I would have picked up the book if I was not already familiar with theLifehacker Website. I also regularly listen to Gina Trapani onTWIG and All About Android. The book I picked up is a gem. I have already implemented a number of ideas and plan to implement a number of others in the coming days. Read more

Thrive* – While at the 2014 ATD-ICE conference, I had an opportunity to listen to Arianna Huffington speak about well-being, a key metric of success. I walked away from this presentation inspired to put some her concepts into practice. However, before I could do so, I had to learn more. At the conference, I purchased her book, Thrive: The Third Metric to Redefining Success and Creating a Life of Well-Being, Wisdom, and Wonder and just finished reading it. Read more

Getting things done the David Allen way with Evernote: A beginner’s guidebook on how to master GTD with Evernote – I just finished reading Master Getting Things Done the David Allen Way with Evernote* by David Donaldson and Joe Allen. This book was a very quick read at only 42 pages. Having read a number of books on Evernote and the Getting Things Done (GTD) system, I am not sure if this was worth the money; however, the book was honest in that it did provide a basic orientation of how to use Evernote to manage your GTD system. Read more

Research

Managing your Research with Evernote for Windows* – Always looking for information to better leverage Evernote, I thought Managing Your Research with Evernote for Windows, a marriage between Evernote and research would be a great find. While it does a great job talking about the basics of Evernote, I believe it fell short of the promise of talking about how to manage academic research with Evernote. Read more

Social Media

A World Gone Social – In their book, A World Gone Social: How Companies Must Adapt to Survive*, Ted Coiné and Mark Babbitt emphasized companies must move from an industrial age to a social age mentality. The manner in which the world communicates has significantly changed; however, most companies continue to operate as though nothing has changed to include my past and current employers. Read more

Organizations Don’t Tweet, People Do: A Manager’s Guide to the Social Web – I am going to tell you about a book that I believe is extremely important to organizations and how we communicate and learn. This book is Organizations Don’t Tweet, People Do: A Manager’s Guide to the Social Web* by Euan Semple. When I first looked at the title, I thought it was about how to use social media in the workplace, but I found it was more than that. It is about the importance of allowing employees to use social media tools to learn, collaborate, and share information. Read more

Social Media Mastery (A Daily Actions Guide) – While on my train trip across the states, I had an opportunity to read Social Media Mastery (Updated for 2016): 75+ Tips to Help you Expand your Reach, Build your Platform, and Establish your Online Authority (Daily Actions)* by Tara Ross. This was an enjoyable little book well suited for small business owners and beginners to social media. Read more

Google+ Pro Tips – How to Bring Your Audience to Google+ – This book, Google+ Pro Tips – How to Bring Your Audience to Google+*, addresses building your Google+ audience and actually provides strategies you need to take external to Google+. Read more

Google+ Pro Tips – Strategies for Posting & Sharing on Google+ – Google+ Pro Tips: Strategies for Posting & Sharing on Google+* is another Stephan Hovnanian book. It is part of an informative series on how to get the more out of Google+. Read more

Google+ Pro Tips – How to Get More Visibility on Google+ – Google+ Pro Tips – How to Get More Visibility on Google+* is the second one that I am reporting on. Personally, the more I participate on Google+, the more I want to understand how to get the most out of it. Hovnanian looks at Google+ from a business perspective. In this book, he listed the factors that help you to become found on Google+. Read more

Google+ Pro Tips: Managing Your Google+ Circles* – I downloaded a little book written by Stephan Hovnanian to my Kindle that focuses entirely on Google+ Circles. I have to say that I am very pleasantly pleased with the book. Even though I am quite familiar with Google+ and its Circles, I walked away with some new ideas that I plan to implement in the very near future. Read more

Working Out Loud

Show Your Work – I was totally jazzed about Jane Bozarth’s ASTD presentation called “Show your work” that the first thing I did when I got home was read her book called, surprisingly, Show Your Work*. This book mirrored the presentation quite well, yet it provided much more detail. The book is peppered with lots of examples of how to show your work in support of transparency in the workplace. Read more

Here are my lists for the past few years:

• 2013 has been a banner reading year
• Have you been reading more? (2012)

I am already getting 2015 off to a good start. I look forward to the new things I will learn. If you have some recommendations you think I will like, please leave a comment.

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