In this hilarious and highly practical book, author and professional speaker Scott Berkun reveals the techniques behind what great communicators do, and shows how anyone can learn to use them well. For managers and teachers -- and anyone else who talks and expects someone to listen -- Confessions of a Public Speaker provides an insider's perspective on how to effectively present ideas to anyone. It's a unique, entertaining, and instructional romp through the embarrassments and triumphs Scott has experienced over 15 years of speaking to crowds of all sizes. With lively lessons and surprising confessions, you'll get new insights into the art of persuasion -- as well as teaching, learning, and performance -- directly from a master of the trade. Highlights include: Berkun's hard-won and simple philosophy, culled from years of lectures, teaching courses, and hours of appearances on NPR, MSNBC, and CNBC Practical advice, including how to work a tough room, the science of not boring people, how to survive the attack of the butterflies, and what to do when things go wrong The inside scoop on who earns $30,000 for a one-hour lecture and why The worst -- and funniest -- disaster stories you've ever heard (plus countermoves you can use) Filled with humorous and illuminating stories of thrilling performances and real-life disasters, Confessions of a Public Speaker is inspirational, devastatingly honest, and a blast to read.

Delivering an effective media interview today is more challenging than ever before. Today's media spokesperson must compete with shrinking audience attention spans, cope with social media overload, and confront sensationalized reporting. Given those challenges, how can you create positive messages that cut through the noise and motivate your audiences? How can you respond to difficult questions in a confident manner that increases your credibility? And how can you navigate your company through a media crisis so it becomes a mere blip instead of a reputation-destroying disaster? Brad Phillips, one of the world's top media trainers, will lead you through an engaging mix of 101 two-page lessons, three dozen real-life case studies, and several hands-on exercises. He will teach you how to become an effective media spokesperson, eliminate your fear, build your brand, and enhance your reputation. You will learn how to: -Master the ground rules for working with reporters -Create memorable media messages -Support your message with media-friendly stories, statistics, and sound bites -Deliver a winning interview -Answer tough questions -Adjust your approach for print, radio, television, and social media -Use positive body language that reinforces your message -Dress for television -Prepare for and manage a media crisis One of the most comprehensive and well-organized books ever published on the topic, The Media Training Bible will prepare you for today's media culture, in which a tweet can become newsworthy and a news interview can become tweet-worthy.

Turn any presentation into a landmark occasion “I love this book. I’ve followed Humes's lessons for years, and he combines them all into one compact, hard-hitting resource. Get this book on your desk now.”—Chris Matthews, Hardball Ever wish you could captivate your boardroom with the opening line of your presentation, like Winston Churchill in his most memorable speeches? Or want to command attention by looming larger than life before your audience, much like Abraham Lincoln when, standing erect and wearing a top hat, he towered over seven feet? Now, you can master presentation skills, wow your audience, and shoot up the corporate ladder by unlocking the secrets of history’s greatest speakers. Author, historian, and world-renowned speaker James C. Humes—who wrote speeches for five American presidents—shows you how great leaders through the ages used simple yet incredibly effective tricks to speak, persuade, and win throngs of fans and followers. Inside, you'll discover how Napoleon Bonaparte mastered the use of the pregnant pause to grab attention, how Lady Margaret Thatcher punctuated her most serious speeches with the use of subtle props, how Ronald Reagan could win even the most hostile crowd with carefully timed wit, and much, much more. Whether you're addressing a small nation or a large staff meeting, you'll want to master the tips and tricks in Speak Like Churchill, Stand Like Lincoln.

“This book will have you laughing so hard you cry . . . As Confessions aptly demonstrates, military spouses lead interesting lives.” —Tara E. Crooks, cofounder of Army Wife Network As the wife of a Marine Corps officer, Mollie Gross learned the hard way to laugh instead of cry at what she could not control—and as she quickly discovered, nearly everything was out of her control. A standup comedienne, Mollie explores everything about the “issued” spouse, from deployment and the stress of having a husband in a combat zone, to the realization that marriage changes when your husband returns home from war. Nothing is taboo or out-of-bounds in this funny, poignant memoir, including the “parties” military wives throw for themselves before hubby returns. (You’ll have to read the book to find out about those.) “Mollie Gross is the Chelsea Handler of the milspouse community. She’s unfiltered, honest, and hilarious, with an underlying message to stop whining and be proud. Think of it as heartfelt humor for the home front.” — Military Spouse magazine “Mollie’s no-holds-barred account of what it was like during her first four years of being married to a Marine, dealing with the moves, wartime deployments, and life on the home front, will leave you laughing, crying, and shaking your head in disbelief asking, ‘Did she really just say that!?’” — Kristine Schellhaas, founder of USMC Life

FOREWORD BY GUY KAWASAKI Presentation designer and internationally acclaimed communications expert Garr Reynolds, creator of the most popular Web site on presentation design and delivery on the Net — presentationzen.com — shares his experience in a provocative mix of illumination, inspiration, education, and guidance that will change the way you think about making presentations with PowerPoint or Keynote. Presentation Zen challenges the conventional wisdom of making "slide presentations" in today’s world and encourages you to think differently and more creatively about the preparation, design, and delivery of your presentations. Garr shares lessons and perspectives that draw upon practical advice from the fields of communication and business. Combining solid principles of design with the tenets of Zen simplicity, this book will help you along the path to simpler, more effective presentations.

Everywhere you look – on posters, in offices, on social media – there’s a motivational quote to greet you. Dreams can come true! Happiness is a journey! Think positive! You can do anything! But how many of these are accurate? How many are wise? And which of them are based on evidence you can actually trust? The answer is depressing: not many at all. The Motivation Hoax exposes and unravels the nonsense that permeates the inspiration industry, and in its place offers a suite of tools and insights that are reliable, credible and, most importantly, tested. Who will benefit from this book? The Motivation Hoax is for you if: You’re a leader who abhors clichés and vacuous platitudes. You’re an employee who desires a realistic guide to workplace success. You find yourself rolling your eyes when you see or hear yet another nauseating motivational quote. You value science over rhetoric, no matter how eloquently worded. A reality check like no other, The Motivation Hoax is among the most refreshing, liberating and surprisingly affirming books you’ll read this year. Dr James Adonis is one of Australia’s best-known leadership educators. His nationally syndicated Fairfax columns reach over 100,000 readers every month. Over the past decade, James has worked with hundreds of organisations – including McDonald’s, American Express, Coca-Cola, Qantas, Optus, Ernst & Young, Gucci, Toyota and many government departments – to help them lead change and improve performance.

Featuring 15 explosive new chapters, this new edition of the New York Times bestseller brings the story of Economic Hit Men up-to-date and, chillingly, home to the U.S.―but it also gives us hope and the tools to fight back. The previous edition of this now-classic book revealed the existence and subversive manipulations of "economic hit men. John Perkins wrote that they are highly paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. Their tools include fraudulent financial reports, rigged elections, payoffs, extortion, sex, and murder. In Perkins's case the tool was debt-convincing strategically important countries to borrow huge amounts of money for enormous, development projects that served the very rich while driving the country deeper into poverty and debt. And once indebted, these countries could be controlled. In this latest edition, Perkins provides revealing new details about how he and others did their work. But more importantly, in an explosive new section he describes how the EHM tools are being used around the world more widely than ever-even in the U. S. itself. The cancer has metastasized, yet most people still aren't aware of it. Fear and debt drive the EHM system. We are hammered with messages that terrify us into believing that we must pay any price, assume any debt, to stop the enemies who, we are told, lurk at our doorsteps. The EHM system-employing false economics, bribes, surveillance, deception, debt, coups, assassinations, unbridled military power-has become the dominant system of economics, government, and society today. It has created what Perkins calls a Death Economy. But Perkins offers hope: he concludes with dozens of specific, concrete suggestions for actions all of us can take to wrest control of our world away from the economic hit men, and help give birth to a Life Economy.