Journalism Primer

A guide to community news coverage for beginning and veteran journalists in the age of new media

By: Jim Pumarlo

Published; September 28, 2011
Format: Paperback, 62 pages
ISBN-10: 1937391027
ISBN-13: 978-1937391027
Publisher: Romeii LLC

Jim Pumarlo recognizes that small, community based newspapers face some very difficult financial challenges in today’s economy. Despite those monetary concerns, the author presents compelling evidence that by providing high caliber journalism and a strong local focus, community newspapers will thrive. Reduced revenues have caused many cutbacks at local newsrooms, and have caused a decline in the overall journalistic level of those publications. For Jim Pumarlo, these reductions in reporting staff are the wrong way to go, and are actually speeding up the decline in the relevance and revenue of the papers.

Jim Pumarlo offers an alternative vision for developing a successful community newspaper, based on high quality reporting, and a strong local focus in the overall news coverage. Instead of considering as is so often the case, that reporters are a cost center rather than a revenue source, the author provides a strong business case for high level journalism. For Jim Pumarlo, solid and locally oriented content is essential for building revenues for the newspaper. This commitment to excellence in journalism is essential whether the content is published in a print newspaper or in the online version.

Instead of cutting back on serious reporting, Jim Pumarlo recommends improving the standard of the journalism to the highest possible level. The author dispels the misconceptions that have grown up around what local readers want in their local coverage. To rebuild the trust and value in the local newspaper, the author provides the following set of guiding principles for strong and relevant local journalism:

* Be timely with stories
* Be relevant with the information
* Be clear and understandable
* Be inviting and compelling
* Be engaging and offer editorial opinion
* Be accessible and available online

For me, the power of the book is how Jim Pumarlo connects high quality, locally focused journalism, with increased revenues for community newspapers. The author presents a solid case for increasing and maintaining a top quality journalistic standard as the key to financial stability and growth for small newspapers. With an emphasis on delivering the highest quality of content, both in the print and online versions of the publication, advertising and circulation income will increase.

Instead of the shortsighted cutting of reporters, Jim Pumarlo recommends the superior and proven road map to success of providing a high quality product that will be in demand by the readership. The author guides both novice and experienced reporters and editors through the process of creating and writing a compelling and relevant community newspaper. The result will be a profitable and thriving newspaper with ever increasing revenue and circulation.

I highly recommend the practical and real world proven technique packed book Journalism Primer: A guide to community news coverage for beginning and veteran journalists in the age of new media by Jim Pumarlo, to anyone involved in a small community newspaper in any capacity, who seeks a clear and outcome oriented guide to operating a modern, successful small publication. This book will increase the revenue, circulation, and the overall journalistic caliber of any community newspaper.
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Brandwashed

Tricks Companies Use to Manipulate Our Minds and Persuade Us to Buy

By: Martin Lindstrom

Published: September 20, 2011
Format: Hardcover, 304 pages
ISBN-10: 0385531737
ISBN-13: 978-0385531733
Publisher: Crown Business

Martin Lindstrom recognizes that people cannot simply stop buying consumer products entirely. The author tried that strategy himself, and the result was a complete failure. He takes the realistic position that people will always spend their money on various consumer products. At the same time, marketers are also well aware of this reality of modern society. Martin Lindstrom points out that marketers will use every social, psychological, sexual, and demographic information at their disposal to convince us to buy their wares. While those concepts have been around for decades, the author provides evidence that marketers are going much farther than ever before in manipulating the customer. Indeed, Martin Lindstrom alleges that marketers go much farther than ever before in seducing potential customers.

Martin Lindstrom points out that many of the techniques used in modern marketing are what he calls devious, underhanded, and even outright rewiring the brain of the consumer. The author describes how marketers gather information on customers without their knowledge. Going far beyond collecting buying behavior, marketers utilize complete individual profiles gleaned from multiple sources, ranging from social media to invade personal and family lives. This collected and collated data is then turned around to sell people even more products and services. The methods described by the author extend to marketing to very young children, and at earlier ages than previously thought possible.

Martin Lindstrom shares a series of chapters that describe how marketers manipulate customers, and provides a series of remedies to reduce the influence of those same intrusive marketing strategies. The topics covered include:

* What age companies begin to market to consumers
* Why fear sells in marketing
* How brand and shopping addicts are created
* The role played by sex in marketing
* Hoe peer pressure is applied to consumers
* How nostalgia is used to market fond memories
* How celebrities and fame are used in marketing
* How hope and values are marketed

For me, the power of the book is how Martin Lindstrom combines a comprehensive and fundamental understanding of marketing techniques, with practical and readily applied tactics to avoid marketing manipulation. As the author states, the purpose of the book is to educate consumers to make more informed buying decisions, and how to avoid falling prey to intrusive marketing methods.

Martin Lindstrom presents his information as an antidote to what he considers underhanded marketing strategies. To be a better informed consumer, is to be a wiser and and more resistant consumer. The author shares the latest brain research used by marketers to stimulate certain areas of the brain to generate buying impulses. He also offers hands on advice to openly resist even the most subtle marketing messages. The author also shares the results of a unique marketing experiment he employed in the real world. Overall, this book is an eye opening experience for anyone.

I highly recommend the often shocking and very informative book Brandwashed: Tricks Companies Use to Manipulate Our Minds and Persuade Us to Buy by Martin Lindstrom, to anyone who is serious about understanding the inner workings of marketing at their most basic and fundamental level. With this knowledge, combined with the techniques to counter the marketing tactics, you will be a better informed consumer.
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The Secrets of Successful Communication by Kevin T. McCarney – Book review

The Secrets of Successful Communication

A Simple Guide to Effective Encounters in Business

By: Kevin T. McCarney

Published: September 1, 2011
Format: Paperback, 186 pages
ISBN-10: 0983124434
ISBN-13: 978-0983124436
Publisher: O’Connell House

Kevin McCarney recognizes the importance of communication to build connections between people. If the human interactions fail at any stage of the communication event, then a connection will not be made, and the encounter will be lost. Kevin McCarney presents his theory that the dualistic human brain, in the form of the Big Brain and the Little Brain, is the driver of the success rate of any encounter. The Big Brain works toward happiness and success, but the Little Brain lurks on the fringes awaiting its chance to create trouble. The Little Brain can effectively derail the communication process, resulting in a failed encounter. The author demonstrates how to overcome the weakness of the Little Brain, so that the Big Brain can forge effective connections with others.

Kevin T. McCarney understands that during the communication encounter, even the smallest slip and mistake can result in the largest problems. The Little Brain will, if presented with the opportunity, will force an inappropriate and damaging response that can destroy the human connection. Any response can have both an immediate and a lasting impact on the other person. To prevent this potential derailment, Kevin McCarney advises people to devise a desired outcome for any interaction. People form opinions of one another based on both direct and external influences. As a result, it’s crucial to respond in a positive way that creates an immediate and long term good impression.

Every interaction can create memorable moments that are either positive or negative in their impact. The author points out that great memorable moments can be created in any contact, as opportunities for them arise in every encounter. While there may be outside influences affecting the other person, the biggest effect is choosing to utilize the Big Brain over the Small Brain at all times. By choosing the Big Brain, memorable moments can be created as opportunities arise, developing the all important trust factor. People prefer to work with people who they trust, and the Big Brain can help build trust with other people.

For me, the power of the book is how Kevin McCarney provides a theoretical framework for understanding the underlying principles that at the core of every encounter. The author presents his concept of the Big Brain and Little Brain in an understandable format, demonstrating the importance of each brain’s action during an encounter. Kevin McCarney offers useful and ready to apply advice as well, for improving personal interactions to create memorable moments and to build trust. The book is packed with ideas and strategies for improving interpersonal communication whether at home or at work.

I highly recommend the very engaging and results oriented book The Secrets of Successful Communication: A Simple Guide to Effective Encounters in Business by Kevin T. McCarney, to anyone seeking a hands on and practical approach to improving personal and professional interactions with other people. This book will guide you toward more memorable moments, enriched relationships, and deeper levels of trust as you build strong and lasting connections with others.
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Stepping Up

How Taking Responsibility Changes Everything

By: John Izzo, Ph.D.

Published: January 2, 2012
Format: Paperback, 192 pages
ISBN-10: 1609940571
ISBN-13: 978-1609940577
Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers

John Izzo understands that taking responsibility ourselves is crucial for facilitating change in our workplaces and in our personal lives. The author refers to this taking of responsibility as stepping up. Through the act of stepping up, people can become the agents of change, rather than passively awaiting change to be made by other people. John Izzo points out that making real change within a corporate workplace requires people to step and take responsibility. In today’s difficult economic climate, stepping up is a necessity, as imposed change can be very harmful to those who fail to take responsibility. Acting as a victim will not achieve positive results; and more likely end with an even worse situation. For John Izzo, taking responsibility is within the power of everyone, and making real and beneficial change through stepping up matters.

John Izzo presents two main points in the book. The first thrust of the book is about the value and importance of taking responsibility and of stepping up. The author demonstrates why stepping up matters, and how it empowers the individual to create change that works. The second aspect of the book offers the keys to stepping up and having more influence in our workplaces ad in our personal lives. John Izzo shows the reader that anyone can learn how to step and and be a real change agent.

The author provides how people can step up, through a focus on what he calls the five rows of responsibility. The concept is based on the sphere of influence that a person can impact positively or negatively through their actions. For the author, people talk about how others should do something to solve the problem. He expands that principle to include every problem faced in the workplace, in one’s personal life, or in society as a whole. To make real and lasting change, John Izzo challenges people to step up and take responsibility for changing the immediate five rows of their own lives, and act as if everyone else were changing their five rows of influence as well. It’s all about claiming one’s own personal power, and stepping up to act upon it as a leader of change.

For me, the power of the book is how John Izzo combines the reasons for taking personal responsibility for change with some practical attitude changes to step up and make those changes a reality. The author presents a compelling case for stepping up and becoming empowered in life. He also makes a powerful case for rejecting the all too frequent choice of playing the victim and placing oneself into to the control of other people.

John Izzo offers practical and readily applicable techniques for stepping up in the workplace and becoming a catalyst for change. The concepts are easy to understand, and the author makes clear that stepping up isn’t a choice reserved for only the select few. John Izzo demonstrates clearly that stepping up is a choice that anyone can make to create change in every aspect of life. The author underlines his concepts with real world examples of the principle of stepping up in action. Overall, the book is an excellent guide to taking responsibility, personal empowerment, and taking control of one’s own life.

I highly recommend the empowering and change creating book Stepping Up: How Taking Responsibility Changes Everything by John Izzo, Ph.D., to anyone seeking a well grounded and hands on book for facilitating real change in every area of a person’s life. The author guides you toward taking responsibility and stepping up to be the agent of change. This book is about the real power that individuals possess. All they have to do is step up and take control of it.
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For Better or For Work

A Survival Guide for Entrepreneurs and Their Families

By: Meg Cadoux Hirshberg

Published: March 5, 2012
Format: Hardcover, 260 pages
ISBN-10: 0983934002
ISBN-13: 978-0983934004
Publisher: An Inc. Original

Meg Cadoux Hirshberg understands first hand about the constant business pressure that a start-up business venture has on both the entrepreneur and the family. Whether the business is conducted in the home, with its attendant loss of privacy, or in an office where the spouse is away from home, there is real stress on the entrepreneur’s family relationships. Meg Cadoux Hirshberg delves into the murky waters of borrowing money from relatives, generational succession of the company management, and the possibility of marital breakdown. To address these, and other rarely discussed but very real entrepreneurial stress points, the author draws on her own personal experiences of living the start-up business life.

Meg Cadoux Hirshberg presents an inside view of being part of an entrepreneurial family. The author shares her personal experiences, and fresh insights into the challenges that arise in a start-up company. She writes openly and frankly about the strains that the business demands placed on her marriage and on the family. The author provides an overview of the problems of company finances, and the stress created through the constant issues of cash flow, financing, and daily business operations. Writing from both the head and from the heart, Meg Cadoux Hirshberg shares an honest, and rare glimpse into the home life of an entrepreneurial family.

For me, the power of the book is how Meg Cadoux Hirshberg combines a powerful and moving personal story with real world tested advice for entrepreneurs and their spouses. The book is an intriguing blend of home and business life, and the stress placed on one by the other. The author’s format reflects that constant pull in all directions that her life, as spouse and partner in Stonyfield Yogurt, made evident in her business life. The author demonstrates how she and her family triumphed in the end, and how life and business can mix; if blended in the proper proportions.

Meg Cadoux Hirshberg offers some very important, and rarely presented advice to entrepreneurs, spouses, and family members. For too long, these ideas and strategies for coping, have been taboo and off limits for discussion. Meg Cadoux Hirshberg pulls back the curtains, and writes frankly about what entrepreneurship is really like for families; from the inside. Each chapter addresses a crucial aspect of the start-up business life. Within each of these important sections, the author shares her hard learned lessons, with the goal of helping other families avoid the challenges and stress faced by her own family. The many photographs in the book provide an even more personal and human aspect to this fine book.

I highly recommend the insightful and inspirational book For Better or For Work: A Survival Guide for Entrepreneurs and Their Families by Meg Cadoux Hirshberg, to any families who are either involved in an entrepreneurial venture, or who are considering starting their own business. This book will help everyone involved, and it’s indeed an entire family commitment, to overcome the challenges and obstacles that face marriages and families int he world of start-up businesses.

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The End of Diversity As We Know It

Why Diversity Efforts Fail and How Leveraging Difference Can Succeed

By: Martin N. Davidson

Published: November 14, 2011
Format: Hardcover, 264 pages
ISBN-10: 1605093432
ISBN-13: 978-1605093437
Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers

Martin Davidson undestands that companies are serious and sincere in their diversity plans and programs. For the author, however, those diversity programs are ineffective, focus on the wrong things, and is all too often left to the Human Resources as a personnel management issue. Because of these shortcomings in how organizations address diversity, the end result is diversity is considered a problem instead of a solution that creates a competitive opportunity. Martin Davidson recommends that companies identify differences, including those that are not as immediately obvious as race, age, gender, and orientation. The author urges leaders to consider diversity not as a problem seeking a solution, but rather as both a solution and an opportunity for the organization.

Martin N. Davidson recognizes that diversity goes beyond a narrow range of groups, whose differences are more superficial than real. Instead, the author demonstrates why the definition of diversity should be widened to include differences in ways of living, culture, economic background, and personal worldviews. To bring these additional aspects of diversity into the conversation and the overall organizational planning, Martin Davidson provides his advanced and statistically valid model Leveraging Difference™ initiative.

Instead of creating a merely superficial, and even raw numbers based model, the Leveraging Difference™ system considers a much wider and deeper consideration of diversity within the firm. The model challenges business leaders to consider the opportunities presented through the leveraging of strengths and advantages offered through a more complete understanding of diversity. The utilization of the Leveraging Difference™ model guides leaders though the following process:

* Seeing difference
* Understanding difference
* Engaging difference
* Becoming a Leveraging Difference™ organization

For me, the power of the book is how Martin N. Davidson combines a fresh approach to understanding the deeper meaning of diversity, with a real world based model of Leveraging Difference™ to transform diversity into a competitive advantage. The author redefines diversity, enriching the concept, and transforming it into a powerful source of opportunity for the organization. At its core, the book is one about leadership, and taking the initiative to change the way the company views diversity.

Instead of seeing only the most superficial of differences, Martin Davidson encourages leaders to delve more deeply into cultural and personality based diversity. He moves beyond training programs, arbitrary and problematic quotas, and legalistic thinking toward a vision of diversity as an integral part of an overall business plan. The author proposes a holistic and all encompassing view of diversity that treats it as an organizational strength With the Leveraging Difference™ model in place for leading the organization, the enhanced approach becomes a powerful force for creating a real competitive edge.

I highly recommend the transformational and results oriented book The End of Diversity As We Know It: Why Diversity Efforts Fail and How Leveraging Difference Can Succeed by Martin N. Davidson, to any business leaders who are seeking a clear competitive advantage through a more complete understanding of diversity in organizations. This book will change the way any company considers diversity, and how differences are leveraged within the overall enterprise.
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Shift or Get off the Pot

26 Simple Truths About Getting a Life

By: Linda Edgecombe

Published: June 1, 2009
Format: Paperback, 256 pages
ISBN-10: 1897178654
ISBN-13: 978-1897178652
Publisher: Insomniac Press

Linda Edgecombe understands that the pressures of people’s lives cause them to lose focus and feel that their lives are beyond their own control. The author advising slowing life down to a more human and liveable speed, and shares the techniques for making that shift in speed. Linda Edgecombe demonstrates that everyone knows the answers to how they can fulfill their life’s purpose. Those answers just get lost in all the noise and demands of everyday life. Linda Edgecombe offers a restful oasis to rest and refresh oneself, and to make the changes that will get an individual’s life back into their own hands.

Linda Edgecombe recognizes that a person can only be successful if they know who they are and what they really want to do in their lives. To assist people on this voyage of self discovery, the author shares some intriguing tools and has the individual ask their inner selves some deep and probing questions. Instead of living a fantasy, the author shares ideas for making those dreams a reality.

Linda Edgecombe presents three core questions, that everyone must ask and answer for themselves, as they keys to the shift. Those core questions are:

* Are you doing the best you can?

* Are you living on the deferred life plan?

* When was the last time you did something for the first time?

For me, the power of the book is how Linda Edgecombe combines the often difficult questions of one’s life’s direction with good humor and spontaneity. The author asks the reader to reflect on their own life, and on their future, and shares some engaging and fun practices for making what she calls a shift. Unlike many books on finding life’s purpose, this book avoids the pain so often associated with and resulting from that introspection process. Through a healthy injection of humor and laughter, this book is a pleasure to read, and the practices a joy to consider for everyone.

I highly recommend the joy filled and inspirational book Shift or Get off the Pot: 26 Simple Truths About Getting a Life by Linda Edgecombe, to anyone seeking to make changes in their lives, or is looking for their life purpose, but lacks the guidance on their inner voyage. This book sets the course for a fresh new approach to life, filled with spontaneous events, laughter, and an exciting new lease on life.

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Bart Wendell recognizes that meetings provide a public display of leadership abilities, both good and bad, that can make or destroy a leader’s career. The author considers the meeting to be a true test of a leader’s skills. As a result, Bart Wendell offers the insightful advice that conducting a successful meeting goes far toward the development of an outstanding leader. Because of the nature of meetings, and why they so often fail to produce positive results, alert leadership is a necessity. People drawn into meetings bring their silos, and not solutions, along with them. Meetings include diverse participants with a wide variety of abilities and agendas.

Bart R. Wendell (photo left) understands that leaders must be able to gauge how a meeting is progressing, and time when to look for a needed breakthrough, in order too achieve a positive outcome that benefits the organization. This skill requires practice and is as much an art as a science. The author points out that leaders very often demonstrate their lack of skills when they want and need to perform their best. What Bart Wendell calls Hot leaders overheat the meeting and cause impulsive and rash responses and decisions. The author describes Cool leaders as too calming resulting in a lack of action or decision making.

To counter these three observations, Bart Wendell proposes a framework built of five leadership principles. Those five principles are as follows:

* Meetings reflect leadership ability. Great leaders run great meetings
* A leader changes through the act of running a meeting, both good and bad
* Good leaders use Hot and Cold effectively to guide the meeting
* Great leaders understand themselves; their own strengths and weaknesses
* A great leader is not afraid of uncomfortable but right decisions

For me, the power of the book is how Bart Wendell combines a deep understanding of the subtle human characteristics of meetings, with a practical guide for developing leadership skills, through running effective meetings. The author considers meetings to be the crucible in which skilled leaders forge their best qualities. For the author, this testing of leadership is both an internal struggle with oneself and one’s fears, as it is an external discovery of effective leadership techniques. Bart Wendell devotes an entire chapter to each of the critical aspects of leadership in meetings, underlining both the inner journey to self realization, as well as the skills visible to those attending the meeting.

The idea that meetings, with the need to lead and guide others to a worthwhile result, forms the basis of great leadership is a good one. Understanding the many implications of this important leadership concept alone makes this book a very worthwhile read. The author’s experience as a business consultant, meeting leader and facilitator, as well as a psychologist bring a unique and valuable perspective to this book that is rarely found in leadership books.

I highly recommend the insightful and leadership building book Hot Leaders Cool Facilitators: Learning to Lead One Meeting at a Time by Bert R. Wendell, Ph.D., to anyone seeking to become a better leader and to conduct more effective meetings. The author demonstrates how intertwining the concept of great leadership with running great meetings is a powerful connection. This book will change the way that you view both leadership and meeting management.