2020 Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers—YALSA/ALA “An empathetic tale that treats homelessness with respect and makes it visible.”—Kirkus Reviews Seventeen-year-old Abby Lunde and her family are living on the streets. They had a normal life back in Omaha but, thanks to her mother’s awful mistake, they had to leave behind what little they had for a new start in Rochester. Abby tries to be an average teenager—fitting in at school, dreaming of a boyfriend, college and a career in music. But Minnesota winters are unforgiving, and so are many teenagers. Her stepdad promises to put a roof over their heads, but times are tough for everyone and Abby is doing everything she can to keep her shameful secret from her new friends. The divide between rich and poor in high school is painfully obvious, and the stress of never knowing where they're sleeping or where they’ll find their next meal is taking its toll on the whole family. As secrets are exposed and the hope for a home fades, Abby knows she must trust those around her to help. But will her new friends let her down like the ones back home, or will they rise to the challenge to help them find a normal life? "We, her readers, are drawn in from the first page. This lovely book has tremendous heart.”—Brandon Hobson, author of Where the Dead Sit Talking
The acclaimed bestseller about visual problem solving-now bigger and better "There is no more powerful way to prove that we know something well than to draw a simple picture of it. And there is no more powerful way to see hidden solutions than to pick up a pen and draw out the pieces of our problem." So writes Dan Roam in The Back of the Napkin, the international bestseller that proves that a simple drawing on a humble napkin can be more powerful than the slickest PowerPoint presentation. Drawing on twenty years of experience and the latest discoveries in vision science, Roam teaches readers how to clarify any problem or sell any idea using a simple set of tools. He reveals that everyone is born with a talent for visual thinking, even those who swear they can't draw. And he shows how thinking with pictures can help you discover and develop new ideas, solve problems in unexpected ways, and dramatically improve your ability to share your insights. Take Herb Kelleher and Rollin King, who figured out how to beat the traditional hub-and-spoke airlines with a bar napkin and a pen. Three dots to represent Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio. Three arrows to show direct flights. Problem solved, and the picture made it easy to sell Southwest Airlines to investors and customers. Now with more color, bigger pictures, and additional content, this new edition does an even better job of helping you literally see the world in a new way. Join the teachers, project managers, doctors, engineers, assembly-line workers, pilots, football coaches, marine drill instructors, financial analysts, students, parents, and lawyers who have discovered the power of solving problems with pictures.
It's time for adventure... Gustav is a garden gnome who longs to experience the world beyond the picket fence that surrounds his yard. Though he makes attempts to explore, it is only with the love of an imaginative little girl that his dream becomes a reality.
"A visual guide to making extraordinary presentations by the acclaimed author of The Back of the Napkin. We are all natural born presenters. We have ideas to share, voices to share them, and people to share them with. So why do most of us find public speaking so hard? In this pithy but powerful guide, communication expert Dan Roam provides a simple five-step path to take us from jitters and complexity to confidence and clarity. He explains his tried-and-true visual techniques and the wisdom he has gained from giving award-winning presentations. Roam shows us how to: - Clearly present any idea with simple visuals - Know our audience before we step in front of them - Channel fear into fun"--
"I'm a huge fan of High Output Management and Setting the Table [...] Luca's Best Practices for Operational Excellence took my management to the next level. It's been almost a month since I started implementing the principles, but I can already say that I've noticed a significant improvement in my company's morale [...] That feels amazing." – Molson Hart, Viahart CEO Inside, you’ll find the solutions to your problems as a manager: How to manage “difficult” employees? How to get your subordinates to solve their own problems? How to get more time for yourself to work on what’s important? How to introduce a culture of mutual trust, respect, and accountability, in a team which is demotivated or full of personal problems. What’s inside The 4 Principles of Operational Excellence that determine whether your organization will operate smoothly or always react to the last problem, whether your subordinates respect you and each other or operate with defensiveness and distrust. The 8 Best Practices of Operational Excellence that effective managers use weekly and monthly to ensure that the Principles are followed in practice every day, even when conditions are not optimal, even when they are not around. How to get buy-in, a roadmap for an impactful roll-out, and systems to sustain the change. This book does not let you alone with the complex reality of implementing change in a big company where multiple projects and agendas are involved. This book will help you improve the way your team works, leading to the following benefits: Less stress: as your team’s Operational Culture improves, they will learn how to solve alone problems you would have to micromanage instead. More time: as your team takes care of its own problems, you will be freed from running after emergencies and work on the things that matter. More respect: as you become a better leader, and your subordinates become better teammates, valuing each other’s work, you will become more respected and valued. More budget: as your team improves its output, your team’s bottom line contribution becomes available to be redistributed as budget and bonuses for you and your team. A better career: the skills you will learn with this book are rare and thus valuable. They will make you a more valued and respect employee, leading to a successful career. A complete playbook with best practices you can apply starting today in your company, to translate into impactful action the Principles of Operational Excellence. It includes comparisons between the actions of good managers and bad ones, lots of detailed examples, and word-by-word scripts. Other books only describe how an effective company looks like, ignoring how to get there. This book doesn’t leave you alone with the implementation. It proposes practical tactics and word-by-word scripts you can use to obtain buy-in from the Top Management and roll-out the change initiatives. THE COMPLETE TOOLKIT FOR THE OPERATIONS MANAGERS & SUPERVISORS IN MANUFACTURING & LOGISTICS Handle unmotivated workers and instill newfound proactivity. Get your workers to work safely, even when the boss is not looking. Get your employees to keep an orderly work-floor, even when they are not motivated. Get your quality up while decreasing the cognitive load of your workers. Manage a fast-changing company, where workers fail to keep up with growth and change. In this handbook, you will find all the procedures you need to run your operations smoothly.
Ever been to so many meetings that you couldn't get your work done? Ever fallen asleep during a bulletpoint presentation? Ever watched the news and ended up knowing less? Welcome to the land of Blah Blah Blah. The Problem: We talk so much that we don't think very well. Powerful as words are, we fool ourselves when we think our words alone can detect, describe, and defuse the multifaceted problems of today. They can't-and that's bad, because words have become our default thinking tool. The Solution: This book offers a way out of blah-blah-blah. It's called "Vivid Thinking." In Dan Roam's first acclaimed book, The Back of the Napkin, he taught readers how to solve problems and sell ideas by drawing simple pictures. Now he proves that Vivid Thinking is even more powerful. This technique combines our verbal and visual minds so that we can think and learn more quickly, teach and inspire our colleagues, and enjoy and share ideas in a whole new way. The Destination: No more blah-blah-blah. Through Vivid Thinking, we can make the most complicated subjects suddenly crystal clear. Whether trying to understand a Harvard Business School class, or what went down in the Conan versus Leno battle for late-night TV, or what Einstein thought about relativity, Vivid Thinking provides a way to clarify anything. Through dozens of guided examples, Roam proves that anyone can apply this systematic approach, from leftbrain types who hate to draw to right-brainers who hate to write. This isn't just a book about improving communications, presentations, and ideation; it's about removing the blah-blah- blah from your life for good.
From the celebrated author of "Big Fish," an imaginative, moving novel about two sisters and the dark legacy and magical town that entwine them. In this new novel, a Southern literary master returns to the tradition of tall-tales and folklore.
Get ready for the ultimate crash course in communicating and solving problems through simple pictures. Thirty-two thousand years ago, your many-times-great-grandparents Oog and Aag drew pictures on the wall of a cave. They had an innate need to communicate, but no written language. So they found an easy and natural way to share their thoughts and stories. Today, after so many years when speaking and writing dominated, we're back in another highly visual age. About 90 percent of everything shared online is now visual—selfies, GIFs, smartphone videos, and more. This explosion of communication through pictures isn't a millenial-driven fad; it's as natural as those lines first drawn by Oog and Aag. Just turbo-charged by the latest technology. And yet over the past twenty years, as I've taught people from Fortune 500 CE0s to White House staffers how to harness the power of imagery, the biggest objection I've always heard is, "But I can't draw!" Trust me, you can. You don't need to be da Vinci to be an outstanding visual thinker and communicator. The most effective drawings are the simplest, and you can get good at those in three minutes. In this little book, I'll teach you how to use seven basic shapes to explain just about anything to just about anyone. If you've read my previous books, you'll see one or two familiar tools here, along with a bunch of new tools you can start using right away. If you're new to my approach—welcome! Get ready to work smarter, communicate more clearly, and get better at whatever you do, just by picking up a pen. Get ready to draw to win.
