Reviews (3)

a mess
A lot of gobbledy gook.Sounds like the author wants to be a therapist.3/4 of the book is psycho babble.Exercises are not helpful.A waste of money.

round and round
I was looking for a book which would give me several practical exercises to help improve the quality of my voice.I found the book poorly organized and the exercises do not come until 3/4 of theway through the book.It is not that clear which exercises to start with and the exercises refer back to philisophical points made in the first 180 pages.I did not want to have to wade through pages and pages of discussion about the voice and simply wanted a "how to." This makes complete sense of the voice.
I have been working in the field of voice training for nearly 4 years now. This book remains a constant companion of mine which I have read and re-read. I strongly recommend it to anyone who is interested in developingtheir own vocal freedom. Read more

Subjects:  1. Linguistics    2. Performing Arts/Dance    3. Public Speaking    4. Reference    5. Speech    6. Speech (General)    7. Voice culture    8. Performing Arts / Theater / General    9. Phonetics, phonology, prosody (speech)   

Editorial Review

Nearly all business books deal with managing a company. Read more

Reviews (3)

Career minded Admin need this book
This book was great!I have Michelle Burke's five core competencieshanging in my office to let others know how seriously I take my career.Ihave read the book several times and have found it extremely useful andmotivating.Great Book for anyone at any stage of their career.

Michelle Burke's Corporate Value
Burke's invaluable 'Valuable Office Professional' has saved ourorganization both the headaches of administrative training as well as thecost of on-going educational maintenance.The beauty of her insightapplies quite poignantly to help increase the productivity of not only theoffice assistant but CEO's alike.Recommended for all who endeavor tosucceed in corporate America.

The not so valuable book of office professionals.
I order the book and I started to read it as soon as I got it out of the box.I also ordered the Webster"s secretarial handbook.This book was a lot better and had useful information.The Valuable officeprofessionalwas a bit confusing to read.The information was verypointless. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business / Economics / Finance    2. Business Life - General    3. Business/Economics    4. Clerical occupations    5. Interpersonal Relations    6. Managing your boss    7. Secretarial Science    8. Skills    9. Advice on careers & achieving success    10. Office management    11. Secretarial & office skills   

Reviews (9)

Excellent!
A great book for someone contemplating entering the speaking/seminar business. I discovered the National Speakers Association through this book.

Bly provides excelent overview
Any aspiring to mid-career speaker will find most of this book's content highly useful.

Lacking
Nothing new here. For basic advice it is a passable book, but hardly of much value for serious candidates. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business Communication - General    4. Business/Economics    5. Employee Training And Development    6. Human Resources & Personnel Management    7. Lectures and lecturing    8. Occupational training    9. Oral Communication In Business    10. Public Speaking    11. Skills    12. Training    13. Business & Economics / Consulting    14. Consultancy & grants for businesses    15. Management & management techniques    16. Personnel & human resources management   

Subjects:  1. English as a Second Language    2. Foreign Language - Dictionaries / Phrase Books    3. Foreign Language Study    4. Language    5. ELT: speaking / pronunciation skills    6. English    7. Foreign Language Study / English as a Second Language    8. Language acquisition    9. Speaking / pronunciation skills   

Reviews (1)

Great Learning Tool
This book is a great learning tool for any Speech student. It's an easy reader and has helpful learning tools. A great asset for really understanding how to speak publicly. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Communication    2. General    3. Language    4. Language Arts & Disciplines    5. Language Arts / Linguistics / Literacy    6. Public Speaking    7. Theater - General    8. Language Arts & Disciplines / Speech    9. Media, information & communication industries    10. Public speaking / elocution   

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Handbooks, manuals, etc    5. Office management    6. Reference - General    7. Secretarial Aids & Training   

Reviews (3)

This Book Is Loaded With Wisdom
If you want to improve your communications skills, then you need this book. It is loaded with great counsel whether you are addressing a large arena full of people or you are making a presentation to your colleagues at work.Joan Detz has put together a powerhouse of information in this title.

Insightful!
This extremely practical, highly focused book goes through the hands-on details of preparing a presentation or speech. Some of the instructions seem self-evident, but only because author Joan Detz is extremely thorough and recognizes that it is easy to forget these "obvious" tips under pressure. She provides a vast amount of practical information, far more than anyone could absorb at once, but her tips are worth reading again and again. She also includes good self-assessment forms and questionnaires. Many of these venerable public-speaking concepts date back to the Sermon on the Mount, but Detz adds her own spin by emphasizing that the focus should be on the speaker, not on slides or props (downplay the loaves and fishes). The book's power resides in its completeness; Detz seems to have thought of everything, and that is reassuring. We [...] recommend this book to anyone who must make presentations in public, under any circumstances.
It's Not What You Say, It's How You Say It
Extremely easy to read.Every point is supported by real life examples or funny bloopers.Because of its simplicity, it sticks and you are more likely to apply it to your next presentation, speech, delivering a status to the boss.It is worth having in the bookshelf as a business reference or for personal situations. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business Communication - General    3. Health/Fitness    4. Language Arts / Linguistics / Literacy    5. Public Speaking   

Subjects:  1. Interpersonal Relations    2. Interpersonal communication    3. Language Arts / Linguistics / Literacy    4. Social Science    5. Sociology    6. Sociology - General    7. Speech    8. Communication studies    9. Language Arts & Disciplines / Speech    10. Public speaking / elocution   

Reviews (4)

The perfect foundation for a debate team/class
Speak Out! Debate and Public Speaking in the Middle Grades serves as a debate bible for the overworked innovative teacher.The authors do an excellent job of creating a user friendly book for both middle school students and their teachers.Although I have taught middle school debate for over ten years, I found myself saying "ah-ha" at an alarming rate while reading.When I think of this book, two things stand out the most.The book provides a number of creative activities aimed at giving students theopportunity to practice all of the fundamentals of debate.Secondly, the authors do a masterful job of addressing two of the most difficult concepts to teach, argumentation and refutation.Most of the books on debate I have encountered require a PhD. to understand the meat and potatoes of debate, argumentation and refutation, but Speak Out!...scaffolds these concepts and provides ample opportunity for student mastery.As a battle tested teacher that has been in the trenches for a number of years, Speak Out! is a breath of fresh air in today's stormy educational climate.My only regret is I wish I purchased a copy sooner.

Good Resource
This is a good resource for use in teaching middle schoolers debate skills through the Middle School Public Debate Program format. It does not give information on other formats such as Lincoln-Douglas, Legislative...
Student-Friendly Book
This book has enabled me to use a student-friendly text to teach not only public speaking, but also research skills and logical thinking.I use it in my public speaking course and my social studies class.The exercises can be adapted to any subject.A big plus is that it builds on the natural argumentative nature of middle schoolers.This is the only book I've found aimed towards the middle school student. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Debates and debating    2. Education    3. Language Arts / Linguistics / Literacy    4. Public Speaking    5. Reference    6. Speech    7. Teaching Methods & Materials - General   

Reviews (7)

Excellent Office Reference
If you need to know the correct format for an office document or the correct way to address an official, it is in this book.This book covers the traditional means of communication as well as the electronic arena.It is well organized and very easy to use.

Excellent desktop reference for secretaries and assistants
A superb one-stop reference volume covering topics highly relevant to the duties of secretaries and personal/admininstrative assistants, this handbook has withstood the test of time. The third edition dates from the early 1990s, but most of the many tasks treated comprehensively in this handbook have changed very little over the years: forms of address, basic grammar and punctuation rules, formal business correspondence, organization of meetings and travel, postal mail procedures, telephone etiquette and procedures, and so on.A few chapters that are very technology-sensitive (computers and word-processing equipment, desktop publishing, etc.) have dated considerably, but the handbook overall is so useful that it's worth having within arm's reach in just about any office-for both secretaries and their managers.
I bought it flowers for Secretaries Day !!
We are a small firm, and I am a licensed professional who types his own correspondence, contracts for clients, transmittals, etc.. Because the styles and forms of business letters have changed since I was in college, I decided I needed a good reference to help me with the tricky stuff that comes along occassionally.Read more

Subjects:  1. Business / Economics / Finance    2. Handbooks, manuals, etc    3. Office practice    4. Reference    5. Secretarial Aids & Training    6. Secretarial Science    7. Secretaries    8. Skills    9. Secretarial & office skills   

Features

• Abridged

Reviews (5)

101 Common sense steps better suited to people just starting out
The 101 "tips" aren't really secrets, but more of common sense packaged in one place.
Good advice for beginning speakers...
As part of my Lotusphere preparation, I read the book 101 Secrets Of Highly Effective Speakers by Caryl Rae Krannich.As the title indicates, it's a series of short "secrets" (tips) on how to make effective presentations.The tips are broken up into categories such as Plan To Exceed Expectation, Build Your Body - Your Speech Body, Close With Power, and Prepare Like A Pro. Sensible advice for all
True to the title, Ms. Krannich outlines, in a sensible order, 101 eminently useful tidbits on public speaking.She covers everything from the speaker's posture to controlling anxiety to the actual environment of the room, giving fledgling speakers insights that might have taken years of trial and error otherwise. True, there are limitations in the user-friendly self-help style Ms. Krannich adopts.At times , things seem a little too overly simplified; at other times, she doesn't explain enough why the technique is useful.Most of the time though, she offers well reasoned common sense.Definitely useful. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Abridged Audio - Misc. Nonfiction    2. Business & Economics    3. Business/Economics    4. General    5. Public Speaking   

Reviews (10)

Good, but lacking.
There isn't a human being alive who hasn't, at one time or another, been treated to verbal abuse. Some people are equipped to handle it very well, others are not. But not too many people can say they actually enjoy being verbally abused. THE GENTLE ART OF VERBAL SELF DEFENSE by Suzette Elgin is a good basic starting point in developing your own verbal self defense mechanisms. Wonderful experience
The whole experience of shopping for on Amazon.com was a good one.It was easy and fast.My purchase came within a week.I am very pleased with this transaction

A Mixed Bag: Analysis strong, Implications Weak.
Professor Elgin does a good job of analyzing verbal insults to reveal the presumptions underlying them, which we often sense but which we are unable to identify.She also rightly explains that responding to the conclusions reached by our adversaries--but ignoring the presumptions--simply impales us more deeply on their verbal hooks.Her suggestions, however, for dealing with these insults are somewhat in error.Her recommendation that we respond to the presumptions is correct, as allowing the verbal abuser to go unchallenged merely sets us up for further insult.What I find troubling, however, is the cheeky and indirect responses she recommends as retorts.The more straightforward of these responses are, it seems to me, appropriate.The more clever, indirect, and inappropriately neutral responses are, however, misguided, as they will ultimately lead to further animosity and serve to embed problematic interpersonal dynamics beneath a veneer of civil insult.Perhaps I would have found her analysis and recommendations more convincing had she systematically substantiated her analysis with references to credible literature.All things considered, I think that the forewarned reader can learn much of value from this book but only if they consider carefully the long-term implications of following her specific recommendations, some of which will be effective, and others of which are, in this reviewer's opinion, cheeky, indirect, unclear, and likely to provoke further insult.Read more

Subjects:  1. Bargain Books    2. Invective    3. Public Speaking    4. Reference    5. Threat (Psychology)    6. Verbal behavior    7. Verbal self-defense    8. Psychology   

Reviews (2)

It really does help!
I thought I had maxed out my typing speed and accuracy when I started using this book in college. While I absolutely detest the drills, especially the backward drills, it has really helped to increase both my speed and accuracy in a mere month! My disk that came with my book got cracked however, so now I am trying to locate a new disk, without luck at this point.

A warning
This book is extremely difficult to use without the software,and the software sells separately... The diagnostic charts areactually quite useful, but it is a tremendous waste of time to navigate through all the computations manually.The best use of this book, without the software, is for practice drills.... Beware. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Computer Bks - General Information    2. Computer Books: General    3. Computer Books: Word Processing    4. Computers    5. Computers - General Information    6. Keyboarding    7. Reference - General    8. Secretarial Aids & Training - Typing    9. Computer Software Packages    10. Computers / Keyboarding   

Reviews (2)

A Very Talented, Passionate, Communicator Shares His Secrets
I've read a lot of communication textbooks over the years since I'm a professor in the field. This is one of the best. Professor Fujishin exudes the passion he talks about in the final two chapters of this book. He is passionate about the topic, the audience (in this case his readers), and he has a healthy self-esteem. All three are necessary for connecting with an audience in a meaningful way, he explains.
A "textbook" that is not a traditional textbook.
This book is my most favorite "textbook" since I returned to school to get my AA. This book is not like the traditional textbook-it doesn't put you to sleep after the first 3 pages. Each chapter starts off with a short story that applies to the concepts taught in the chapter. Very amusing stories. After the concept is introduced, the information is broken down into subtopics that are reasonably short. I think this helps the flow of the book. Models are included in the text so if your instructor wants an outline, for example, you have one in the text to refer to. The reading of this book is smooth and easy. I sold my original copy back to my school's bookstore and now I am regretting it. For someone who is working on an AA in speech communication, I'm looking to buy this book again to help me prepare future speeches. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Language    2. Language Arts & Disciplines    3. Language Arts / Linguistics / Literacy    4. Public Speaking    5. Performing Arts / Theater / General    6. Public speaking / elocution   

Subjects:  1. Language    2. Language Arts & Disciplines    3. Language Arts / Linguistics / Literacy    4. Public Speaking    5. English    6. Performing Arts / Theater / General    7. Public speaking / elocution   

Reviews (1)

Great Combination of Theory and Practice.
Over the past several years I've had to read several text books, especially those having to do with speech communication.The majority of these speech communication books I have had to read are long, dry, and dull.They tend to be filled with all sorts of theories and very little actual real-life experience examples or practice.COMMUNICATION IN GROUPS isn't like that and does one of the best jobs for a textbook of combining the theories behind small group communication with vivid, real-life examples to illustrate the ideas.The book lays out the format for working in small groups, explains how and why small groups are formed, the decisions that small groups have to make, problems that small groups face, and principles of how a group can work together to complete their project and make a presentation.Terms are defined in easy-to-understand language and examples are relevant and applicable.The book is fairly easy to read and unlike most textbooks I have forced myself to read, I actually enjoyed reading COMMUNICATION IN GROUPS.I would recommend this text for any small group communication class or anyone interested in the field of small group communication. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Communication    2. Group Psychology    3. Interpersonal Relations    4. Language    5. Language Arts & Disciplines    6. Psychology    7. Small groups    8. Language Arts & Disciplines / Speech    9. Public speaking / elocution   

Reviews (5)

A Must Read for my Clients
As a consultant who works with leaders from the profit and not for profit sectors I am recommending The Art of Connecting to all of my clients.It gives clear examples and easy to follow "tips and traps" for working through differences ranging from class, age, gender, disabilities and race.In today's crazy world being able to build rapport and communicate effectively are essential skills for successful people.

universally valuable
I have been a professional communicator for over 20 years and I was sincerely impressed by the practical usefulness of this book. I strongly recommend it to any one who manages a company or sees the value of influencing, motivating or simply connecting with others. Because I see our workplace and culture becoming less homogenized, it is increasingly important that we gain the skills outlined in this book regardless of whether we are interacting with customers, co-workers or those who are in different socio-economic positions both in the work environment and in the world at large. Ewing and Raines have done a wonderful job and this book would be a valuable addition to anyone's personal library.

Relevant and Timely
Art of Connections is a wonderfully written "how to " book on creating rapport in some of the most challenging situations. The most intersting insight gained was the obvious difference in the 2 writers style and their different approaches to similar situations. It opened my eyes to the fact that breaking through with people happens in different ways not through a single approach.As an executive coach I found their stories re-telling real conversations very enlightening and timely...thanks Claire and Lara! ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business Communication - General    4. Business/Economics    5. Communication in management    6. Intercultural communication    7. Interpersonal Relations    8. Interpersonal communication    9. Secretarial & office skills   

Reviews (1)

Business Statistics is demystified
Business Statistics Demystified makes use of analogies that helps in clearly getting the points across about the topics given in the book.It makes sure that the reader understands the points by using different analogies over and over again.It even includes an appendix that gives information on using basic math necessary for statistics along with further explanations on the topic of levels of measurements.This saves the trouble of having to rely on a whole lot of different resources for mathematical concepts used in statistics.The quizzes that focus on the chapters and the exams that focus on several chapters combined help to narrow down what is most important in learning this subject so that the reader does not get too overwhelmed with all the information.It features side bar notes throughout the book; here you will find important terms and definitions.The book explains the essentials in how to apply statistical studies to help in making important business decisions and what type of graph to use when preparing a report.The book is like a textbook written in an informal fashion which makes it easy enough to understand and it is worth every dollar spent.You cannot go wrong. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business Statistics    3. Business/Economics    4. Commercial statistics    5. Mathematics    6. Probability & Statistics - General    7. Statistics    8. Business & Economics / Statistics    9. Business mathematics & systems    10. Probability & statistics   

Subjects:  1. Careers - General    2. Computer Books: General    3. Computers    4. Keyboarding    5. Software - Utility    6. Typewriting   

Reviews (4)

A Speaker's Bible!
If you are looking for a treasure trove of ideas on ways to improve cash flow as a speaker -- this book delivers the goods!
you can't tell this book by its title
This book is a major rip-off. Its title leads you to believe you'll get ideas that you can immediately put into action to generate relatively immediate sales. Allow me to quote some random examples:
Public speaking your way to wealth
A terrific read. Lilly has compiled a detailed list of tips and tricks that would be helpful to anyone in the communication game. Experienced speakers will certainly find something in this book for them. I know i did, all that is left to do now is to public speak my way to wealth. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Advertising    2. Advertising & Promotion    3. Business / Economics / Finance    4. Business Consulting    5. Business consultants    6. Business/Economics    7. Careers - Other Specific Fields    8. Consulting    9. Employee training personnel    10. Fees    11. Language Arts & Disciplines    12. Motivational speakers    13. Public Speaking    14. Training    15. Advice on careers & achieving success    16. Business & Economics / General    17. Business communication & presentation