Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds

I just finished reading this book last night. Although it may appear the book is a brochure with no substance, it’s actually very insightful and summarized a tried approach to preparing for and making presentations.

I would strongly recommend this book to everybody who presents or thinks about getting into presenting. The book is full of examples of great slides that I personally learned a lot from. The book should also serve as a great reference guide.

The Secret by Rhonda Byrne, short marketing book review

It has definitely been one of the first buzz books in personal development. It was an easy read, inspirational as it was supposed to be. I was more interested in learning about the marketing efforts put together to market the book with a film, and all the buzz. There’s several books on the topic that I’ve read after the Secret, but the secret was the one that talks about it all in simple terms.

Although this book is not necessarily about marketing, I’d still suggest reading this book to anyone who is or is planning to pursue a career in marketing. Marketing, in my experience, is one of a few professions were one has to know and understand the concept of personal motivation. This book is definitely going a bit into this topic.

Reality Check by Guy Kawasaki

Reading the book right now… I would usually not review anything before I complete it, but this book is amazing. Anybody who saw Guy present, read his blog, followed him on Twitter, etc… knows what kind of guy Guy is. Clean, to the point, no BS, very valuable. The chapters are very short (2-3) pages and there’s a lot of them, I’m at Chapter 70 now. It’s a very convenient read, it’s DICEE.

The book is written from a standpoint of a tech VC, an experience tech guy. So you may think that it can only be applied to tech startups in Silicon Valley. I actually found that there’s a lot that can be taken into more traditional business practices out of the Silicon Valley. I’ve been reading with book with my PM and Marketing manager hats on and got a lot of valuable ideas from this book! Guy didn’t solve my problems, he showed me a different way to look at some things.

Twitterville by Shel Israel, short marketing book review

Finished reading this book a couple of weeks ago. Very simple read. This book can help two types of people:

1. those who want to know more about Twitter and how it’s affecting our daily conversations and lives.
2. those who are already in the social space. Shel presents a couple of chapters talking about processes, tips, and a bit on metrics.

I would subscribe to the second group and prefer a bit more specifics. However, I enjoyed reading the book for its stories and how well it’s written.