When it comes to productivity, hard work is half the battle. The crucial half is planning well. Diaz-Ortiz walks you through every step of setting and achieving smart goals. She helps you brainstorm goals, choose the best ones, and adjust them to make them realistic. Then she helps you strategize how to reach them, day-by-day, year-by-year. You'll be amazed at what you can do in a day, let alone a lifetime.

From the New York Times bestselling authors of Sprint comes “a unique and engaging read about a proven habit framework [that] readers can apply to each day” (Insider, Best Books to Form New Habits). “If you want to achieve more (without going nuts), read this book.”—Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit Nobody ever looked at an empty calendar and said, "The best way to spend this time is by cramming it full of meetings!" or got to work in the morning and thought, Today I'll spend hours on Facebook! Yet that's exactly what we do. Why? In a world where information refreshes endlessly and the workday feels like a race to react to other people's priorities faster, frazzled and distracted has become our default position. But what if the exhaustion of constant busyness wasn't mandatory? What if you could step off the hamster wheel and start taking control of your time and attention? That's what this book is about. As creators of Google Ventures' renowned "design sprint," Jake and John have helped hundreds of teams solve important problems by changing how they work. Building on the success of these sprints and their experience designing ubiquitous tech products from Gmail to YouTube, they spent years experimenting with their own habits and routines, looking for ways to help people optimize their energy, focus, and time. Now they've packaged the most effective tactics into a four-step daily framework that anyone can use to systematically design their days. Make Time is not a one-size-fits-all formula. Instead, it offers a customizable menu of bite-size tips and strategies that can be tailored to individual habits and lifestyles. Make Time isn't about productivity, or checking off more to-dos. Nor does it propose unrealistic solutions like throwing out your smartphone or swearing off social media. Making time isn't about radically overhauling your lifestyle; it's about making small shifts in your environment to liberate yourself from constant busyness and distraction. A must-read for anyone who has ever thought, If only there were more hours in the day..., Make Time will help you stop passively reacting to the demands of the modern world and start intentionally making time for the things that matter.

Winner of the 2007 Polsky Prize given by the ASID Foundation As the U.S. population ages, adult day services have become an integral component in the continuum of care for elderly people. Providing a variety of social and medical services for cognitively or physically impaired elderly people who otherwise might reside in institutions, these facilities can be found in a variety of building types, from purpose-built facilities to the proverbial church basement. They also vary widely in their philosophies, case mix, funding mechanisms, and services. In this interdisciplinary study, Keith Diaz Moore, Lyn Dally Geboy, and Gerald D. Weisman offer guidance for planning and designing good-quality adult day services centers. They encourage architects, caregivers, and staff members to think beyond the building, organizational mission, and staffing structure to conceive of the place that emerges as an interrelated system of people, programming, and physical setting. Through case studies, thoughtful explanations, and well-crafted illustrations, Designing a Better Day provides caregivers, architects, and administrators tools with which they can make qualitative changes for participants and their families. Organized into three parts—creating awareness, increasing understanding, and taking action—this book will be a key resource for professionals involved in creating and maintaining effective adult day services centers.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • At last, a book that shows you how to build—design—a life you can thrive in, at any age or stage • “Life has questions. They have answers.” —The New York Times Designers create worlds and solve problems using design thinking. Look around your office or home—at the tablet or smartphone you may be holding or the chair you are sitting in. Everything in our lives was designed by someone. And every design starts with a problem that a designer or team of designers seeks to solve. In this book, Bill Burnett and Dave Evans show us how design thinking can help us create a life that is both meaningful and fulfilling, regardless of who or where we are, what we do or have done for a living, or how young or old we are. The same design thinking responsible for amazing technology, products, and spaces can be used to design and build your career and your life, a life of fulfillment and joy, constantly creative and productive, one that always holds the possibility of surprise.

Become more mindful of the user when building digital products, and learn how to integrate a user-centered approach into your thinking as a web or app developer. This book shows you how the user experience is the responsibility of everyone involved in creating the product and how to redefine development principles when building user-centered digital products. There are still many organizations that are not design driven, and the gap between stereotypical design and development teams needs to be bridged in order to build digital products that cater to the needs of real people. We are at a point where we see organizations that cannot bring the user experience into their core thinking falling behind their competitors. You'll see how to increase the level of UX maturity within any organization by tackling what is possibly the biggest stumbling block that stands between design and development: putting user needs ahead of system efficiency. UX for Developers shows how you can adjust your focus in order to be more mindful of the user when building digital products. Learn to care about what you build, not just for the system’s sake, but for those who will use what you build. What You'll Learn Understand what it means to build websites and applications for the user, rather than from a developer’s perspective. Review the soft skills required to build more usable digital productsDiscover the tools and techniques to adopt a user-focused approach to development.Improve communication throughout design and development, especially between developers and non-developers. Who This Book Is For Primary audience is Web/app developers that are looking to understand what it takes to build usable digital products. Secondary audience is UX Designers who are looking to understand the viewpoint of developers; Project managers and stakeholders who need to facilitate better working relationships between developers and designers.

An essential primer for students and first-stop reference for professionals, The Fashion Design Reference & Specification Booktakes the fashion designer through the entire design process, from conceiving a garment to marketing it. This valuable handbook contains the information and ideas essential to planning and executing fashion projects of every scale and distills them in an easy-to-use format that is compact enough to slip into a tote. Linking six central phases in the cycle of fashion—research, editing, design, construction, connection, and evolution—The Fashion Design Reference & Specification Book helps designers develop effective strategies for building a cohesive collection and communicating their vision. The Reference & Specification Book series from Rockport Publishers offers students and practicing professionals in a range of creative industries must-have information in their area of specialty in an up-to-date, concise handbook.

Even the smartest among us can feel inept as we fail to figure out which light switch or oven burner to turn on, or whether to push, pull, or slide a door. The fault, argues this ingenious—even liberating—book, lies not in ourselves, but in product design that ignores the needs of users and the principles of cognitive psychology. The problems range from ambiguous and hidden controls to arbitrary relationships between controls and functions, coupled with a lack of feedback or other assistance and unreasonable demands on memorization. The Design of Everyday Things shows that good, usable design is possible. The rules are simple: make things visible, exploit natural relationships that couple function and control, and make intelligent use of constraints. The goal: guide the user effortlessly to the right action on the right control at the right time. In this entertaining and insightful analysis, cognitive scientist Don Norman hails excellence of design as the most important key to regaining the competitive edge in influencing consumer behavior. Now fully expanded and updated, with a new introduction by the author, The Design of Everyday Things is a powerful primer on how—and why—some products satisfy customers while others only frustrate them.

"There are a lot of books about goal setting. This one is special." — Scott Warner, CEO, Gigg When it comes to productivity, hard work is half the battle. The first half—the crucial half—is planning well. The DO LESS method is a simple way to achieve your goals more often, in less time, and with greater peace of mind. Learn how to: Decide the right goals for you Create workable strategies for reaching them Harness time for maximum efficiency From the big-picture down to the details, Claire Diaz-Ortiz walks you through every step of setting and achieving smart goals. She helps you brainstorm goals, choose the best ones, and adjust them to make them realistic. Then she helps you strategize how to reach them, day-by-day, year-by-year. Whether you want to finish a house project, lose weight, or write a book, Design Your Day—by someone who read 150 books while caring for an infant—is an all-in-one guide to smart productivity. Use Claire’s tricks and tools and you’ll be amazed at what you can do in a day, let alone a lifetime.

DIV In the world of interior design, thousands of bits of crucial information are scattered across a wide array of sources. The Interior Design Reference & Specification Book collects the information essential to planning and executing interior projects of all shapes and sizes, and distills it in a format that is as easy to use as it is to carry. You’ll also find interviews with top practitioners drawn across the field of interior design. —Fundamentals provides a step-by-step overview of an interiors project, describing the scope of professional services, the project schedule, and the design and presentation tools used by designers. —Space examines ways of composing rooms as spatial environments while speaking to functional and life-safety concerns. —Surface identifies options in color, material, texture, and pattern, while addressing maintenance and performance issues. —Environments looks at aspects of interior design that help create a specific mood or character, such as natural and artificial lighting, sound and smell. —Elements describes the selection and specification of furniture and fixtures, as well as other components essential to an interior environment, such as artwork and accessories. —Resources gathers a wealth of useful data, from sustainability guidelines to online sources for interiors-related research. /div

The internationally renowned designer and entrepreneur helps women look and be the very best version of themselves with this strong, sexy style guide filled with practical and inspirational tips and personal insights gleaned from her own journey in life and business. “As a teen, I’d draw the type of glamorous clothes and accessories I longed for. In retrospect I realize that I was a designing the life I wanted and would one day achieve.” As a designer, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and working mother, Rachel Roy has a unique perspective on how fashion defines who we are—and who we want to be. Growing up in a low-income neighborhood in California, she envisioned the life she lives today. The head of her own fashion business, she’s a successful, hard-working entrepreneur who believes through style we can help design the life we want to live. Design Your Life is the embodiment of Rachel’s ethos—a style guide every woman, no matter what stage of life she is in, needs to help her define and implement her personal look, motivate her to focus on the person she wants to be and the job she aspires to have, and make choices based on where she wants to go. Rachel offers hands-on tips for developing personal style while staying true to yourself, using and updating what’s in your closest, and adding essential pieces to your wardrobe. Throughout, she shares stories from her own life and the vital role fashion and style has played each step of the way. Elegantly designed and illustrated with more than fifty exclusive color line drawings, filled with her passion, vision, and commitment to empowerment, Design Your Life takes fashion one step further—from looking great to becoming great, from the inside out.