“Bradt's message in this excellent and inspiring book is a 'golden ring' itself amidst the rubble often permeating our lives. It not only speaks true but makes you strive for more.”--Stephen R. Covey, author, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness “Beautifully written and full of wisdom, The Ring in the Rubble is a gem.”--Ken Blanchard, co-author of The One Minute Manager and Leading at a Higher Level Change always creates hidden opportunities. A leader's job is unearthing them. In The Ring in the Rubble, change authority Gary Bradt reveals the secrets to moving beyond the rubble of disruption, fear, and uncertainty that change often creates, to finding the golden ring of opportunity that always lies beneath. Each chapter of this breakthrough book delivers a powerful principle for leading change, supported by engaging real-life experiences of the author and other well-known business executives that illustrate how to put principles into action. Bradt asks penetrating questions that help you “dig deeper” and pinpoint the best ways for applying these principles to your specific change effort. You will discover how Richard Schulze weathered a devastating event that threatened to destroy everything he'd worked so hard to build-and became the founder of Best Buy in the process. You'll see how a 65-year-old man, nearly broke after having suffered a string of disastrous setbacks, dug through the rubble to emerge as Colonel Harland Sanders, who remains the face of Kentucky Fried Chicken to this day. Change itself doesn't dictate the eventual outcome of your situation; how you think about and handle change is what makes all the difference. You'll never find the ring if you don't start digging!

Tres Roeder lays out a system to help you succeed not only in your projects, but in any interpersonal relationship that requires a change in behavior. Tres Roeders 90 percent project success rate stands well above industry averages. In this book, Mr. Roeder lays out how he succeeds by using a balanced approach of technical project management skills, business acumen and sixth sense people skills. Sixth sense people skills are unlike any people skills guidance you have ever received. Read this book and forever change the way to manage people and projects.

Working with a discouraged, disorganized, cynical team? Learn how to turn it around. Sync or Swim is a small tale with enormous insight on ways you can empower, engage, and energize employees or volunteers facing discouragement or cynicism. Sam, the new CEO, was ready to hit the ground running. But his team members—and Mother Nature—had other plans.An ambitious yet naïve sheepdog is called upon to lead Monarch Enterprises, a troubled organization on a beautiful isle. Confronted with broken systems and challenging personality types, Sam must learn how to marshal his team before the imminent storm washes everything away. Along the way, he gleans valuable lessons from an unlikely mentor: a wise, old puffin. This delightful, quick read will: Teach you communication techniques that enhance teamwork and productivity Bring to life the principles used by hundreds of successful organizations Provide relevant, practical insights based on real-world experiences Stimulate lively and positive interaction (discussion guide included) Based on the principles successfully used by major corporations, health organizations, over 250 colleges and universities, government agencies, churches, and non-profits

If you were to account for your life at this moment—are you living up to your own potential? Does your present state of affairs give you reason to be disappointed or discouraged? Is your job unsatisfying...your relationships far from what they could be...your spiritual life a mere shadow of what it once was? If you answered “yes” to one or more of these questions, then there is a very good chance you--like scores of other Americans--have been lulled into accepting a life that is simply "good enough." This is what I term a Mediocre Me Mindset--a confining way of thinking about your role in the world that convinces you to settle for the perceived safety of the status quo rather than push outside your comfort zone to try and make tomorrow a little better than you found it today. In Mediocre Me, you will find a simple, yet profoundly powerful approach to rethinking the way you view your role in the world. It’s a proven means of breaking free from the grasp of mediocrity so you can lead a life of true purpose, meaning, and significance. And perhaps the best part of all...it’s not a new idea! The concepts in Mediocre Me are actually anchored in an over two thousand year old legend. One that reminds us we are at our individual and collective best not when we are standing still, unwitting prisoners of the status quo, but rather, when we are unafraid to reject apathy and embrace action by leading the positive change we want to see occur in our surroundings. Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, “America is another name for opportunity.” At a time in our nation’s history when we seem more divided than united, more fearful than hopeful, there can be no more fence-sitting. It’s time to begin writing a different, more empowering personal leadership story of your own. One that will energize you to do what you can, when you can, where you can, to be a force for good in your part of the world when doing so is needed now more than ever.

A straight-talking guide to the way business experience and success are attained in the real world profiles the "adversity paradox" through which professionals rise to even greater heights after seemingly career-breaking setbacks, in a reference that cites the examples of such individuals as Harvey Mackay, Doris Christopher, and Pete Dawkins.

A page-turning novel that is also an exploration of the great philosophical concepts of Western thought, Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World has fired the imagination of readers all over the world, with more than twenty million copies in print. One day fourteen-year-old Sophie Amundsen comes home from school to find in her mailbox two notes, with one question on each: "Who are you?" and "Where does the world come from?" From that irresistible beginning, Sophie becomes obsessed with questions that take her far beyond what she knows of her Norwegian village. Through those letters, she enrolls in a kind of correspondence course, covering Socrates to Sartre, with a mysterious philosopher, while receiving letters addressed to another girl. Who is Hilde? And why does her mail keep turning up? To unravel this riddle, Sophie must use the philosophy she is learning—but the truth turns out to be far more complicated than she could have imagined.

NEW YORK TIMES BEST HISTORICAL FICTION OF 2020 "Only Katy Simpson Smith could have written a novel of such elegance, emotional power, and grace. The Everlasting, a quadruple love story spanning two millennia, is no less than the story of love itself—its frustrations and thrills, its blunders and transcendent glories. Meraviglioso."—Nathaniel Rich, author of King Zeno From a supremely talented author comes this brilliant and inventive literary work of historical fiction, set in Rome in four different centuries, that explores love in all its various incarnations and ponders elemental questions of good and evil, obedience and free will that connect four unforgettable lives . Spanning two thousand years, The Everlasting follows four characters whose struggles resonate across the centuries: an early Christian child martyr; a medieval monk on crypt duty in a church; a Medici princess of Moorish descent; and a contemporary field biologist conducting an illicit affair. Outsiders to a city layered and dense with history, this quartet separated by time grapple with the physicality of bodies, the necessity for sacrifice, and the power of love to sustain and challenge faith. Their small rebellions are witnessed and provoked by an omniscient, time-traveling Satan who, though incorporeal, nonetheless suffers from a heart in search of repair. As their dramas unfold amid the brick, marble, and ghosts of Rome, they each must decide what it means to be good. Twelve-year old Prisca defiles the scrolls of her father’s library. Felix, a holy man, watches his friend’s body decay and is reminded of the first boy he loved passionately. Giulia de’ Medici, a beauty with dark skin and limitless wealth, wants to deliver herself from her unborn child. Tom, an American biologist studying the lives of the smallest creatures, cannot pinpoint when his own marriage began to die. As each of these conflicted people struggles with forces they cannot control, their circumstances raise a profound and timeless question at the heart of faith: What is our duty to each other, and what will God forgive? Moving back through time from today (The Wilderness) to the Renaissance (The City) to the Middle Ages (The Grave) and finally to Rome under Marcus Aurelius (The Paradise), Tom, Guilia, Felix, and Prisca search and suffer for love in the eternal city, made vivid and familiar as they reappear in each century.