Why am I passionate about this?

Having begun my career in publishing, I worked for many years as a management consultant and trainer; alongside that, I have written and published many books offering advice on management, marketing, and job skills, like the time management book shown above, a bestseller now in its sixth edition. I have always thought management often fails by overlooking the importance of issues rather than finding things difficult; I hope my business writing helps identify priorities and shows that the deployment of various techniques and skills can be manageable–and useful.


I wrote

Successful Time Management: How to be Organized, Productive and Get Things Done

By Patrick Forsyth,

Book cover of Successful Time Management: How to be Organized, Productive and Get Things Done

What is my book about?

Whatever you do, the one thing we all have in common is time. In a competitive workplace, good time management…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies

Patrick Forsyth Why did I love this book?

I loved this and found it both interesting and helpful when it first appeared, and I reckon anyone could still benefit from reading it now. Based on research across a range of industry sectors identifies what makes a manager and an organization successful and provides guidance about how action should be taken.

What I like about it is that once noted, its ideas seem like common sense (they are!) but are factors so easily missed or shortchanged in the hurley-burley of corporate life. 

By Thomas J. Peters, Robert H. Waterman,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked In Search of Excellence as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The "Greatest Business Book of All Time" (Bloomsbury UK), In Search of Excellence has long been a must-have for the boardroom, business school, and bedside table.

Based on a study of forty-three of America's best-run companies from a diverse array of business sectors, In Search of Excellence describes eight basic principles of management -- action-stimulating, people-oriented, profit-maximizing practices -- that made these organizations successful.

Joining the HarperBusiness Essentials series, this phenomenal bestseller features a new Authors' Note, and reintroduces these vital principles in an accessible and practical way for today's management reader.


Book cover of The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done

Patrick Forsyth Why did I love this book?

This was perhaps the first bestselling business book and became a classic. Drucker coined many maxims, for example, saying that if you don’t know where you are going, any road will do. This is obvious, but how many flounder for lack of clear objectives?

Good, sound common sense is here that stands a new look in the present day, even if it comes from a time when legislation and political correctness made things more straightforward while leaving some current issues unaddressed.

By Peter F. Drucker,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Effective Executive as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

What makes an effective executive?

The measure of the executive, Peter F. Drucker reminds us, is the ability to "get the right things done." This usually involves doing what other people have overlooked as well as avoiding what is unproductive. Intelligence, imagination, and knowledge may all be wasted in an executive job without the acquired habits of mind that mold them into results.

Drucker identifies five practices essential to business effectiveness that can, and must, be learned: Managing time Choosing what to contribute to the organization Knowing where and how to mobilize strength for best effect Setting the right priorities…


Book cover of Killer Presentations: Power to the Imagination to Visualise Your Point - with PowerPoint

Patrick Forsyth Why did I love this book?

Presentation is a skill that, love it or hate it, is necessary for so many in the corporate world, and many books are setting out how to go about it. This is different, and I love it because it is based on research and highlights not only what makes for a ‘good’ presentation but also what makes one truly persuasive.

What is more, I like it because it does it in a way that embraces the modern ways of PowerPoint, pitches, and a competitive world—no ‘death by PowerPoint’ here; quite the reverse.

By Nicholas B. Oulton,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Killer Presentations as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This second edition has completely a new chapter on Web Presenting and links to several online seminars as well as a chapter on how to make your presentation content more memorable by using m62's Passive Mnemonic Processing techniques. The book illustrates its approach clearly and in detail: using real company examples and a series of 40 colour-images to show how such slides can work. Additionally, the book provides unique links to web sites where you can see more about this sort of presentation in action. Contents: Introduction, a new approach; Section one: Powerpoint; Section two: Messaging; Objective setting; Presentational intentions:…


Book cover of The New One Minute Manager

Patrick Forsyth Why did I love this book?

This is a short book, a revised version of another classic, and I like its focus on the fact that the only sensible definition of management is achieving results through other people.

This demands a constructive approach, constructive criticism, and development, helping people achieve excellent performance. It is sound common sense in an area so often overpowered and neglected in today’s hectic, time-poor world.

By Ken Blanchard, Spencer Johnson,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked The New One Minute Manager as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A revised edition of the timeless business classic—updated to help today’s readers succeed more quickly in a rapidly changing world.

For decades, The One Minute Manager® has helped millions achieve more successful professional and personal lives. While the principles it lays out are timeless, our world has changed drastically since the book’s publication. The exponential rise of technology, global flattening of markets, instant communication, and pressures on corporate workforces to do more with less—including resources, funding, and staff—have all revolutionized the world in which we live and work.

Now, Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson have updated The One Minute Manger…


Book cover of 100 Great Cost Cutting Ideas

Patrick Forsyth Why did I love this book?

I like this because you can easily pick from its one hundred separate sections. In a world where pressure on costs is so strident, it is easy to overlook ideas that might make a positive difference to any organization's financial status.

Many people in organizations suffer from what might be called a ‘numeracy shortfall’ and need some help in this area. This book is clear and understandable and could make the difference between profit and loss. Who would not like that?

By Anne Hawkins,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked 100 Great Cost Cutting Ideas as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Every company is now in the business of reducing costs wherever and whenever they can. No business owner or manager can avoid cost-cutting if they are to succeed, or indeed survive.

This book contains 100 great ideas to reduce and save costs in business organisations. Researched from leading companies around the world, each idea is described in a succinct way. You are then shown how to apply that idea to your own business situation. A simple formula which has the potential to reap great rewards.


Explore my book 😀

Successful Time Management: How to be Organized, Productive and Get Things Done

By Patrick Forsyth,

Book cover of Successful Time Management: How to be Organized, Productive and Get Things Done

What is my book about?

Whatever you do, the one thing we all have in common is time. In a competitive workplace, good time management can not only help you achieve results but also boost productivity and assist progress in your career. There is no magic formula, but many details help.

This book contains many suggestions to improve how you work and suggests that making such work practices a habit, something explained as perfectly possible, is the route to job and career success.

Book cover of In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies
Book cover of The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done
Book cover of Killer Presentations: Power to the Imagination to Visualise Your Point - with PowerPoint

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By K.B. Thorne,

Book cover of Bad Blood

K.B. Thorne Author Of Bad Blood

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve adored reading a good snarky first-person story since I first read Bloodlist, so long as the snark doesn’t go too far and become total unlikeable jerk… It can be a fine line! I hope I stay on the right side of it, but having read it enough and written in it for years with my Blood Rights Series, I feel qualified to say I’m a…snark connoisseur. (If you ask my family, this is how my own internal/life narrator speaks! My mother says that my character Dakota is me if I “said everything aloud that I think in my head.” She’s probably right, and I’m okay with that.)

K.B.'s book list on if first person snark is your style

What is my book about?

Bad Blood is paranormal suspense in First Person Snark, so if you like sarcastic, strong female characters set in a world where the preternatural is run amok (i.e., legal citizens in the United States), then this book and series are for you.

Follow Sadie Stanton–"poster girl for the preternatural"–as she deals with all sorts of messes and sets up her business while being a vampire in a new day...or night, really.

Bad Blood

By K.B. Thorne,

What is this book about?

VAMPIRES ARE PEOPLE TOO

I’m Sadie Stanton, and I don’t know why everyone makes such a big deal out of me. I’m just like everyone else—I’m trying to start a business, not spending much time on my social life, and dealing with an obnoxious roommate...

Oh, and being a vampire. There’s that. But it’s okay, because we’re all legal now.

But believe me, that doesn’t make life easy. In fact, it might be harder now than ever before, but I did it to myself… And now vampires are attacking people seemingly at random and not even trying to feed. Everyone…


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