Recommendations based on "Creativity and Problem Solving"

Most managers fail. Some 70% of employees say they are dissatisfied with their line manager. A shocking 50% are labelled as incompetent, a disappointment or a wrong hire by their co-workers. But, what do we expect when over half new managers are given no training when they are promoted? Becoming a manager isn't a progression; it's an entirely new job. Penguin Expert Series: Managing People is a manual for managers who want to succeed in their new job, motivate and direct their teams and establish a working culture where everyone wants to do their best work. The book condenses Simon Birkenhead's decades of experience working as a team leader. He reveals; what makes a good manager, highlights common pitfalls to avoid, presents his tried and tested 'four-lever framework.' With strategies to activate motivation in your team, set goals and expectations, provide feedback and coaching to building a high-performance culture, and plenty of examples from across industries, this is everything first-time managers need to succeed and be the boss that everyone wants to work for.

Apply psychology and behavioral science to web, UX, and graphic designBehavioral science leader and CEO at The Team W, Inc., Susan M. Weinschenk, provides a guide that every designer needs, combining real science and research with practical examples on everything from font size to online interactions. With this book you'll design more intuitive and engaging apps, software, websites and products that match the way people think, decide and behave.Here are some of the questions this book will answer: What grabs and holds attention? What makes memories stick? What motivates people? How does listening to music make people feel? How do you engineer a decision? What line length for text is best? Are some fonts better than others?We design to elicit responses from people. We want them to buy something, read more, or take action of some kind. Designing without understanding what makes people act the way they do is like exploring a new city without a map: results will be haphazard, confusing, and inefficient. Increase the effectiveness of your designs by using science-backed examples on human behavior."Every once in a while, a book comes along that is so well-written, researched, and designed that I just can't put it down. That's how good 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People is!"―Lynne Cooke, Clinical Assistant Professor at Arizona State University

Five years and more than 100,000 copies after it was first published, it's hard to imagine anyone working in Web design who hasn't read Steve Krug's "instant classic" on Web usability, but people are still discovering it every day. In this second edition, Steve adds three new chapters in the same style as the original: wry and entertaining, yet loaded with insights and practical advice for novice and veteran alike. Don't be surprised if it completely changes the way you think about Web design. Three New Chapters! Usability as common courtesy -- Why people really leave Web sites Web Accessibility, CSS, and you -- Making sites usable and accessible Help! My boss wants me to ______. -- Surviving executive design whims "I thought usability was the enemy of design until I read the first edition of this book. Don't Make Me Think! showed me how to put myself in the position of the person who uses my site. After reading it over a couple of hours and putting its ideas to work for the past five years, I can say it has done more to improve my abilities as a Web designer than any other book. In this second edition, Steve Krug adds essential ammunition for those whose bosses, clients, stakeholders, and marketing managers insist on doing the wrong thing. If you design, write, program, own, or manage Web sites, you must read this book." -- Jeffrey Zeldman, author of Designing with Web Standards

Refactoring is about improving the design of existing code. It is the process of changing a software system in such a way that it does not alter the external behavior of the code, yet improves its internal structure. With refactoring you can even take a bad design and rework it into a good one. This book offers a thorough discussion of the principles of refactoring, including where to spot opportunities for refactoring, and how to set up the required tests. There is also a catalog of more than 40 proven refactorings with details as to when and why to use the refactoring, step by step instructions for implementing it, and an example illustrating how it works The book is written using Java as its principle language, but the ideas are applicable to any OO language.

Building upon the success of best-sellers The Clean Coder and Clean Code, legendary software craftsman Robert C. "Uncle Bob" Martin shows how to bring greater professionalism and discipline to application architecture and design.   As with his other books, Martin's Clean Architecture doesn't merely present multiple choices and options, and say "use your best judgment": it tells you what choices to make, and why those choices are critical to your success. Martin offers direct, no-nonsense answers to key architecture and design questions like: What are the best high level structures for different kinds of applications, including web, database, thick-client, console, and embedded apps? What are the core principles of software architecture? What is the role of the architect, and what is he/she really trying to achieve? What are the core principles of software design? How do designs and architectures go wrong, and what can you do about it? What are the disciplines and practices of professional architects and designers? Clean Architecture is essential reading for every software architect, systems analyst, system designer, and software manager -- and for any programmer who aspires to these roles or is impacted by their work.

How to Write Code You're Proud of . . . Every Single Day". . . [A] timely and humble reminder of the ever-increasing complexity of our programmatic world and how we owe it to the legacy of humankind--and to ourselves--to practice ethical development. Take your time reading Clean Craftsmanship. . . . Keep this book on your go-to bookshelf. Let this book be your old friend--your Uncle Bob, your guide--as you make your way through this world with curiosity and courage."--From the Foreword by Stacia Heimgartner Viscardi, CST & Agile MentorIn Clean Craftsmanship, the legendary Robert C. Martin ("Uncle Bob") has written the principles that define the profession--and the craft--of software development. Uncle Bob brings together the disciplines, standards, and ethics you need to deliver robust, effective code and to be proud of all the software you write.Robert Martin, the best-selling author of Clean Code, provides a pragmatic, technical, and prescriptive guide to the foundational disciplines of software craftsmanship. He discusses standards, showing how the world's expectations of developers often differ from their own and helping you bring the two in sync. Bob concludes with the ethics of the programming profession, describing the fundamental promises all developers should make to their colleagues, their users, and, above all, themselves.With Uncle Bob's insights, all programmers and their managers can consistently deliver code that builds trust instead of undermining it--trust among users and throughout societies that depend on software for their survival.Moving towards the "north star" of true software craftsmanship: the state of knowing how to program wellPractical, specific guidance for applying five core disciplines: test-driven development, refactoring, simple design,collaborative programming, and acceptance testsHow developers and teams can promote productivity, quality, and courageThe true meaning of integrity and teamwork among programmers, and ten specific commitments every software professional should makeRegister your book for convenient access to the book's companion videos, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.

How to Reduce Code Complexity and Develop Software More Sustainably"Mark Seemann is well known for explaining complex concepts clearly and thoroughly. In this book he condenses his wide-ranging software development experience into a set of practical, pragmatic techniques for writing sustainable and human-friendly code. This book will be a must-read for every programmer."Scott Wlaschin, author of Domain Modeling Made FunctionalCode That Fits in Your Head offers indispensable, practical advice for writing code at a sustainable pace and controlling the complexity that causes projects to spin out of control. Reflecting decades of experience helping software teams succeed, Mark Seemann guides students from zero (no code) to deployed features and shows how to maintain a good cruising speed as they add functionality, address cross-cutting concerns, troubleshoot, and optimize. They'll find valuable ideas, practices, and processes for key issues ranging from checklists to teamwork, encapsulation to decomposition, API design to unit testing. Seemann illuminates his insights with code examples drawn from a complete sample project. Written in C#, they're designed to be clear and useful to anyone who uses any object-oriented language including Java , C++, and Python. To facilitate deeper exploration, all code and extensive commit messages are available for download.Choose mindsets and processes that work, and escape bad metaphors that don'tUse checklists to improve outcomes with skills already possessedGet past analysis paralysis by creating and deploying a vertical slice to an applicationCounteract forces that lead to code rot and unnecessary complexityMaster better techniques for changing code behaviorDiscover ways to solve code problems more quickly and effectivelyThink more productively about performance and securityRegister your book for convenient access to downloads, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.

A captivating blend of cutting-edge scientific evidence and real-world stories providing leaders and managers with proven and practical strategies and tools for navigating today's emotionally taxing workplace.Broad changes have dramatically disrupted our workplaces and increased the emotional demands on leaders everywhere. Leaders now must support their teams' mental health and burnout (while managing their own), build trust with and motivate a remote and diverse workforce, allay employee fears of obsolescence while driving the integration of new technologies like AI, and demonstrate bottomless sensitivity and compassion while still delivering results at a relentless pace. No wonder leaders are burning out. Emotional labor is a daily unrecognized burden leaders carry and can have significant costs for their health and performance over time.However, achieving high performance and fulfillment without compromising your well-being is possible, and Emotionally Charged shows you how. Dina Denham Smith and Alicia A. Grandey debunk myths and equip you to handle emotionally loaded work events, from preparing for high-stakes scenarios to managing curveballs and conflicts, supporting distressed employees, and recovering effectively after being drained at work.Blending real-world cases from leaders and evidence-based insights, Emotionally Charged will help all leaders--from front-line managers to C-Suite execs--manage the new work landscape. Anchored in the science of emotions, Emotionally Charged will equip you with practical strategies and tools to lead successfully and thrive in the new age of work.

Building on their breakthrough bestsellers Lean Software Development and Implementing Lean Software Development, Mary and Tom Poppendieck’s latest book shows software leaders and team members exactly how to drive high-value change throughout a software organization—and make it stick. They go far beyond generic implementation guidelines, demonstrating exactly how to make lean work in real projects, environments, and companies.The Poppendiecks organize this book around the crucial concept of frames, the unspoken mental constructs that shape our perspectives and control our behavior in ways we rarely notice. For software leaders and team members, some frames lead to long-term failure, while others offer a strong foundation for success. Drawing on decades of experience, the authors present twenty-four frames that offer a coherent, complete framework for leading lean software development. You’ll discover powerful new ways to act as competency leader, product champion, improvement mentor, front-line leader, and even visionary.Systems thinking: focusing on customers, bringing predictability to demand, and revamping policies that cause inefficiency Technical excellence: implementing low-dependency architectures, TDD, and evolutionary development processes, and promoting deeper developer expertise Reliable delivery: managing your biggest risks more effectively, and optimizing both workflow and schedules Relentless improvement: seeing problems, solving problems, sharing the knowledge Great people: finding and growing professionals with purpose, passion, persistence, and pride Aligned leaders: getting your entire leadership team on the same page From the world’s number one experts in Lean software development, Leading Lean Software Development will be indispensable to everyone who wants to transform the promise of lean into reality—in enterprise IT and software companies alike.

'Ridley is spot-on when it comes to the vital ingredients for success' Sir James Dyson Building on his bestseller The Rational Optimist, Matt Ridley chronicles the history of innovation, and how we need to change our thinking on the subject. Innovation is the main event of the modern age, the reason we experience both dramatic improvements in our living standards and unsettling changes in our society. It is innovation that will shape the twenty-first century. Yet innovation remains a mysterious process, poorly understood by policy makers and businessmen alike. Matt Ridley argues that we need to see innovation as an incremental, bottom-up, fortuitous process that happens as a direct result of the human habit of exchange, rather than an orderly, top-down process developing according to a plan. Innovation is crucially different from invention, because it is the turning of inventions into things of practical and affordable use to people. It speeds up in some sectors and slows down in others. It is always a collective, collaborative phenomenon, involving trial and error, not a matter of lonely genius. It still cannot be modelled properly by economists, but it can easily be discouraged by politicians. Far from there being too much innovation, we may be on the brink of an innovation famine. Ridley derives these and other lessons from the lively stories of scores of innovations - from steam engines to search engines - how they started and why they succeeded or failed.