His first attack of gout came in 1869 at the age of 35 (mine at age 30). It became progressively worse so that “approximately one third of the last twenty-two years of his ministry was spent out of the Tabernacle pulpit, either suffering, or convalescing, or taking precautions against the return of the illness.” In a letter to a friend he wrote, “I thought a cobra had bitten me, and filled my veins with poison; but it was worse,-it was gout.” For over half his ministry Spurgeon dealt with ever increasingly recurrent pain in his joints that cut him down from the pulpit and from his labors again and again. The diseases (gout, rheumatism and Bright’s disease) finally took his life at age 57 while he was convalescing in Mentone, France.

When my own gout threatens to undo me, I turn to Spurgeon who points me towards Christ. I was reading Spurgeon this morning, and so enjoyed Packer’s introduction to him that I would share it with you all, and encourage you to get to know the Prince of Preachers yourself.

In C. H. Spurgeon’s own day he was not thought of as a scholarly man. Because he was a popular preacher, fulfilling a marvelous evangelistic and nurturing ministry to ordinary people; because his writings, too, were addressed to ordinary people rather than academics; because he was a Dissenter, belonging to a minority culture in Anglican-dominated England; because the stereotype of a Dissenter was of an uncultured boor, whose forthrightness betokened crudity of mind; because Spurgeon himself had never attended a university or theological college; and because he resisted supposedly enlightened and progressive trends (the acceptance of Darwinism and the fallibility of the Bible; the denial of penal atonement and the eternal punishment of the lost), he was often dismissed, even by admirers of his preaching, as a brash upstart for challenging the wisdom of the learned and as a myopic dinosaur for proffering the old paths.

Yet he was a bookworm from childhood, and a diligent student all his life. He was an amazingly rapid reader, with a photographic memory, virtually total recall, and as he put it “a shelf in my mind” for storing every fact with a view to it’s future use. Each week he would work his way through a number of books – major treatments of scientific, historical, and philosophical questions. He had 30,000 volumes of every kind (save fiction) in his personal library, and claimed to know the contents of them all. The stereotypes of Spurgeon as a brash ignoramus cannot be sustained either from his lifestyle or his words. His limped, thought-laden rhetoric came from a shrewd, mature, extremely well stocked mind.

– JI Packer, Psalms Volume II Introduction

90% of the information in this book was easily figured out by myself just simple messing around with the application. There were three distinct pieces of information that got me excited, and ultimately saved me enough time that I think I broke even.

If you are a complete novice to MS Office products or if you have no idea what XML is and how it might work, then this book might be good for you.

I tend to think that most of us are far enough advanced that we don’t need to be spoon fed the milk that this book provides. Ergo, I’m not recommending it.

ISBN #: 0-07-223127-0 

Recommended?: No

Every knowledge worker in modern organization is an “executive” if, by virtue of his position or knowledge, he is responsible for a contribution that materially affects the capacity of the organization to perform and obtain results.

While Mr. Drucker asserts that this work is not a textbook because “effectiveness, while capable of being learned, surely cannot be taught. Effectiveness is, after all, not a ‘subject’, but a self-discipline.” I would argue that he has done an effective job of teaching it.

Mr. Drucker rests his pillars on a foundation of five practices:

1. Time Management
2. Contribution of Effort
3. Making Strengths Productive
4. Prioritization
5. Effective Decisions

Of these five practices, ACES actively recruits and develops individuals with good Time Management skills, an understanding of Priorities and a willingness to make decisions under pressure. It isn’t difficult to see how the other two practices can be leveraged in any one in our organization.

One of the most unique element of this book is its forthright practicality. Mr. Drucker is not content to merely dabble in the realm of the theoretical but drives hard into applicable disciplines that can make in impact today. While I have read any number of books that proposed to cover the same topic, I can not think of one that I walked away from so convicted to change specific aspects of my work day.

I was also struck by Mr. Druckers reference to, and description of, knowledge workers. If he didn’t coin the phrase he certainly defines it by breathing a life into the two words that anyone in the space will immediately recognize as fact. By defining the knowledge worker, a.k.a. the executive, so well he clearly demonstrates what the individual can focus on in order to improve their effectiveness.

I highly recommend this book, and if you can stand my dog eared and highlighted paperback I would be more than willing to loan out my copy.

ISBN #: 978-0-06-083345-9 

Recommended?: Yes

I particularly like the fact that it covers “Project Fundamentals” (a.k.a. – Project Management 101) for the new users of the project. So, if this is your first Project and the first time you have used MS Project, you get a great Hands On walkthrough.

The later chapters to into slightly greater detail about the application and demonstrate some more in-depth functionality that our team doesn’t currently utilize – but it is great to know it is there and how to get to if you want to.

All in all I enjoyed the book, it was a fast read, and I think that it should be pre-requisite reading for everyone on our team!

Highly Recommended!

ISBN #: 0-7356-1958-1 

Recommended?: Yes

I found the book to be a refreshing breather from the more typical process, proces, process books that are currently found on the market. No if you know me, you must know that I am a process man at heart, so don’t go thinking that I have experianced a fundamental shift in perspective because of this book.

However, it certainly brings to light a number of the weaknesses inherent in the the process only mindframe and provides some insight on how to go about encouraging creativity within a process.

I suggest that anyone looking for a break from the more popular process management theories take a look at this and see if it doesn’t encourage you to temper your processes with just the right ammount of creative edge.

ISBN #: 0887309607 

Recommended?: Yes

That sums it up! Brendan Lynch suggested this book to me, and it has been a great help in enlightening me in the art of communicating statistics visually. I’ve learned any number of useful tips and guidelines for:

• When, where, and how to use charts
• when, where, and how to use graphs
• when, where, and how to use tables
• style guidelines for maximum effect
• how to determine the effectiveness of a given presentation
• and so much more

Additionally, the book is written such that it not only teaches you these things, but provides an easy to use reference for those times that you need to look up specifics.

Stephen Few, the author, present numerous “bad” examples, breaks them down and explains in detail why the example is bad, and then presents a “good” example in order demonstrate how it should be done. I must admit that in reading this book I was appalled to discover how many of the bad examples looked exactly like some chart, graph, or table that I have created and how few of the good examples looked like something I might create.

I am quite excited to revamp any number of my current reports and I’m actually looking forward to the opportunity to exercise my new found knowledge on future tasks. If you ever use these elements in reports or presentations I highly advise reading this book, even if you are “good” at it – it never hurts to improve!

ISBN #: 0-970601-99-9 

Recommended?: Yes

Other than covering all the things that a good manual should cover, and which most of the rest of you probably had fun figuring out for yourself, there isn’t much more that this book covers. That being said, I’m glad I picked it up and read it, and I think other iPhoners will feel the same way.

ISBN-10 #: 0-596-51374-7 

ISBN-13 #: 978-0-596-51374-0

Recommended?: Yes

The author (Steve Souders of Yahoo!) shares fourteen easy steps that any front-end web designer can take to optimize performance. He give a general nod to the fact that most people expect that the back-end is where all the optimization can and should take place, and goes on to demonstrate with stunning clarity that “In reality, for most web pages, less than 10-20% of the end user response time is spent getting the HTML Document from the web server to the browser.”

He provides hard numbers on tracking a Web Pages performance and will provide you with all the tools necessary in order for you to evaluate your own pages. As he states, “In any optimization effort, it’s critical to profile current performance to identify where you can achieve the greatest improvements.”

After convincing you of the fact that the front end needs to be tweaked to get the best performance, he goes on to propose 14 elegant rules for optimizing a page. Some seem relatively straight forward, others seem bizarre upon first glance, and some others seem downright contrary on first glance.

However, with a systematic ease he goes on to demonstrate the logic as well as the potential benefits associated with each one. You will find that not all are necessarily appropriate to all projects, but that you will want to print out the list of 14 rules and stick on the wall next to you so that you can ask yourself which are appropriate for the current project.

All in all, it was a very fast read, well organized, imminently applicable, and in some way’s eye opening. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and I believe that you will to.

ISBN-10 #: 0-596-52930-9

ISBN-13 #: 978-0-596-52930-7

Recommended?: Yes