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Posts Tagged ‘learning’

I know from experience, and from talking with other business colleagues that we are all serious about improving their business, sometimes just don't have the time to read and take courses.

And this is right where audio books have now started to play an incredible important role in our lives.

As a business person, you can now use the amazing value inherent in listening to audio books. Another huge benefit of audio books is that you never have to worry again about not having the time to finish, or having the will power to actually turn the pages of a book.

With an audio book you can enjoy the same value of any business book when preparing to go to work in the morning, when commuting to and fro work, etc.

If you are at loose for the specific business audio books to go for, below are 5 of some of the best that any business person shouldn’t do without listening to:

1. How to win friends and influence people – by Dale Carnegie

I don't know about you, but the most important aspect of my business is PEOPLE. For almost every endeavor of life, especially business, we need people to keep the business going.

Not just the people that bring us sales, but also the people that make the sales possible. To ensure that we all succeed at this, we need to know "how to win friends and influence people".

That's why this incredible book by Dale Carnegie is a "must have" for any person in business.

This audio book contains such an enormous wealth of information that you will not only learn how to influence people in your workplace, in effect turning around more sales, you will also learn how to win over your friends and staff.

With audiobooks, you can kill two birds with 1 stone - listen to and audio book both enjoying and learning at the same time - whilst you are travelling from home to the office and back.

2. It’s not the big that eat the small… it’s the fast that eat the slow – by Jason Jennings and Laurence Haughton

In today's business, one of the single most common words that we need to embrace is "CHANGE". In a constantly "updated" world, we need to be ready to embrace and implement changes to our businesses.

This audio book by Jason Jennings and Laurence Haughton, provides you with all the information on how to keep your company afloat, despite the ever-changing nature of business today.

Asserting that the fastest organizations in the world today will be those that will thrive, this audio book shows you how to make your company or business among these fastest, using the power of commerce, deployment of resources and good management of people.

3. Management Challenges for the 21st Century – by Peter F. Drucker

When it comes to business management and leadership, one name stands tall in any gathering of experts. That name is Peter F. Drucker.

Being an expert of the industry and writing about it for a staggering 80 years, Drucker is not just talking from theory. He has been there and done that, when it comes to business and management.

This audiobook title explores in depth how 21st century management challenges can be handled by business professionals.

4. Jack: Straight from the Gut – by Jack Welch

There's no denying the fact that Jack Welch is one of the world's most successful CEOs ever.

This audiobook will follow Jack Welch's steps through his career to where he is today, one of the most successful businessmen ever.

5. Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap – by Jim Collins

You can't argue with the fact that "without the techniques and strategies, no company or business can excel beyond a few days, weeks or even months".

Companies that have been around for years and years, are still around for a reason, they know what to do, and they have done it right.

The author has taken quite some time to collate the results from his extensive studies of companies who have had business success for many, many years - looking into what they are doing so right, that their counterparts are not.

The power of the information contained within this business audio book can help any business person to succeed.

I can guarantee that the five audio books I have selected (and have listened to in-depth myself) can really boost both your career and your business if you are willing to apply what you learn from them.

An excellent source that I have found for audio book downloads is Spoken Network. You can find them at:

www.spokennetwork.com?cam=ama0027

Of course, I was taught French during my school days but never took it seriously. As far as I was concerned, it wasn't important to be and would never be.

After all, English was more popular and I could get along anywhere in the world with my knowledge of English language, right?

How dead wrong I was.

I realized my mistake when I was sent to France for an assignment. I was like a real fish out of water.

Literally everywhere I went, restaurants, bars, shops, galleries, offices, transport - everyone was speaking French. Locating someone who could speak English was like locating someone in England who could speak Chinese.

Whew, I really felt lost.

That experience nonetheless, I still made a silent resolve not to learn the language, since I wasn't going to be coming back to France.

But on getting back home, my boss told me I would be going back in 3 months. Not only that, but this time I would be staying for much longer than the last time.

I argued, begged and pleaded, but she was having none of it.

Right that second I made the decision to make sure I had learned French before those three short months were over.

Being a lover of audio books, I went right ahead and bought some “Teach yourself French” foreign language audio books which I played while preparing for work in the morning, while exercising, during my commute to and from work and any other time when my hands were busy but my mind was free.

To be honest, I didn't really pay too much attention to the "Teach yourself French" lessons in the beginning, because it was all very strange to me.

But as time went on, it all started to make sense. What really helped was the translations to English for any word spoken in French.

It definitely confirmed the theory I had read some time ago about how powerful listening can really be. No wonder God gave us 2 ears and just one mouth. This means just listening is powerful enough to learn virtually any language.

You wouldn't believe it but gradually I picked up and was able to speak some amount of French just 6 weeks after.

Can you just imagine the look on my superior's face, when I spoke to her completely in French without even mixing it a little with English!

She couldn't believe it and asked me how I was able to do it. I told her - audio books!

My superior was so amazed and impressed that I had taken the time to learn the language, that she promoted me to the head of delegation for the next trip we had planned to France. I was going to represent our entire company.

She made sure every other member of my team got their foreign language audio books and did exactly what I had done.

When I eventually got back to France 3 months later, I was no longer "a fish out of water".

It was fantastic, and I was amazed that I had been able to do this without hiring a tutor, going to college or night school, or even reading any French tutorial books.

All of this was possible within 3 months just listening to French audio book lessons.

Do you know what was most intriguing about this? I did this all in my "free" time. There were no extra committments of time needed from me, I just used the same time that I had wasted in the past.

Now, if I could do this within just three months, I am absolutely certain that anyone else can do it too.

I can honestly say that if there is any foreign language that you are itching to learn, do exactly as I did and you'll be amazed by the results in just three months, simply from the power of audio books.

There are several audio book versions of many books on learning foreign languages that you can get on the Internet.

You can start your search from SpokenNetwork.com directly or via the search engines. You just need to type in the phrase or title of the book that you are interested in, and you'll be given a whole host of results… within seconds.

www.spokennetwork.com?cam=ama0026

It's indeed incredible that not many people pay a great deal of attention to what gets into their minds.

The mind is such a massive part of determining the way you live your life.

You could achieve all of your dreams just by having a positive mind set.

Most of the highly successful people you see in the news today took a great deal of time to work on improving their minds.

You'll find that the most notorious people on the planet would fill their minds with a constant stream on negative thoughts. It's this kind of attitude that will lead to a person thinking that they do not want to achieve anything in life.

The question that obviously comes to play here is, are we born with positive or negative minds?

I will quickly and firmly say NO!

Our minds grow with us, as we put different types of information in to it. If we are constantly filling our minds with a flow of negative input there's no doubt that we will have our own negative thoughts and even actions.

So, if you want the opposite and creative thoughts, it is pertinent to always get the right kind of information into your mind.

The most common way to do this is by reading the right kinds of books.

Of course, as life has changed so much, hardly anyone has any time anymore, only a few people will still read books.

We mostly only have time to read the newspapers and magazines, and guess what? Most newspapers only end up giving us bad news that further increase our negative state of mind.

If you want to really get positive and helpful information, you need to read books that contain such information.

Thankfully with the advent and popularity of audio books, anyone can get the right information into his or her mind without having to “read”.

You can enjoy the benefits of audio books while exercising, commuting to and fro your work, etc.

For those who don't know exactly the audio books to go for, below are some of the 10 best audio books to improve your mind.

1. Build Your Self Esteem Author: Glenn Harrold Publisher: Diviniti Publishing

2. Awaken the Giant Within Author: Anthony Robbins Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio

3. Develop a Powerful Memory Author: Glenn Harrold Publisher: Diviniti Publishing

4. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People Author: Stephen R. Covey Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio

5. How to Win Friends & Influence People Author: Dale Carnegie Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio

6. Awaken the Giant Within Author: Anthony Robbins Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio

7. Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway Author: Susan Jeffers Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio

8. The Power is within You Author: Louise L. Hay Publisher: Hodder Headline Audio books

9. Creating Inner Peace and Calm Author: Glenn Harrold Publisher: Diviniti Publishing

10. Get Up and Do It! Publisher: BBC Books

Any or all of these audio books can be bought from some of the leading audio book stores on the Internet.

An amazing place that I have come across for audio books downloads is Spoken Network. You can find them at:

www.spokennetwork.com?cam=ama0022

When it comes to burning (or copying/writing) a downloadable audio book into CD, you must be sure that it isn’t for commercial purpose, but strictly for personal use. Violating this law is a really bad idea as it can get you into really serious copyright infringement problems.

Yes, the downloadable audio books are still under copyright, even after paying to download them.

The only instance where they are no longer under copyright is when the authors or translators have died over 70 years ago. There are also some publications that are made by the government that are not under copyright.

But the rule of "only for personal use" is still ultimate when it comes to burning any downloadable audio book into CD or any such formats.

You won't believe it, but there are even certain audio book publishers that don't allow their audio books to be copied into CD. Such audio book publishers will then choose to disable the ability to transfer the file onto a compact disk.

To be sure if your audio book publishers allow this, check it out before going ahead to buy it.

It would be terrible to buy a Audio book with the intention of burning it straight to CD but then finding that you are not permitted to do so.

Also, when it comes to burning audio books into CD, you might certainly need more than one CD for an audio book. For example, an audio book of about 10 hours can take you as many as 7 CDs to copy into, especially if you want to playback the CD with an MP3 player.

Saying that, These following instructions show you how to burn an audio book onto a compact disk

This guide has been written for use with Windows Media Player Version 10. If you have a previous version installed you can install the most up to date version from Microsoft's website. This is the URL - http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/download

First, the computer you want to use to burn the audio book into CD must be equipped with a recordable CD drive and CD-burning software.

In other words, it is this CD-burning software that can burn the audio book into the CD. And it is the recordable CD drive that can be used for this purpose.

2nd, open up the audio book and play in in Windows Media Player. You will need to make sure that you select 'Full Mode' when you are doing this, do not choose "Skin Mode".

3rd. you will now see a 'now playing' message to the right side of Windows Media Player. If this does not show up you can press "Restore the Video and Visualization Pane" button to display it.

Fourth, you can now click the "Library" tab. You will notice the “Start Burn” button displayed.

5th. Now it is time to actually put the blank CD into your CD drive.

6th. Now you need to Select 'Start Burn'. Your Windows Media Player will begin burning the audio book into the CD you have inserted.

Lastly, Most audio books will be larger than one CD, if your's is, Windows Media Player will ask you to insert a new CD. You can remove the one inside and insert another blank CD.

When the entire burning process is finished, it will display the status as "Complete".

An excellent source that I have found for audio book downloads is Spoken Network.

This is where you can get them:

www.spokennetwork.com?cam=ama0018

It’s really amazing that you can get the exact value listening to an audio book while doing your normal chores as you would reading it.

Certain experts even say information sinks in more when we are not paying direct attention to them.

But when did this audio book phenomenon really start? In other words, what is the past of audio books?

Audio books seem to be a brand new invention, right?

WRONG!

As audio books have been linked with MP3s, PDA and CDs (for eample) it seems that many people think that they are a new invention. But audio books started far before now.

In order for us to know just how long audio books have existed, we first need to know what audio books actually are.

Forget about any other jargon you have heard, audio books are simply books that are recorded to be heard, instead of read.

That being the case, such recordings of books in audio formats have been around for a very long time – far before now. To be completely specific, you could say that they have been around since for the last 50 years.

It could even be longer, if you include the Library of Congress recordings made especially for the American Foundation for the Blind and distributed free throughout the U.S.

However, according to Robin Whitten, the editor and founder of the only magazine which is dedicated solely to the audio book industry – Audiofile–http://www.AudioFileMagazine.com, Caedmon (now a subsidiary of HarperCollins Publishers) can be credited to have started the recordings of literature as far as 50 years ago.

Also, he said that Caedmon was only a small company way back then in New York, which began the process of recording the great authors and poets of the 1950s to audio. Specifically, he said one of the earliest recordings were by greats such as Dylan Thomas, T.S. Eliot, Fitzgerald and Robert Frost.

What happened then was that they were simply recorded while doing their own works and made as vinyl records.

But the early recording made here could be argued to be the very first collection of audio books ever made.

However, the transition of these book recordings into audiocassette tapes didn’t happen until the late 1970s up to the 1980s. From then on, it grew until audio books in tape format were accepted by everyone and sundry.

For whatever reason however, the audio book craze did not hit off until the early nineties.

And now that we have changed from cassette tapes to compact disks even more people have an interest in audio books.

With the explosion of the world wide web and everything that comes with it, audio books have now gone from vinyl records, tapes and CDs into downloadable digital formats. These can be listened to in many different ways, on a desktop PC, laptop, MP3 player etc.

If you still want to ‘go back through time’ the original book recordings that began this audio book industy are available.

Impossible?

Not really.

You can still buy some of the early fifties analog recording made by Caedmon on the world wide web.

For instance, I searched on the world wide web and came across the actual recording of “The Lord of the Rings” as read by J.R.R. Tolken.

You can find that classic you have always dreamt of in audio book format if you search hard enough on the Internet.

A really good place for audio book downloads is Spoken Network. You can find them at:

www.spokennetwork.com?cam=ama0016

Something really great about audio books is you have many options when it comes to listening to them.

For those of us who like to be given lots of options for doing certain things instead of being forced to adapt to just one choice, you definitely have lots of options for listening to your audio book.

If you find your self preferring sitting in your favorite chair, or sitting at your desk then cassette tape if the option for you.

But if you have a desktop or laptop computer, you might prefer listening to your audio book from it.

Most PCs have Digital Audio Players for playing audio books. It's not very likely but, if your personal computer does not have any, you can still download them for free on the Internet. The best two free digital audio players that you can download are:

- RealOne Player: This can be downloaded free of charger here; http://www.Real.com

- Windows Media Player: This is available for download free of charge on their website - http://www.Microsoft.com

But if you would rather listen to your audio book while on a walk, running, on the way to work, going around the house, going around the shops (and many more) then a portable audio player is the right way to go, preferably with an earphone.

With the ever expanding market of portable audio playback devices, it goes to show that more and more people are now using them, because of the wonderful benefits they provide.

The most common form of these portable audio playback devices are the normal audio CD players or CD-ROM devices. You can carry these around with you while you do your household chores, exercise, jog or commute to and fro work.

The more advanced form of these portable audio playback devices for playing audio books, especially those for listening to downloadable audio books, include:

— Audio-ready PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants). Some of these PDAs include Casio CASSIOPEIA and Compaq iPAQ. Both can be pretty expensive, costing as much as about $500 for the Compaq iPAQ and about $400 for the Casio CASSIOPEIA.

— Compatible Portable Audio Players. Some of these include the Creative’s NOMAD Jukebox 3 and the SONICblue’s Rio 900. These can be much less expensive than PDAs. For instance, you could purchase the SONIC blue's Rio 900 for around $250 from websites like Sonicblue.com

Finally, like I said in the start of this article, whatever tool you decide to use in listening to your audio books will depend largely on “how” you prefer listening to your audio books.

For example, the 'young and restless' teenagers can't be without the PDAs. I bet you wouldn't too if you were their age, right? The 'good old' cassette tape could not be a better format for the "aged and rusty", who would rather just be sat on their favorite sofa!

A really good place that I have come across to download audio books is Spoken Network. You can get these at:

www.spokennetwork.com?cam=ama0017

There’s no denying what a perfect combination audio book technology and the introduction of MP3 portable players have become.

You now have options of listening to your audio book, not just on cassette tape players, CD players, and your computer, but also on your MP3 player.

So, if you are one that would rather listen to your audio book on MP3 player, rather than your PC, you can.

Below you will find the specific help you require to get this working.

NOTE- This guide is for Windows Media Player Version 10. If you are using an older version, you can download the latest version from Microsoft's website.

Here's the exact link - http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/download

First, the audio book needs to be on you PC, the PC you wish to use to make the transfer. If it is originally in a CD, you need to copy it from the CD into your computer.

Second, you need to find the USB cable that came with the MP3 player as all MP3 players use different cables. Once you have this cable you need to connect the MP3 player to your PC.

As soon as you plug in the USB cable to both your computer and MP3 player, your computer will indicate that it has found a new piece of hardware. If you are not indicated about this then there may be something wrong. Just disconnect the cable and then reconnect.

Third, open your Windows Media Player and open the audio book you want to copy. This will open the audio book in the main display area of Windows Media Player.

Fourth, add the audio book to the Sync List of your Windows Media Player.

Fifth,. This will bring a pull-down arrow on the left-side box of the Sync tab. Make sure you select the labeled "Removable Disk (E)" as the source where the audio book will be copied to.

Sixth, a display with an option will appear, "start sync". Go ahead and click on this option. When this is completed, Windows Media Player will show a message, a message telling you that it is transferring the audio book files to your MP3 player as "Removable Disk (E)".

Seventh, as soon as the sync (or copying) is complete, you can verify if it is in your MP3 player.

One last note, make sure you select the hardware icon (found in the system tray - near the clock) to ""safely remove hardware"". Be sure that you do not disconnect before you get the "it is now safe to remove the hardware" message. NOTE if you do not do this before you disconnect can cause errors on both your PC and MP3 player.

When all of this is done, you can then try to playback the audio book from your MP3 player. After you have gone through the above steps your audio books should appear on you MP3 player.

If however you find you have a previous version of Windows Media Player, you can still apply the exact steps above. The only major difference is that instead of having "sync", you will have "copy". You can click on it and follow the same steps above to have your audio book copied to your MP3 player.

An excellent source that I have found for audio book downloads is

Spoken Network. You can find them at:

www.spokennetwork.com?cam=ama0017

If you’d like learn chinese, you are about to under a very challenging proposition. This language consists of many complex characters that represent both a sound and meaning. It will take a lot of effort on your part to properly learn all various aspects of the chinese language.

The Chinese language is written in Chinese characters or hanzi. In order to learn modern Chinese you will need to commit about 5000 hanzi to memory. This is going to be a very challenging task for someone who’s unfamiliar with a language such as this.

While learning Chinese characters, keep in mind that they are used to represent actual physical things and abject concepts. If you are able to learn what each component represents and get that image in your head, you will eventually build up in the library of the components of each character. With your mental images, you will need attach the meanings and the pronunciations of each words as this will make your learning easier down the road.

There are many books out on the market that will allow you to make this process easier. Some of those books we use illustrations and stories with Chinese characters explain meaning and create a fun environment for you to learn about the language ,also how to properly speak and write it.

You may also want to take a class in writing Chinese characters. This will ensure that you do them correctly and make you much more familiar with the art form. If you do that, you can then make up cue cards for yourself which you can study off of during some idle time. As you do this you are going to start to notice some recurring themes in the characters in your association will begin to come together. The more characters you learn, the easier it is to expand your library of characters.

You’re probably wondering how do I know all those things. Well, like I said, there are plenty of places online for Learning Chinese. In my signature is a review of what I feel is the best online course going. I believe you will find it very useful.

I’ve never been an A student in history class but just an average one who would sit down and listen to my professor’s litany and find myself absorbing Colonial Period, Civil War Era, World War II, Cold War and a lot of other significant happenings in the olden times in one sitting. Although looking at such timelines can be a little interesting, I can’t grasp all the info being forced into my brain. And so, the rest of my history in history class became one dull 60-minute agony for more or less two years of my life. I didn’t like learning about the holocaust timeline.

That one afternoon changed the whole way I thought about history. Although it was an uneventful day with loads of paper works and readings to accomplish, our professor perhaps came that day with something interesting enough to tickle and challenge our brain cells. “Do you think history repeat itself”? My teacher questioned us expecting the normal quiet that follows. As anticipated, we did give the professor a blank stare but this time a more intent look on my face, our faces (at least I know all of us had the same reaction). It was then I thought to myself maybe history really does repeat itself? I took a look at the russian revolution timeline and saw a pattern, it was eerily similar to that of the french revolution timeline.

Our professor had given us points to ponder. The social issues we discussed in history class over the last several weeks brought us to our answers. He illustrated his point by referring to past presidents. Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States had been elected for Congress in the year 1846. Alternatively John F. Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States had his position in the Congress in the year 1946 exactly 100 years ago when Lincoln was elected. Those little facts do not discredit the parallels that can drawn between these two pats presidents. Abraham Lincoln was finally elected President in the year1860 which was again an approximate of 100 years when John F. Kennedy took the authority in the White House to sit as the newly elected President in 1960. Departing on only that fact, those two presidents both were big proponents of Civil rights and were both assassinated during their presidency.

I ask myself if everything that happened was just a coincidence? I’d like to believe so, but our history professor made us think even more, an in-depth analysis and scrutiny of the past events. He then asked the question once more, “Class, do you think history repeats itself”? I had an answer ingrained in my brain that history does not repeat itself. There may have some flukes of nature and happenstance in the lives of the two presidents that were parallel with each other, but I strongly believe that it was just a product of human’s ability to over generalize. That big of info really makes one think about how the past still can haunt the present, this repeating of mistakes shows us people’s susceptibility to repeating past mistakes.

I know I’ve made a point at that moment in my once boring history class. I saw my professor’s face lit up and that’s enough for me to know that my wild guess is acceptable and that he might as well believed in my viewpoint. What happened that day sparked a little bit of interest in the subject, and now I see that I’m just a small blip in history.