QwikSmarts®

New Program Helps Schools/Colleges Get Materials at No Cost

In the seventeen years since our first newsletter for students was published, we've witnessed a sad decline in the funds allocated to career centers and job counseling at many colleges and universities. Not everyone is in dire straights, but students everywhere still need all the help they can get from their schools.

To help all the schools that want our qwik-reading career and life skill resources for their students, and particularly their graduating classes, Real Solutions Press has created the Find-Us-a-Sponsor program. It's really quite easy. The school only needs to do three simple things:

1. send a blank email to us to receive download instructions immediately;  
2. fill out the form, indicating which materials you would like to receive, sign it and fax it to us. You'll see that the Distribution Commitment states that your school will deliver the materials directly into your students' and/or grads' hands or campus mailboxes (rather than setting them out in a public place in the hopes that some will be picked up by passersby), then
3. when the resources arrive, deliver them to your students as agreed.

That's it! We do all the hard work. Once we have your 'order', we'll search for a sponsor to foot the bill for those materials...often a local bank or restaurant, which will include a special offer or coupons inside the book. It's a terrific win-win...win situation!

Of course, if your school prefers to pay for materials in order to secure a guaranteed delivery date, just give us a call at (303)604-6402 for information on educational pricing discounts.

Calling all Entrepreneurs!

What advice would YOU give to young entrepreneurs just starting out? Think back to the day that lightbulb went off over your head and you knew you had a great business idea. Chances are, you didn’t know everything you needed to know to set up, run, and grow your business. Many young people today are turning away from the traditional job hunt after college and instead are pursuing their entrepreneurial dreams.

Now is the time…and this is the place…for you to pass along your hard-earned knowledge to give a leg up to tomorrow’s business owners. They can read books on all these subjects, but it’s the golden nuggets of your experience that will propel them along the road to entrepreneurial success faster than all the theory in the world.

Try to keep your advice short and sweet—just enough detail so our young readers can grab the tips they need and run with them. Any topic is fair game: analyzing ideas for feasibility, researching markets, protecting intellectual property, raising capital, developing a business plan, assembling a great team, hiring and firing, manufacturing, advertising, managing funds, you name it…someone needs your insights!

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Do you want to reap some national (and international) exposure for your business savvy? Consider submitting a story about how you discovered a solution to a business problem or concern for possible publication in the new book, The Smartest Thing I Ever Did…® in Business  or The Smartest Thing We Ever Did…as a Husband-Wife Business Team,  or any of the other dozen titles in this exciting new book series by Real Solutions Press LLC. The contributor of each published story receives a 100-word bio in the book to talk about who they are and what they do, and may include a URL or other contact information. You can help others with your wisdom while gaining the equivalent of thousands of dollars of advertising for your business, gratis. Featured Contributor and Co-Author opportunities are also available.

See www.TheSmartestThingIEverDid.com for more details and to post your stories right now!

What people are saying about our book for grads!

Our new book, Grads: Take Charge, was first published way back in 1995 under the name Success in the 'Real World.' Since that time, we've updated, upgraded, and expanded it.

Here's what people were saying about the book back then...just imagine how valuable the new-and-improved edition is today!

"Success in the 'Real World' should be required reading for anyone who is preparing to take a place in today's turbulent business world. Why would anyone consider entering the workforce without it? It would be like showing up for a gunfight with a peashooter! I recommend it for anybody who is serious about their future and their career."

C. Allen Powell, Co-founder/Executive Director,
National Technical Honor Society and
Founder/CEO, Society for Excellence in Business and Industry

 

"Success in the 'Real World'  belongs in the briefcase or desk drawer of every new graduate!"  

Arnold Sanow, The Business Source, Inc., Co-author, Marketing Bootcamp

 

"In thinking about the time and effort I've put into pursuing my goals, I wish Success in the 'Real World'  had been around during my college years. It is 'must reading' for students, recent graduates, anyone looking to change jobs or make a career change, parents, guidance counselors, and professors seeking to link functional education with practical application."   

Edward R. Johnson, VP Human Resources, DeVilbiss Healthcare, Inc.

 

"Success in the 'Real World' provides excellent advice in a user-friendly language. Not only is it easy to read, it is filled with helpful hints for dealing with important issues such as office politics, workforce diversity, unemployment, and managing finances. Fully meets its objectives!"  

Leslie Shields, Professor, Howard University School of Business;
co-author, Work, Sister, Work

 

"Success in the 'Real World' is coming out at just the right time for me to make the scary leap into the 'real world.' It will be in my briefcase at all times."  

Rachel Hall, Geneva College, Class of 1995

 

"Success in the 'Real World'  covers the gamut from careers to cooking. Imagine! Cliff's Notes® about life!"  

Elsa P. Skaggs, Educational and Professional Services Associates

 

To get a taste of what this exciting and valuable new book is about, request your free electronic copy of our 14-page QwikSmarts® Special Report for the Class of 2008 by emailing us at Report@QwikSmarts.com.

What advice would YOU give to the Class of 2008?

Do you remember what it was like when you graduated from college or high school, full of excitement for having that milestone behind you but a bit scared and confused as you realized that you were not as prepared as you could have been for ‘real life’? Whether you’ve been out of school for a year, a decade, or what seems like a lifetime, you’ve discovered little ‘tricks’ and insightful tidbits that you wish you had known when you were stepping off that graduation stage.

Now is the time and this is the place for you to pass on that valuable knowledge so you can help today’s grads sidestep the School of Hard Knocks!

Click on Comments at the end of this post to see what wisdom others have posted and to post your own 'golden nugget' for the Class of 2008.

Try to keep your advice short and sweet—just enough detail so our young readers can grab the tips they need and run with them. Any topic is fair game: job hunting, on-the-job performance, budgeting, choosing a career path, dealing with roommates, handling relationships, cooking for one, moving far from family, handling new household responsibilities, you name it…someone needs your insights!

FREE QwikSmarts® Special Report for the Class of 2008!

The Class of 2008 is just discovering what a tough world it is that they’ve graduated into. It’s time to start juggling work, relationships, independent living, maybe even more schooling. So we’ve just made available a QwikSmarts® Special Report for this year’s grads—a qwik look at the transition from school to the ‘real world’ of work and independent living, with valuable tips to succeed on all fronts.

Just email us to request your Special Report and its savvy advice will be on its way to you as a PDF email attachment. And be sure to put RealSolutionsPress.com on your white list so your ticket to career and life success won’t get caught up in your spam filter!

This QwikSmarts® Special Report will be available soon as an audiobook. In your email, please let us know if you would like the ebook, the audiobook, or both!

QwikSmarts® Helps with Rainforest Re-forestation

Going green and being environmentally conscious is all the rage these days. To help limit the number of trees we create demand for, we are making all QwikSmarts® titles available in electronic format at www.Shop.QwikSmarts.com. But we also get lots of orders for printed versions of our books, booklets, and cards—usually in large quantities. To do our green part, Real Solutions Press (the publishers of QwikSmarts®) is dedicated to helping with special reforestation projects by making donations to our favorite green business, TreeBanking, Inc.

New Book released for the Class of 2008!

College students have been reading books for years—the last thing they want to look at now is a bunch more of them, filled with paragraph after paragraph, chapter after chapter, of advice on how to find a job, manage money, or find an apartment.

The new Complete QwikSmarts® for Grads covers everything from figuring out which career path to follow after college, finding a job, writing a resume, and performing on the job to managing money, handling everyday legal matters, cooking, and everything else involved in that important transition from school to the ‘real world’ of work and independent living.

No more endless hours reading huge books with a highlighter in your hand to mark those few helpful tips or savvy advice you stumble across every few pages. Like all QwikSmarts® publications, this book is a compilation of only the most valuable information available, presented in its jam-packed, qwik-reading format. It’s like having summaries of the best career development and money management books at your fingertips along with cooking, legal, time management, household organization books, and so much more.

This indispensible new book is now available in an instant-download PDF format at a hugely reduced price for the Class of 2008.  Visit www.Shop.QwikSmarts.com to get your instant ticket to career and life success right now!

So…what are QwikSmarts®, anyway?

Everybody wants to feel ‘smart’ when they’re headed into a new situation, don’t they? But who has the time to read huge books or spend hours surfing around on the Internet to find the information they need to be confident in that new situation? No one we know! Life today moves too quickly. That’s why we created QwikSmarts®—to provide maximum information in minimum time™.

What you see in a QwikSmarts® is basically a qwik summary of the best advice available, in the easiest and fastest format possible: bullets. You won’t get a bunch of theory or long, drawn-out stories about why you should do certain things to improve your financial life or your career or your parenting—you get the qwik-and-dirty—‘do this’, ‘don’t do that’, ‘try this’—that you can apply immediately to your life and see results. If you have the time, the tips you find in QwikSmarts® provide the perfect jumping-off point for more in-depth research when needed.

Why Bullets?

Life today moves fast…really fast. Few people have the luxury of time to curl up with a nice 300-page career development or money management book in the hopes of finding a few helpful tips they can implement immediately to improve their lives. What people really want and need is savvy advice…fast. QwikSmarts® gives it to them!

Formats to Fit Any Application

QwikSmarts® come in lots of different formats. We’ve got books and booklets, but they’re like no other you’ve seen before. They cover a wide variety of topics in our unique, bulleted format so you get the equivalent of all the ‘meat’ from a shelf full of how-to or self-improvement books in a small, qwik-reading format. When you want the best tips and most savvy advice on a particular topic or for a specific situation, you’ll find it in seconds in any of our QwikSmarts® books or tips booklets.

We’ve also got information cards and smaller tips cards, which make taking the best advice available with you in your purse or briefcase super-easy. Want a little cheatsheet of interviewing skills to refer to right before you’re back to the office? Or maybe you need to brush up on some negotiating tips before walking onto the used car lot. Or perhaps you want to keep a list of on-the-job tips handy to keep you on track for that promotion at work. That’s what QwikSmarts® cards are all about—giving you the information you need to be confident and successful, in a small, handy format.

Take a look at the right-hand column for details on the many ways you can use QwikSmarts® to boost your performance!