Making Ideas Happen

Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality

By: Scott Belsky

Narrated by: Don Hagen

Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's summary

How the world's leading innovators push their ideas to fruition, time and time again. Edison famously said that genius is 1 percent inspiration, 99 percent perspiration. Ideas for new businesses, solutions to the world's problems, and artistic breakthroughs are common, but great execution is rare. According to Scott Belsky, the capacity to make ideas happen can be strengthened by anyone willing to build their organizational habits and harness the forces of community. That's why he founded Behance, a company that helps creative people and teams across industries develop these skills. Belsky has spent six years studying the habits of especially productive creative people and teams—the ones who make their ideas happen time and time again.

After interviewing hundreds of successful creatives, he has compiled their most powerful-and often counterintuitive-practices, such as:

• Generate ideas in moderation and act without conviction
• Reduce all projects to just three primary components
• Encourage fighting within your team
• Seek competition and share ideas liberally

In an increasingly flexible and entrepreneurial environment, creative minds have the opportunity (and responsibility) to solve and change industries—but they can only do that if they overcome the obstacles. While many of us obsess about discovering great new ideas, Belsky shows why it's better to develop the capacity to make ideas happen-a capacity that endures over time.

©2010 Scott Belsky (P)2010 Gildan Media Corp

Critic reviews

"If you care about your art, your job or your market, you really have no choice. This is strategy and tactics, concepts and how-to, all in one on a topic that's often overlooked." (Seth Godin, author of Linchpin)

"Ideas are easy. Implementation is hard. This audio book helps you with the hard part." (Guy Kawasaki, co-founder of Alltop and former chief evangelist of Apple)

Diversity is the key

This book did a great job of explaining how organizations can successfully innovate if you get the right mix of talent and viewpoints AND you create an environment where the differences are treated strengths.

One of the Best

In the past I though of many ideas that did not see the live. After listening to this book, I got answers to why. Well written and organized with real life example. Many thanks to the author and the narrator.

I fully recommend this book to creative people whom want their ideas to become a reality

Clear direction for the "idea happy' business owne

Would you consider the audio edition of Making Ideas Happen to be better than the print version?

Listening to teaching books to me is easier and help me learn better on the subject. This book does not feel like a study guide but more like a coaching session from a high powered business coach.

What did you like best about this story?

Well laid out to build ideas, author was good at the process of problem-why the problem- soluction -action steps

Which character – as performed by Don Hagen – was your favorite?

NA this is a teaching book

Any additional comments?

Great listen/read for anyone who wants to learn to put ideas to action.

Productivity and project management for creatives!

If you're a right-brained creative who struggles with productivity and project management, then you'll really get a lot out of this book!

Scott Belsky does not really break new ground with any of the concepts in this book, but he does put the popular ideas and techniques into strategies and techniques that work for creatives and creative teams.

Scott really identifies with the struggles that artists, designers, writers, etc. face with getting things done. He takes the concepts that you may have already heard about or learned from David Allen's "Getting Things Done" and makes them really work for this type of industry mindset.

I got so much out of the audiobook that I went out and purchased the physical book as well to use as a quick reference and reminder, which I refer to frequently when I start to feel overwhelmed. The "Action Method" introduced in the book is applicable not only in how I organize my projects and tasks, but also in how I organize my files and other resources.

Where David Allen's GTD leaves the productivity management concepts relatively broad, Scott Belsky fine tunes and sharpens those concepts for creative professionals in a very effective way!

Great Book good practical advice

A must read for all creative people. This should be taught in all creative schools

Solid book

When I create 10 or more bookmarks, it's a keeper. definitely worth a listen.

Loved the narrator

The book was very helpful and gave me insight into motivation. Interesting and I enjoyed the voice!

So many reasons to love this!

Good delivery. Very densely packed with a lot of good, clear, realistically actionable information that is business newbie friendly. I keep this one in heavy rotation, as it's the type of read where you'll hear something new differently every time around. It's one of those gifts that just keeps on giving!

get on rolling the ball

i pick this book by the title, not knowing really what was in it.
to my surprise i was infront of research about creativity and entrepreneurship all what i trully enjoy and love, the book is about how to get the ball rolling, and how to get things in action for creative people. a must read

boring voice reading

they chose a very boring reader. I was looking forward to hearing this book but the reader literally makes you want to go to sleep. I prefer to read the book myself