• Making Ideas Happen

  • Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality
  • By: Scott Belsky
  • Narrated by: Don Hagen
  • Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
  • 4.0 out of 5 stars (694 ratings)

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Making Ideas Happen  By  cover art

Making Ideas Happen

By: Scott Belsky
Narrated by: Don Hagen
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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)

What listeners say about Making Ideas Happen

Average customer ratings
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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Terrible Narrator

What would have made Making Ideas Happen better?

This audio book needed a much more energetic narrator

What was most disappointing about Scott Belsky’s story?

I have no idea if the story is any good, I stopped it after 5 minutes.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Don Hagen?

I'm unfortunately not familiar with many of the narrators available.

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Making Ideas Happen?

N/A

Any additional comments?

If you want to fall asleep, then this is the book for you. Definitely not suitable for one's commute.

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

The ultimate blueprint for all creative people

This book is a must read for anyone that has good ideas and struggles to take action to make them happen. The book is very well researched I cannot emphasize this enough. It gives you plenty of insight into the lives of creative leaders who can follow through and how they motivate themselves to make their ideas a reality.

You are guaranteed to understand in plain terms why so far you have been unable to execute your ideas and what to do about it in more ways than one. The author gives you the ultimate blueprint you need to focus, stay motivated and realize your ideas. I have to agree that the narration is a bit monotonous but don't let that hinder you from getting this book, the content is brilliant!

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Absolutely awful

I actually can't write a review of the actual contents of this book because the computer reading it was so f***ing annoying that I just couldn't take it. I listen for at least 2 hours and got nothing out of it because the inflections, emphasis and lilt of the voice is just wrong enough that I found myself trying to interpret what it was trying to say and once you start concentrating on the details like this, the message is lost. It droned in my ear in a tone akin to fingernails on a black board and I found myself repeating a new manta ... 'you gotta be kidding me! you gotta be kidding me!'

All kidding aside, this reading is bad, really bad. So much so that I honestly believe it verges on fraudulent. There should be a warning somewhere stating "THIS BOOK IS NOT READ BY A HUMAN". This was the first, and last book I'll buy from Audible until I see warnings like that because I don't want to take a chance and waste my money on another book as horrible as this one.

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Great book. Great plan. Needs more Belsky.

The content however CANNOT be matched. If you are a creative who cares about realizing your ideas, this book is a must have. Totally a great plan.

I agree with the others. This book would be more successful if another voice talent did it. Mr. Hagen is more of a fiction reader and, unfortunately, did not capture the energy Mr. Belsky created in his tome. Wish Scott would have read it himself. Could have been a more valuable listen to me.

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Current, Informative and Inspirational

I found the topics discussed and strategies very informative and inspirational. Nice blend of examples and action steps to applying these principles in your own life. Effective both professionally and personally - work-life balance.

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

Avoid this audio Advertising for his Action Method

This book did not deliver on its title. Over half the book was advertising on his Action Method for getting organized. If you wanted to understand the Action Method I would recommend this book. Otherwise, it offered nothing new in how to make ideas happen.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

One of the best books I have read in a long time

This book not only makes you understand that ideas are common among the creativee but it gives you a process to get you to move forward. You no longer do you have to feel that your ideas will never go anywhere. Here is your blueprint to getting things really done.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

The voice on this did not bother me at all

I have read the reviews on this title, and I must say that I disagree to the critic voices of the reader. I found the performance of the reader 100%. I have listened to many, many audiobooks, and I very rarely get disturbed by the reader of the content. Getting absorbed in the content is so much more interesting than trying to find faults with the readers performance. This book is great! The quality of the audio and the performance of the reader is as good as one expect from Audible. Perfect.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Misleading

This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

Anyone who wants to learn about different ways of making todo lists

What could Scott Belsky have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

I don't know where to begin. All i heard after 3 hours was managing a todo list. It would have been acceptable to me if he talked about todo lists for half an hour. But it just goes on and on. There's gotta be more to making visions come to reality than managing a todo list.

What do you think the narrator could have done better?

I don't have any issue with the narrator

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Just felt like I wasted a precious audible credit :(

Any additional comments?

take it from me folks, keep a todo list, and your vision will come to reality. Now listen to something else :)

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Well Read

I read a number of reviews complaining about the quality of the narration. It kept me from purchasing this book for a while but finally gave in.
I found the narration a perfect speed and tone and easy to listen to. I don't know where the negative comments have come from unless it's been re-recorded and re-posted.
This book is full of very useful information from start to finish. I highly recommend it.

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3 people found this helpful