The Crash Course in Personal Development is an easy way to improve your personal skills fast. But it is far from a dry traditional course: as the author says: ‘be prepared to learn, but also be prepared to have fun’.

Personal development is a broad topic – this book might just as easily (though more clumsily) have been titled 'making the best of your life' or 'getting things the way you want them to be'. Time management, stress management and negotiation have all proved to be tightly interwoven topics. In each case, the important thing is to be clear just what it is you want to achieve (in life, in a negotiation), then take steps to maximize the extent to which you are in control.

There's no magic formula that will guarantee success in every endeavour, but by taking charge, by developing the skills and techniques that will enable you to have better control of your time, manage stress and negotiate better with others, you will ensure that your chances are the best they can be.

After exploring the key elements that make for effective time management, negotiation and stress reduction the course itself consists of a programme of 150 exercises and techniques to help you to decide what you want from life – and get it!  As with the companion books Crash Course in Creativity and Crash Course in Managing People, targeted reading ensures that the practical exercises are backed up with expert knowledge.

This dynamic personal development programme is split into 30 units, each designed to be completed in your spare time in one week. Under pressure to get results? A whole unit can be fitted in within a day. The final section provides a refresher that pulls together key learning points, ideas for further reading, and detailed tables that will help you to select the right techniques to use in specific situations.

Contains exercises from Instant Time Management, Instant Stress Management and Instant Negotiation, arranged into a structured course with a reading programme to back up the material, plus online links to expand your knowledge.