I’ve always found the “For Dummies” books ironically satisfying. The titles require a self-deprecating and humble audience, yet the authors these “Dummies” hire are usually the best.
I’ve read Patrick McEnroe’s “Tennis for Dummies” having played some tennis and experienced some of the best tennis coaches (for my kids) in the central part of the U.S. It takes a real expert to make complex concepts easy to grasp. The kid brother may not have been as good a player as his brother, John, but he sure is articulate and practical.
Rather than grasping for straws today on a blog topic, I looked through my bookshelf and found “Small Business for Dummies” by Eric Tyson and Jim Schell. It reminded me how fun yet insightful these books are.
I decided that writing a book called “Dynamics GP for Dummies” would be a wonderful idea. I decided to google this title in the unlikely case that the book actually existed already. It did.
I looked into it on Amazon and noticed that, as usual, the author had great experience and the table of contents was practical and well-laid out.
I’ve always found that I learn so much more from books like this that encourage me to learn on my own than any other way.
For example, when I was 22 and had recently graduated from Penn State, I took a CPA exam review course that was all lecture and slides. It was all watching and listening-no actual doing.
Years later I took a different review course that came with a software program that made me take practice exams and that told why my answer was right or wrong. I passed it right away as soon as I got my hands on that program-without going to any of the lectures.
This is why hands-on training is better than lecture training and it is why a book that encourages you to think on your own and try things on your own can work better than “just doing your job” with the software as you were trained to do it (or not trained to do it).
Back to the book….the book has a section on “Nine Pregnant Woman in a Room for a Month.” Even if you are not a consultant trying to learn other people’s best tricks, this one has to peak your interest.
Other useful chapters are “Implementation Pitfalls”, Most Useful Features, Extending Dynamics GP with Modifications and Customizations, Safeguarding your Database, Analyzing Information through Inquiries Smartlists and Reports, of course Closing the Books, What GP does best, and Getting Started.
All of the most used modules have a chapter as well.
A link to the table of contents can be found here on Amazon in case you are interested.
Take a look at this book when you can-at least the table of contents. I’m going to order and read it.
Please comment if you’ve read the book already.
